Blue Christmas.

Just thought I needed a little something to bump the podcasting post off the top. (Though, briefly, I had to cut loose the Chasing Chevy Chase pod. The guys there have already covered Oh, Heavenly Dog, Under the Rainbow and Modern Problems and, yet, they decide to save the full amount of vitriol for Deal of the Century? Fuck that and fuck them.)

As I do my best to power through a soundtrack composed by three of the least interesting - yet double Academy Award-winning! - composers out there, I cannot help but reflect on what a crappy Christmas I had. (There are a lot of moving parts to the story, so it would behoove you to keep up.)

Earlier this month, I received a letter telling me that coverage of my car was going to expire unless I called a particular number; apparently, it's because the mileage on my car is of a certain height. I called the number a few days before the expiration date. I tell him about the car and how my check engine light is on and he pretty much instructs me that nothing can be done unless I find a way to get rid of it. I go to AutoZone on the 16th and find out that there’s a leak in my gas tank or at least that’s what the readout said when the guy checked it out.

Buysoundtrax - I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned them at this blog a number of times before - was offering their annual gift box full of items from their back catalog. Hoping to plug a few holes in my collection, I decided to take the plunge and drop the 40 bucks plus shipping on it.

My supervisor decided to take the whole week off of work, but before she left, she made sure that me and my fellow worker got to get off super early on Christmas Eve. 12 noon, in fact.

I managed to get an appointment to have my check engine light taken care of just a couple days before Christmas. As it turns out, it’s not a leak in my gas tank that’s the problem as much as a faulty sensor. Given that it's the week of Christmas, it may take some time for the part to get in, so for Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and at press time Thursday, I have absolutely no car to work with, so if things get to be overwhelming here at home, well, that’s just too damn bad, isn’t it?

The box finally arrives at 4:30 on the night before Christmas and I can rush right out to get it from the porch. I gave it a little shake when I get to my room. Sounds like a lot of CDs in there. This is gonna be so much fun.

The big morning arrives and of course give my screwed up sleep schedule. I wake up at around 5:30 but I swear to myself to wait until six to even think of popping that box open.The time comes I open it and…surprise is not strong enough to express how I’m truly feeling. Now I was under the impression that the people behind this did a cursory glance at my buying history (and I’ve bought a lot from this company over the years), so I figure that the majority would be truly fascinating stuff. What do I end up getting? A DVD of some thriller I’ve never even heard of; a handful of CDs that I already own (did I mention that I’ve bought from these people before?); a number of label-produced composer compilations with covers performed by their in-house team; a few CDs of songs and classical music, including an incredibly sus compilation that reminded me of the ones that I would routinely bypass at FYE years ago; and about a dozen or so CDs that I’d actually be fascinated by or interested in*. Next time I’m just gonna take part of the sales. Less chance of fuckery, then.

I was hoping to forget about this disappointment by watching some TV, but what do you know? The TV wasn’t working. I’d been just sitting idle in my room for six hours and all it took was the flip of a switch to make things normal. (In the meantime, I watched the 2009 version of A Christmas Carol; the Robert Zemeckis one with Jim Carrey. Not a perfect movie - nothing against the motion capture execution, but it was very clearly shot for 3-D and a lot of those swooping camera movements were distracting - but unquestionably, the highlight of the day.)

As with the day before, cabin fever is setting in in a big way and sneaking away in mom’s car while she’s still awake will open myself to a shit ton of questions I really don’t feel like answering.

All I have to eat in the midst of Mom putting the finishing touches on dinner is a peanut butter cookie and a mug of egg nog, which is fine, but not that satisfying.

The afternoon rolls around and my younger sisters get here. It’s nice to see them as we enjoy reruns of “Martin” together, but…some years ago, the elder of the two adopted a little boy…one with an undiagnosed disorder. He’s very hyper. He has little if any concept of impulse control. He very seldom listens to people who tell him to behave or settle down. His mother picked this time to scroll her phone instead of being a parent (and what is the fucking logic here? “I’ll do something about it when I hear something break because after all, I don’t live here anymore?”).

It’s not long before I take my presents and retreat to my room. After that is the occasional thump, a whole lot of coughing, a whole lot of noise…and nobody does a thing. Back in the day, my father wouldn’t have put up with this from any of us without violence ensuing, so I can’t imagine why she thinks a hands-off approach would work.

After the girls leave and the hurricane has subsided, I point out this lack of action to Mom, telling her, “If I had the money, I would move out tomorrow.”

I get upstairs and the living room is a mess; packaging and wrapping paper everywhere. Bits of food embedded into the carpet. This is really acceptable? Begrudgingly, I get to work gathering up all the crap and stuff in the garbage bag and, as ever, nobody even bothered to put in a new garbage bag after the old one had been removed. It’s like I don’t even fucking exist around here. Does no one else in the world understand how offensive that is?!

I get back downstairs, hoping to improve my mood with a new movie, Dear Santa. Holy first fucking draft, this film is a disappointment. If not for a few stray great lines from Jack Black and the surprise cameo about 2/3 of the way in, this would ended up making my bottom 10 for the year.

By this point, I'm starving for seconds, which I couldn't get. I sit out the time it takes to warm the items up in the oven and then, I chow down. The meal is good, if a little underwhelming (it's been too long since I've had mashed potatoes, but I think that mac and cheese would've worked better).

And then it hits me about the next day: not only do I have to get back to work, but I have to get my car back and God only knows how much it’s gonna cost to get that situation taken care of. I barely have $1000 left in the bank and I have a shit ton of bills coming up. Possible bright side: I’ll be able to sell some of the crappier discs to Lukas Kendall for his ongoing sale and maybe make some coin.

All in all, I’m just reminded of Philip’s (Steve Martin) climactic speech from 1994’s messy yet entertaining Mixed Nuts: “You’re upset because this is Christmas and Christmas is a time of year when you look at your life through a magnifying glass and what you don’t have seems overwhelming.”

As I’m getting back to a dead zone of work and fighting a cold (that I just know came from the brat’s offer of popcorn from his special tin; note to self: never accept anything from his hands for as long as I draw breath), I may find happiness in stray things, but yeah, this is just a very, very depressing existence I’m in now and nothing short of a miracle or a giant flood will ever be able to reverse that.

* - Among the haul was an Oscar promo of Philip Glass’s Jane and an agency promo of John Powell’s The Bourne Ultimatum. How much other cool shit do those jerks keep on lockdown from the plebs unless Christmas is a factor? Unbe-fucking-lievable!