Are you kidding me?

Wal-Mart, along with other retailers around this MERRY country have instructed their employees not to wish their customers a "Merry Christmas!" but instead, "Happy Holidays!" Big deal, right? Wal-Mart FIRED someone for wishing his customer a "Merry Christmas!" WAL-MART TERMINATED SOMEONE'S EMPLOYMENT FOR SAYING MERRY CHRISTMAS. This is un-frickin'-believable. The people of the WORLD have been saying the words "Merry Christmas" to each other for decades. Maybe even centuries. Truth is, I googled "the roots of Merry Christmas" and all I got back were news reports of how Wal-Mart fired the one dude. I know Jews, Muslims, Mormons, Catholics, and even DEMOCRATS who wish people a "Merry Christmas!" I know Jews who don't even celebrate Christmas wish people a Merry Christmas. Here's the deal: You may not celebrate it and it may not be your thing, but a lot of the people in this country get a day off work on December 25 because it's CHRISTMAS DAY. Not "Holidays Day." CHRISTMAS.

I have an idea!

Certain Christians are saying this is a direct attack on Christianity or something like that. Okay, whatever. These same Christians hate Santa, so what say the Christians who are offended by this sudden change from "Merry Christmas!" to "Happy Holidays!" demand that Santa be taken out of every mall? See, certain Christians (I am not one of them, if you could tell) don't like Santa because if you change the letters around, it spells SATAN. Blah, Blah, Blah, SHUT UP. Regardless of how I feel about Santa, I think this is a brilliant idea (not to toot my own horn or anything). Good lord, there would be an uprising. Kids would cry because Santa wouldn't be around. Parents would rejoice, however, because they wouldn't have to stand in line for hours to wait for their whining, crying, spoiled rotten, undisciplined kid to take a picture with Satan, er... Santa. So, Wal-Mart, what say you? You can take away "Merry Christmas!" and Christian's can take away Santa Clause. Well?

I have another idea!

If we change from "Merry Christmas!" to "Happy Holidays!" I think that the workers of The United States of America should get every holiday off. The Chinese New Year is on December 1, right? There's a day off work. Hannukah? EIGHT FRICKIN' DAYS! I'll take eight days off work, won't you? Kwanzaa.... eh, who cares about Kwanzaa they're probably making that crap up anyways. When is Buddha's birthday? I wanna know, because I want to not work on that day. L. Ron Hubbard's birthday could be a holiday. Eh, who cares about him anymore, let's celebrate the birth of the Scientology messiah, the forthcoming (and foretold) child of Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes! When was it foretold, you ask? Well, let me do a very jewish thing and answer that question with another question: Is there a better candidate for who the Antichrist will be?

Now, for another point. Not really an idea, yet. Think of all the things that we will have to abandon if Christmas is abandoned as well (in no particular order, just as I think of them).

1. Calendars. Every single calendar in the world or on a computer would have to be changed. So, start saying your farewells to the rainforest, because lots and lots of trees would be destroyed. Then again, we could just make the paper out of the Christmas trees that would no longer be in peoples' homes.
2. Charlie Brown Christmas. Bye-bye to the catchy Peanuts theme, "Linus and Lucy," adieu to Linus' blue blanket, fare-thee-well to "Christmas Time is Here."
3. National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation. It would have to be renamed "National Lampoon's Holiday Vacation." The good ol' fashioned family "HOLIDAY" just wouldn't be the same.
4. Pine trees. I mean seriously, see-ya-later to those suckers. The only reason they're kept around anymore is for Christmas.
5. Christmas Music. I can't stand most of it, but could you imagine living on without ever hearing Bing Crosby and David Bowie sing "Little Drummer Boy" or Elvis Presley singing "Blue Christmas." I'll have a bluuueeee Holiday without you, I'll be so blue thinking about you. Decorations of red on a green ... uhhh... ummm... what else is green.... uhhh... crap... geez.... hmmmm... ahhh... uhhh... uhhmmmm... greennnnnnnnnnn... uhhhhhh... eh screw it this song sucks now.
6. Santa Clause's saying. "Ho-Ho-Ho! Happy Holidays!" Yeah, it doesn't work, buddy.

That's just a few for now. I just thought of something. Someone had to have gotten offended by "Merry Christmas" for this whole ordeal to happen. I bet it was a Jew. Then again, I'm sure it's just an atheist or agnostic person who hates God because he had a bad Christmas one year. Seriously, the guy who started this whole thing is pissed off because God didn't give him a Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers MEGAZORD toy in 1994. What a sad, sad man.

Obviously, when I first thought about writing about this, I saw great potential for comedy. But in all seriousness, this is making a joke of our country. And the last thing we need right now is another reason for other countries to mock us or look at us and say "Stupid Americans." We just HAND them these opportunities though. Big American corporations make a STUPID decision and the government follows suit, leaving that GAPING gap for other countries to laugh at us. Oh, and here's another thing: It's Wal-Mart! Aren't they supposed to be a Christian establishment anyway? If you could see the look on my face right now, I think it's the only way that could describe this feeling. I just don't get it.

