Well, it’s over. Only 365 more shopping says till Xmas 08!The reputation here in Boca Raton (visiting family) is that all the Jews from NY have moved here. It’s apparently true — Xmas lights are few and far between, but those churches are EVERYWHERE. They must import their Christians from Miami.We did the tradditional thing — a movie and Chinese food. The restaurant had a huge line.Remember, Christianity is only the most recent mythology to in corporate the winter solstice (or thereabouts) into their mythos.What did you do for this season?
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I like to think that I made an attempt to deconstruct some of our tired social mores.
in reality I smoked, blasphemed, and engaged in premarital sex.
Nothing wrong with any of those choices, as long as you didn’t infringe on anyone else.
Course it might cause problems for certain righteous guardians of other people’s behaviour. Then again that might be half the fun right there.
Me, I couldn’t imagine wanting to kiss a smoker. I learned that lesson a long time ago.
You know, it occurs to me that, traditionally people do those three things in the opposite order. To each his/her own, though.
To Dave and all the commenters, here’s a wish for a Rational and Happy New Year.
Judaism is just a mythology a few hundred years older than xianity.
That is very long compared to the 40,000 years or so of human history.
I spent the day listening to Beethoven and Verdi and interrupting that to watch internet programs such as the History Channel’s “Christmas Unwrapped”.
http://fr.youtube.com/watch?v=hQ3BvK1R6hI&feature=related
I spent the afternoon crocheting a flying spaghetti monster. Next year he will grace the top of our solstice tree.
We exchanged gifts on the Solstice, but we have invented our own holiday, which occurs on December 21st, called Seasonal Holiday Gift Man Day. Then yesterday, on that *other* holiday, we made a gluten free vegan pizza and had a marathon of old Blakes 7 DVDs that we bought from overseas.
UnGodly,
Blakes7 was coooool. You just gotta love Zen and Orac.
A most excellent use of xmas day.
bernarda,
Thanks so much for the link; shows just what are the real traditions.
UnGodly,
No nothing of Blakes 7 but love vegan pizza.
DD, I only smoke the good stuff, and plenty of it for the holidays!!
And I wonder why the cookies taste so damn good.
I received the “His Dark Materials” trilogy as a gift so I spent much of the day eating the first third of “The Golden Compass”. I’d like to get through the unfiltered version before I see the movie. It’s thanks to this forum that I put those books on my Amazon wish list in the first place.
We celebrated and celebrated Christmas too, after a fashion anyway.
Had a tree,of course and on the Eve opened a few presents. Earlier on the Eve we ate the Eve dinner of Beef Stroganoff and other tasty dishes. But all Eve-day — with Christmas Carols playing in the background (what can I tell you, I grew up with ‘em and I like ‘em) — there was a lot of card-playing, a lot of laughter, a lot of wine, a little mocking of xians and a lot of sweet fattening stuff.
Oh, and the ex-son-in-law who has no other family was with us for three days and all was peaceful and enjoyable.
Christmas Day, however, was quiet. Some of us went back to work cursing, but that’s the lot of medical types. The ex-son-in-law took off for a ten-hour drive home. My hubby came down with a cold, and I read Charlie Wilson’s War (excellent and amazing read, gotta see the movie).
All in all we had a really nice holiday even if it is called Christmas.
So Merry, Merry Whatever to Everybody!
i was able to listen to ed kagin’s show the night before and greatly enjoyed it. thanks for telling us about it. on the actual festivus day, i re-read passages of “the trouble with xmas” by tom flynn and “simplify your xmas” by elaine st. james and these reading sustained me. today i shred the obnoxious cards, family pictures, and bragging letters from “friends”. old woman atheist from delaware
I won’t lie, I celebrated Christmas, visited the girlfriend, traveled home to see family, and opened many, many gifts.
Then on Christmas day, I entered into many conversations with family members over the misinterpretation of Christmas.
After getting dinner ready (as I had promised to do) for a gathering of my wife’s family, I ran away from home and spent the rest of the day with a few choice friends, spending some of the time at our favorite watering hole, and the rest of it at a friend’s house. I didn’t come home until all the relatives left.
