ok heres's a seasonal off topic & 5 more days to go!

So what are you hoping Santa brings?

Any special plans for the holidays?

I apologize if this offends any of our friend not celebrating just curious. By the way Usil Happy Hanukah!

I am not interested in aquiring more personal possesions. What I really want is a year without turmoil and senseless killings. Please no natural disasters. Let the stock market go up and the sunshine come out! Just easy times without anger or grief. Is that too much to ask?

Calpitor,


Is this the OT thread for the week ?

Anyway I have to agree wiht JAL - there are no material possessions I need. Though if the bearded one feels thus disposed he could bring me a 3.2 Ghz Extreme PC :D I don't need it - but if he's buying .....:D

I would in contrast however superficial its viewed - wish all members of the armed forces be they American, Australian, British or whatever - a peaceful Christmas and safe return. They've stood and been counted and already more than enough have paid the price.

My wish would be that they could all come home soon.

Though somehow - I don't think so. :(

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The above not withstanding - I wish the very best of luck to all who take the time to post here trying to help others.



Richard.

Since i know a student I would just love to shock, with this eMachine
I think it would be a good upgrade from the one that is presently in use. Yep, she loves those eMachines. Been good to her.

Children and what we do for them at this time of year and the stress of us adults coping with everything and making christmas the best day of the year for all. (Our parents did it for us)

I love christmas for the day, the eve and boxing day but, I hate the build up. We celebrate really 3 days, beforehand you go to the supermarket/shops and you can't move, trying to find something that you can find normaly and they've sold out or it's christmas crap. The build up is stupid.

Our US friends celebrate 'Thanks Giving' - another stress for no reason really - no offence.

Christmas cards-what a pain trying to find the right one.

Really it all goes back to the children to see the expressions on the day of opening presents even though it's about 5-00am in the morning and I love the fact that they believe in father christmas.

OK when did you find out that Father Christmas didn't really exist?

I was about 8/9yrs old.

I'd gone to bed at the normal time as did other young members of the family, leaving a lot of my adult family downstairs. I was awoken by the adults laughing bringing the sacks of presents upstairs to secretly hide them at the bottom of the bed for the morning. I took the oath not to tell the younger children what I knew.

Another ?

How are you coping with christmas?

and

What will make Christmas day a happy day for you? (don't say my new P999999999999999 processor with 4 billion memory).

Anyway if Vdr would allow please take a look here:

http://web.icq.com/friendship/browse...,16959,00.html

Free website like americangreetings.com was

Click on each reindeer.

I like number four because eventually he becomes Darth Vadar.

most of the people are 'stressed' out during christmas, because the true meaning of christmas is left out. christmas is the celebration of the birth of JESUS, and most people, celebrations etc. never invite HIM to the party. HE is left out of his own birthday party. i'm 'stessed' out over how americans have ruined the meaning of christmas, and how children are taught to believe in the mythical lie of santa claus. soooo, at least thats my 2 cents, right or wrong.

Sorry JAL but yes I think it is too much to ask. I really have to agree with the scentiment though. Maybe someday the Big Guy will decide that His whole free will idea was a big mistake but until then we will all have to continue to pray that one day those in power will stumble upon peace and decide it is worth keeping.

Sorry for the omission KMIELKE123 you'll notice I editted the title.

For those of you that I didn't ackowledge, as I did Usil, for lack of a better term Happy Fesativus!

kjanx

My OT wasn't to have a go at religion.

I'm a great believer in Jesus etc. and I love watching the movies shown at this time of year depicting his being.

We can't invite him to the party because he's not with us anymore. I don't think the americans have ruined christmas and its true meaing, it's just the way it is celebrated over the years and it has progressed.

Santa did exist, namely St. Nicholas and he gave what he could to the needy in his time. He eventually became depicted, dressed in red and that's where Santa comes from.

I think we all celebrate this time of year as a religious festival even though it is costly.

No offence is meant here.

TJ

TJolly, you mean there isn't any Santa Claus? :eek:

TJ, guess you didn't notice Caliptor already started an OT thread for this week, but being this is the Christmas season I will let both of them run this week, Happy Holidays to one & all. BJ

Well, since TJolly has informed me, there is no "Santa Claus" :eek:

I guess the best wish for me this Christmas is: I hope all my Virtual Dr friends have a good holiday.