Until further stupifying moments,

Ryan J. Schwimmer

Is my life changing?

Of course it's changing. I just started a new job (I'd even call it a career) and I'm getting more comfortable as each day ticks by. (By the way, this is not a diary so I'm not going to sit here for paragraphs on end explaining how it is, but rather how it's affecting my life.) It's weird to say, but I like insurance. I think I like being on the inside of something that nearly rules the world. Besides Wal-Mart and Microsoft... and Starbucks [which, when you think about it, is a mixture of the two].) I think it's a safe assumption that I have a power complex of some sort. Not in everything. As a matter of fact, there are definitely certain things in which I prefer being controlled. However, I like being a leader, or just knowing that I have something others don't. I'm a very shallow person. I watched a movie called Buying the Cow yesterday, and it's based on the good ol' saying "Why buy the cow if you can have the milk for free?" i.e. Why get married when you're in a sexually active relationship? Let me tell you why. Milk is never free. Nothing, and I do mean nothing, in life is free. Do not believe anything anyone tells you; it's not free. When I lived in Norman, there were fliers all over campus about this free small pizza you could get from Papa John's, right? Well we went, and guess what. Not free. You had to sign a blood contract with Satan (Citi Financial) and then you got a free pizza. Are there loopholes? Sure. I gave them completely wrong information on that application for my soul and I got a free pizza. I pity the fool whose address I put on there. They're most likely going to hell now because they are bound by contract to give Satan their soul.

Is my life changing?

No. There was a spike in my religious life recently, but it fizzled out. I don't want to sound completely like Christian, but I think there's some serious spiritual warfare going on. Now, I'm going to use this example, but don't think that I'm a terrible person. Even though I am. So God has totally had my back lately. I did really well in the interview process for this new job that can and most likely will change a lot of things in my life for the better. I've been feeling a lot better. A lot of miscellaneous good things have happened. However, I'd have to say that in this spiritual war, the Axis powers would have to be my family. Most of my family, that is. I don't think that they do it intentionally or anything, but it happens. It seems like if I'm having a good day or something is really going my way, they have to ruin it. Whether it's Nan being mad at me because I won't move in with her so she can stay in that house, or Joe being mad at me because I won't move in with Nan because he got himself into a big mess and I won't get him out of it, or my mother calling me on the second day of my brand new awesome job yelling at me. I'll come back to that at a later date, possibly. Anywho, I think that God is trying to change my life in a good way right now and I think that (again, using the Spiritual Warfare thing) the devil is trying to bring me down through my family or something. I don't know, it's just a theory. I've asked myself the question "It's just little ol' me, why would God or the devil care?" but I'm always brought back to Christian telling me that I'm important to something. He won't tell me what it is though. Heh. Maybe I just think too much.

Now, any normal person would shrug that off and realize that he's thinking too much. Not me. I have recently developed an interest (nearing obsession) with The Old Country, that is, Ireland. It started a few months ago, wondering what it would be like to live in Ireland. Then I started looking it up and researching things and how the weather was and such. Then I heard this song about going "Down to the Old Pub Instead" and it's an Irish song and I like it a lot. Then, the kicker: The Hartford (my current employer) has a location in Ireland. Of all the places in the world, Ireland is one of them. Maybe this isn't all just a coincidence. I've wanted to get away from Oklahoma before, but now it's reaching into wanting to get away from my family, get away from most of the things I have here. Like I said, I probably just think too much. Oh, and my family will be reading this, and I want you all to know that I love you, I just can't stand you sometimes. And that's okay.

One thing I would like to point out right now is that I have an outstanding relationship with my little brother and it honestly makes me happy. And who'd a'thunk that I would be getting along with my little brother more than I'm getting along with Nan? Crazy.

Is my life changing?

All the time.
Never.

Well, I'm ending this here. My mission statement for this blog is to not make it so mundane that it becomes a diary. I don't want a diary. Diaries (Livejournals) are things that you look back on in the future and be like "oh, look how SILLY I was, I can't believe I made out with so and so in the pool!" (Don't ask me where that came from) I want this to be a JOURNAL... or something. I have an example: Famous people have blogs. They don't talk about what they did today or anything, they write about what's going on in their heads. (Some of them.) And of course they're celebrities and people want to know what's going on every day of their lives. I want to provide my readers with maybe a smile on their face because they agree with a view I have on something, or feeling like they're maybe just a little more intelligent after reading it. I definitely do not want to leave people less intelligent; God knows we have enough unintelligence in this world to fill a planet. That's right, we have enough of something non-corporeal to materialize an entire planet.

Until next time,

Ryan J. Schwimmer