For anyone who has followed this report for a while, below is a report I wrote a little over 21 years ago (I started writing them weekly in 1992). Some of the dated references are interestig (i.e. the Canadian postal strike just before Christmas). I was a little grumpier back then. Usually we get grumpier as we age, go figure....
11/12/97 - It seems as
if the Christmas season starts a little earlier every year, doesn’t it? No
sooner has the Halloween candy been marked down than Christmas chaos kicks in.
The elevator music shifts to “Silver Bells” and the elves aggressively pass out
free pantyhose at the mall. Forget the day after Thanksgiving, the starting gun
has sounded, and the premature spew of Xmas lunacy has begun in full force.
Rudolph leaps across frosted store windows, candy canes adorn the artificial
trees and, as Santa gleefully rides his Norelco shaver into this year’s red and
green retail rodeo, we brace ourselves for another season of frenzied
materialism. Ladies and gentlemen, start your credit cards, let the games
begin. Since we’re jumping the gun on mirth and goodwill, the following are a
few items you might want to add to your ever-growing list of obligatory gifts
for the hopelessly unsatisfiable:
Can you go wrong with a
Ronco food dehydrator? I watched the hour-long Ronco infomercial the other
night (because I don’t HAVE a life), and I must admit, that Ron Popeil is one
persuasive guy. I understand his dehydrator has been marked down drastically,
and at a fraction of its true value, can you really afford NOT to buy one of
these beauties? Do you have any idea what sun dried tomatoes cost these
days? Ron does, although he doesn’t seem to know what his food dehydrators cost
... someone has to keep correcting him. “No, Ron, you pathetic cretin, they’re
only $40 now, last week they were
$250.” If you already have enough dried food, you may want to consider the ever
popular Veg-O-Matic, the Bagel Cutter, the Egg Scrambler (give me a break), the
Sausage and Pasta Maker, the Pocket Fisherman ... to name but a few more of
Ron’s “must have” items.
Barbie is experiencing
a make-over, and your little girl (O.K. ... let’s not be gender specific ... whoever
among your friends and family collects dolls) will definitely want the new and
improved “Rad Barbie.” She’s a little lighter in the breast department, has a
bigger waist, smaller thighs, shorter hair, and a new attitude. They’ve wiped that big dopey smile off her
face, and now she looks like she’s on medication. Perhaps she is. Ken turned
out to be a two-timing adulterous embezzler, Skipper contracted AIDS from a
dirty needle, and Midge, severely disfigured in a motorcycle accident, has
become an embittered recluse. It’s been a rough year for Barbie, and it’s no
stretch to assume that she might have had a little elective surgery to cheer
herself up ... it’s the California version of buying a new hat. By the way, for the little soldier in your
platoon, may I suggest the new and contemporized GI Joe
... GI Paulo. He’s a little less macho, a little less bloodthirsty, but he’s much
more sensitive. “Civie” ensembles sold separately.
Speaking of sensitive,
talk show host Jerry Springer has a new video out, and I’m sure this one will
be a hit. Entitled “Too Hot for T.V.,” this video contains all the out-takes of
Springer’s show that were too racy for prime time. If you want to watch a three hundred pound
Amazon beat the crap out of her spineless, emaciated, two-timing boyfriend (whom she recently
caught screwing her mother, after he’d knocked her out with a date rape
drug), or a fist fight between two lesbian devil worshipers with multiple body
piercings, or the countless spontaneous exposures of genitalia by people whose
genitalia you didn’t really need to see, this is the video for you ... check
Aunt Bessie off your list, this one is a slam dunk.
Nothing says “I care”
like a Weekly World News “Bat Child Escapes” headline tee shirt. The graphics
are superb and the novelty can’t be beat. You can see the twinkle in his beady
little bat eyes, and if you look closely, you can even see a hint of drool
rolling off his pointy little canines. I bought one of these shirts for my
friend Bob’s birthday, and I think he was impressed. He probably thought I was going to get him
something useless, like a book of Canadian postage stamps or something. If bat children aren’t your cup of guano,
there are several other astonishing and equally revolting headlines from which
to choose.
In the news the other
day, Saddam Insane was waving Anthrax and other chemical weapons around with
the zeal of an Amway representative. Then, after he’d successfully hidden all
his weapons of mass destruction, he agreed to allow the U.N. weapons inspectors
back into Iraq. Stop this guy! I have no doubt he’s prepared to do something
very evil - he already has, to his own people (ask the Kurds). Just a spoonful
of Anthrax makes the enemy go down. What I want to know is, why hasn’t one of
his own countrymen taken him out yet?
Oops, friendly fire accident ...
I thought the gun was jammed. Sorry!
Say hi to Allah for me.
There was a major
slaughter of innocent tourists at the site of the Luxor Temple in Egypt last
week. Ambushed as they got off buses in this, the southern end of ancient
Thebes, seventy people were murdered. More than likely it was one of the more
radical factions of the growing fundamentalist Islamic lobby in Egypt.
Terrorism is always so unbelievably savage. The world was outraged ... this
kind of thing couldn’t happen in the States, right? And certainly not by one of our own citizens,
right? Oklahoma was just an exception, right? Hmmm. This kind of incident is
not going to help Egypt’s tourist trade one bit. As some of you may already
know, there is a Canada-wide mail strike going on, just in time for the
holidays. My reaction to this is to investigate alternative and more timely
methods of paying bills and corresponding with friends. With the advent of
electronic banking, virtual shopping malls, fax machines and E-mail, perhaps
it’s time to reevaluate the need for a mail system that costs so much
money and seems to be so inefficient. Canada Post gives new meaning to the term
“snail mail”. Perhaps private delivery companies could handle all the heavy
stuff, and if it costs a little more to send a package, we’d probably still
save money in the long run. Eliminate the catalogues, save a bunch of trees in
the process, and get all your information from cheap Internet access through
your television. Ads don’t have to be
printed on paper ... imagine using your T.V. remote control to browse a
catalogue. I bought a book through the
Barnes and Noble Web site a few weeks ago, and, other than the book, no paper
changed hands. People worry about sending financial and personal information
through a phone line, and that’s a justifiable concern. Security will become of
increasing importance as the Internet catches on, but snail mail gets lost and
stolen too.
I know that I am
speaking blasphemy here, and if any disgruntled mailpersons read this- and we
all know there are a few of those out there - I’m a dead man. If I’m found in a vacant alley, beaten to the
consistency of an over-ripe cantaloupe with an undelivered Ronco Sausage &
Pasta Machine, just remember me as a
martyr for the next generation of information dissemination. I know Santa is
online now ... I just put in my online order for a Veg-O-Matic and some Ronco
G.L.H., as in Great Looking Hair paint spray.
- Jamie Oppenheimer c 1997
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