It’s not that I don’t like my wife’s family, it’s just that I had already put in quite a bit of time doing dinner for xmas eve for the same group, and we don’t have much in common to talk about, so why stick around? On the other hand, my friends in this account had no extended family to go to, so they were just hanging around, and I decided to join them. Yeah, it hurt my wife’s feelings a bit, and she said dinner would have been nicer if I had been there, but I replied that I wasn’t so sure about that. Unfortunately, sometimes I can be an ass, and I thought it best just to avoid the possibility by absenting myself.
I am jealous after reading all the entries so far! My perfect holiday would have involved sleeping late, exchanging gifts with my hubby, reading, maybe watching a good movie or something interesting on the History Channel, etc., drinking wine and/or eggnog, and indulging in some marital sex, prior to the traditional (totally secular) dinner with my extended family.
But alas, I have young children!! So instead, I got up early, watched the kids delight over the Santa gifts, then spent most of the day reading directions on how to assemble a Matchbox parking garage, registering new Webkinz on the computer, apologizing for our lack of AAA batteries, and watching a My Little Pony DVD, before heading over to “Nana and Pop’s” house for dinner. Fortunately, I still managed to sneak in some eggnog!
you know, after awhile you lose track of what order you started in.
Wifey & I already exchanged gifts on the solstice. On Tuesday we made with the married people’s vanilla sex, I went for a quick 30 mile ride (brrr!), then we had dinner & cold beers with the extended side of my family.
Pretty much the same as everyone else.
Hey DD,
We don’t need to guard your behavior. Feel free to eat, drink, and be merry. This is about the only heaven you’ll experience, pal. And then, when you die, you’ll give an account to your Maker all by yourself.
Have fun with that!
BTW. How do you spell “atheist”?
L-O-S-E-R
“Judge not, lest ye be judged”
How do you spell “Shnide”
S-H-E-E-P
Baaaaa!!!
I got up fairly early (8:30)to start making our traditional xmas brunch, and get ready for my middle son to bring the grandkids. It was not nearly as early as I used to have to get up when my own kids were small, so not so bad. My other two adult kids and I opened gifts with middle son and grandkids, ate brunch, then headed over to mother-in-law’s to do more gifts. Left there shortly after my soon -to-be ex arrived to come back home to do gifts with my daughter-in-law’s sister and cousin and my ersatz other “grandbaby”. Then had some quiet time alone with the cats. AHHHHHHhhhhhhhhHHHHHHH.
Tried out my new recliner-length body massager. Ahhhhhh, again. Baked a ham and smashed some potatoes and cooked some broccoli for dinner. First time I have ever cooked on xmas, I think. Usually, we snack on cookies and pepperoni bread, but none of that got made this year.
Watched reruns of CSI and LawandOrder while eating candy out of my stocking and chatting with my oldest and youngest kids who have both moved back home for a while.
Karen,
Your kid didn’t like living in Chapel Hill?
Unfree of God wrote:
So then s/he/it had premarital sex and indulged in the True meaning of Christmas.
Then had many conversations about the True nature of Christians and how it differs from what Christians tell everyone else to do.
BaaHaaahAAAAABAAHA!
Cheese, crackers and, wine. Listened to the Answers in Atheism Xmas Eve. A rather entertaining show and funny too.
Spent some time wondering if Christians think all wine is fermented zombie blood, how gross can they get? Well, I guess the Shrub comes in a close second place.
alex
He loved living in Chapel Thrill.
But he got severely depressed for some reason last semester, and has ended up taking a medical leave from school till next fall. He wanted to just take the fall semester off, but the dipshits handling his case didn’t know what they were doing, and by the time they got their act together, he had to take the whole spring semester too. If they had processed it correctly back in September, he could have taken the fall semester off and started back in spring.