My next one would be: to be with my family who are far away and I haven't seen for 5 years.

Or, that a kind old gentleman with a red suit and white beard, would bring me a new computer. :D

Happy Holidays to everyone!! :)

Our minister's son told me there was no Santa when I was about seven. He was the wildest kid I knew.

I think it was Mark Twain who said "Most people are about as happy as they decide to be." That's the way it is with Christmas. Its as happy as you make it.

As to Thanksgiving, there's little stress involved unless you have to cook the meal (and increasingly, people are ordering take out feasts from grocerys and restaurants). For most of us its a day off to see family, overeat, and watch football on TV.

I'm "between" kids (my son is grown but no grandkids yet) so Christmas is relatively stress-free for me this year. And Santa, if you bring me a Ferrari it'll restore my faith in you.

Well hey TJ great minds think alike a holiday thread seemed to be just the thing. For my family the buld up though can be just as much fun as the big day. Christmas pageant, taking my son shopping trying to pick out the right present for his Mum. Today we went out and killed a tree and dragged it out to the car. Tomorrow we'll trim the tree and bake cookies. Each day he pulls off a leaf from his Advent calander and we talk about his day at school and the X-Mas related activity watching the build up for Christmas is really a lot of fun. Each year we get a new decoration his choice this year was an inflatable 7 foot tall Homer Simpson dressed up as Santa. Makes kind of hard to miss our house I tell you. Every Christmas Eve we go to the 'in-laws' for chinese and games and on the drive home we point out the lights of a passing airplane and ask him if it might be Santa? It must be wonderful to be 7 and believe in all the magic at Christmas time I had almost forgotten what it was like.

Tjolly, what a great card! Thanks for the link. I'm e-mailing it to a couple of people and saving it for my boy.

I like Christmas. We try not to let it get too crazy. My boy is old enough now that he's less "gimme gimme gimme." We do like to buy presents for him! So it'll be a good one. He actually still believes in Santa Claus, though I've hinted to him that Santa represents the spirit of love and togetherness. And about the real St. Nicholas.

Actually, my son's name is Nicholas. My husband and I, significantly enough, were married on the Feast of St. Nicholas in early December 1980. So that's a good thing for us. We didn't name our son so much for that, but for my husband's late uncle Nick, who was a very dear man. We got to tell him before he died that we would do so, and he had tears in his eyes. So we like to think that somewhere Uncle Nick is watching out for our boy!

I do get a little stressed out, but there are some things over the years that we have just mutually agreed to let go of. For instance, we don't really "do" Thanksgiving. I could've gone to my sister's house for that -- but I had to work that day -- and it would've been great, but though I always try to grab some turkey somewhere, it really doesn't matter much. Hope I'm not being unpatriotic! We are thankful without it.

We love to decorate the house for Christmas. We all love twinkly icicle lights and things and I made a lighted wreath for the door. There is a sort of magic to it.

But between our jobs and such, it is hard to do some things. My husband loves to shop (God bless 'im), so (this helps) he has bought by now nearly everything for my son, and probably most of those for me. I'm responsible for buying for my parents, sister, bro-in-law and three nieces, but I've been able to buy a lot of things on the Internet. Thank God for the Web because I never could stand the malls.

My one regret is that I will not be able to attend church on Christmas Eve, because I'll be (again) working. The midnight Christmas Eve service was a really really big deal when I was growing up; just a festival of music and candles and pageantry and rejoicing. It's a wonderful memory and I miss those occasions. I really wanted to take Nick to a Nativity play. But another year I will undoubtedly be freer in my choice of days off and get to do some of that.

Christmas can get to be sort of "bah humbug" if one lets it. But as a fervent believer, I find it's another occasion to glory in the gift of Jesus. My personal convictions, not trying to push them on someone.

Hey! Check out my Christmas tree (attached). This is using my new (as of Oct.) digital camera. Uh, I'm still learning but it's not bad.

Merry Christmas!

Quote:

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Originally posted by BIG JOHN
TJ, guess you didn't notice Caliptor already started an OT thread for this week, but being this is the Christmas season I will let both of them run this week, Happy Holidays to one & all. BJ

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Big John also Has a BIG heart! :D