Alex
Started back in spring—
I guess he would have actually started back in winter, but you know what I mean.
obeah, here is another good video even though it is made, by of all people, jesus freaks.
http://fr.youtube.com/watch?v=YcmWvkSdjYY&feature=related
bernarda:
Is funny you should talk about listening Beethoven and Verdi. I started with Beethoven and ended with Bruckner. Thank you for the link The Origin of Christmas – Part 1!!!!
bernarda what is your favorite by Beethoven.
off-topic
the article by Aaron Weaver in AA mag was very good but sad. my hope is that someday the mother will realize what a fine young man her son is and let love not fear rule her heart.
MX
vanilla is underrated
spanders
hope you and family had a nice christmas.if you get a chance read jesus for the non religious by john shelby spong.i can’t get a response from phreedm so i will ask you how does it affect your christian belief knowing the books in the bible were voted on by committee.
Hey reason, I actually read it. I may have recommended it here before. You might actually enjoy anything by Elaine Pagels and Bart Ehrman as well. Check out “The Origin of Satan” by Elaine Pagels. I really like how Spong presented the Jesus story as a Jewish story and related it to their mindset. Couple that with Ehrman’s “Misquoting Jesus” and it’s a fascinating picture. These books don’t push me to atheism, but do push me to shake off orthadoxy. I like to constantly question what I think and believe, but I do believe there is a god and my understanding of god comes from a christian tradition. I like to understand what that tradition is. I guess a number of you would say I can’t give up on the god idea. Fair enough. I like the god idea, but not always the traditions that surround it.
thanks for the response spanders.i find the history of religion in that time frame of early christian late pagan era interesting like a puzzle or who dunnit. trying to figure out who people were really speaking to and what they were really trying to say interests me.
reason, check out “When Jesus Became God”, a book about the Nicene Creed. It’s right in line with what you’re talking about.
phreedum,
) in Christiansburg, VA and I couldn’t help wonder if the guy and his family seated next to us was you. He just looked like I imagine you look and they were having a conversation about what they would do if their xian child wanted to marry a non xian spouse. The next table over was lamenting the fact that if women hadn’t got the vote then we wouldn’t be in the state that we are today in this country. I forgot how small minded and depressing SW VA is and I am chomping at the bit to get the fuck out of here and back home. Phreedum was that you in The Farmhouse tonight?
Me and my family just went to dinner at “The Farmhouse” on Cambria St (Cambria is Latin for Wales where we are from
spanders:
LOL!
Hey, vanilla’s good, but every now & then, some mint chocolate chip sounds great.
alex
why didn’t you shout out i’m gay and i’m here for the children.where is your sense of humor.
Hey Alex,
Nope…wasn’t me. I live about an hour north of Christiansburg.
You don’t have to live in the country to find small minded people…
Just read some of the posts on here…
As for the women and voting…and I know this will be taken out of context…but so what…
Back in 1992 I was discussing the presidential election with the owner of a business…at the end of our conversation this ladies 82 year old aunt came into the office. When she found out what we were talking about, her only comment was…I’m voting for Bill Clinton…he’s cute…all I could think about was that my vote would be cancelled by hers.
What that little episode taught me was that women also have 2 brains…
It’s to bad you didn’t get in touch with me. I had a great book I was going to give you on economics and banking…I remember how much you enjoy reading.
The Creature from Jekyll Island…ever hear of it?
After a great day of celebrating Christmas, which represents the joy of my Savior’s birth, I fired up the laptop and wasn’t disappointed with the annual comments and complaints of how Christmas is really a pagan holiday…
You know…similar to how some of the days of the week are named after Roman gods…same goes for the name of the months…
Of course we all use those names without any complaints…
Tell me…what does it matter? For it’s what’s in the heart that counts…
Maybe next year there will be some new material…although I doubt it.
Let the hate flow through you Phreedum. Feel the power of the dark side.
Spent xmas eve with friend who is recovering from stroke. Her 14 yr old granddaughter was visiting from Baptist boarding school. News story about jesuses missing from creeche and she wanted to blame atheists who hate god. I explained (politely)we don’t hate god, we don’t believe in the existence of god. She’s the product of a “soap opera” in-law situation and doesn’t want to be in that school, then she said one of her friends said she was going to hell with her Daddy (killed in a bar shooting 2 or 3 years ago) so she went to her teacher and asked if her Dad was in hell. Teacher asked if he drank much, went to church often and told her yes, he’s in hell. I about shit!
foot152 -
Sad. Somebody tell me what they’ve told this child isn’t child abuse. If we’re wrong and there is a hell after all, I hope not just the physical and sexual abusers of children end up there, but the mental abusers too. And if that’s the case I hope we atheists get our own section separated from the likes of the damned xians!
foot152 and Godfree
Baptists are just plain mean. They seem to delight every opportunity to condemn someone to hell, yet that isn’t their place at all, according to other sects.
I’d agree that this was abusive. This girl may still be grieving her father’s death. And while he was a drinker, he may have been a loving dad for all we know. The scare tactics of hell are abusive in their own right, but to compound a young girl’s grief over her father’s death with it is a downright dirty deed.
Suck it Jesus! People that believe in christianity have a sickness, yes, they are diseased.
When you christians finish eating and drinking your Christ, please send its spirit to me, I want to make sure it is dead so that it cannot hurt people anymore.
Can’t someone invent a virus for people like this?
Yeah Phree, it’s a man’s world. Just look around; you can tell by how fucked up it is!!!
P.S.-No offense to all the good dudes out there. You know who you are!
I hardly ever read phreedm’s crap but when I saw the block-quote I went back and found it.
What a moron!
And here I didn’t think I could think any less of him if I tried. Wrong, wrong, wrong!
reason, I don’t know if I can say that I have a favorite Beethoven, but I was listening to “Fidelio”. It was Otto Klemperer directing the Covent Garden Orchestra.
The Verdi I listened to was “Otello”.
Amazing how many so-called atheists just made themselves look like complete idiots and hypocrites by stating that they celebrated Xmas, the birth of Jesus Christ. They didn’t state that they enjoyed a day off work, no, they claimed to celebrate a Christian holiday. This is just as bad as Dave promoting Judaism and boasting of how he celebrates Jewish holidays. This former Xian loyalty to Santa and Jesus is almost as bad and just as irrational as jewish loyalty to jew tribalism and racism.
Why is it so difficult for so-called secular people to see that?
If one has a party during Hanukah, Xmas, Kwanzaa or Ganesh Chaturthi, it does not mean that one celebrates those holidays, it means they took advantage of a day off or coincidently had fun on that day.
I was present during numerous religious holiday events while growing up, but I never celebrated those holidays. Giving gifts on Dec 25th doesn’t make that a celebration of the birth of Jesus anymore than it makes it celebrating Saturnalia.
Thats like saying that you vote Democrat, but on election day even after voting Democrat, proclaiming that you just voted republican because most people in your town and family voted Republican.
Take a break from bragging about being “free” from religion and try living up to those words and thinking for yourselves.
SecularMan,
Sorry, I must be missing something. Where did anyone here (xian troll excluded) say they were celebrating the birth of Jesus?
SecularMan
Why don’t you take the two-by-four out of your ass and relax a little?
I used the term xmas in my post twice. So what? My day had nothing to do with religion. The day is called Christmas on the calendar and I’ve been calling it that for the 50 years I’ve been speaking English. Old habits die hard. And I unapologetically celebrate the Santa Claus myth, which also has nothing to do with religion.
When I was in art school, the director/owner was Jewish, and we got Yom Kippur off too. I didn’t complain. I took it, said Happy Yom Kippur, and was glad for the holiday.
Comment from: GodFree&Glad [Member]
This is a common irrational outburst made by so-called Atheists all over the internet and in person during the winter. Seeing it again on this blog, it had to be called out.
Karen, I suggest you shake the rocks and dust out of your head and remove any foreign objects that you may have in your body cavities.
You fail to realize the difference between calling Xmas by it’s name name, Xmas, and claiming to be an Atheist and stating that you CELEBRATE Xmas, the christian celebration of the birth of jesus.
You also fail to realize that the Santa myth IS based on Norse religion. When you say you “celebrate the Santa Claus myth” are you stating that you lie to and delude children into believing in a magical man that flies through the sky?
Try actually understanding what people write before commenting. Again, try thinking for yourself instead of being defensive.