The Pun Also Rises

"Christmas Illumination"

    Here we are in December, and 'tis the season... for illness. Various co-workers of mine (and probably some of yours too) have been out sick lately, which means that the holidays are here. Time off from work, albeit not quite how one planned it. Every little virus and cold reminds me that it is better to give than to receive. This year I celebrated the miracle
of the Hanukah Headache, a headache which should only have lasted for one night, but through the grace of god, magically managed to last for eight whole days.

    Oy. To the world.

    Of course, when comparing Hanukah and Christmas, one must keep in mind that one spans many more days than the other. As you may know, Hanukah only lasts for a mere eight days, while Christmas lasts for anywhere from twenty to seventy days, judging by the number of decorations that went up in my neighborhood just after Thanksgiving.

    If you're going to be decorating your house for Christmas and you still have Thanksgiving leftovers, I think you should be required to include them in your decorations. Nothing says holiday spirit to me quite like a giant Christmas tree covered in turkey bones. Sure, they don't light up, but they'll be just as effective at getting Santa to come to your house. Well, maybe not technically Santa, but his reindeer will come back to lick your tree. Reindeer love turkey. While I love reindeer. Just don't tell Santa about my Blitzen Pot Pie, or I'll be on the naughty list for sure.

    Santa isn't the only one keeping lists this year, though. If you've tried to fly recently, you've probably noticed that your wings are not very aerodynamic and that you don't have any feathers. But if you've tried to fly on an airplane recently, you may have noticed that the federal government is keeping a secret list of people to be hassled whenever they attempt to board an airplane. The list is so secret that they won't even tell you why you're on the list, which is too bad because Santa knows that if you tell people why they're on the naughty list, they'll try to behave better next year.

    But, the TSA doesn't follow Santa-approved guidelines. On the contrary, their modus operandi suggests a very different holiday spirit. To help you understand what I mean, this is what a TSA holiday song would probably sound like:

        You'd better not shout,
        You'd better not fly,
        They'll give you a search,
        And not tell you why,
        TSA is coming to town.

    TSA, for those of you who don't know, is the Transportation Security Administration, also known as the Tactile Sensation Association. They really like touching other people, especially people who are just trying to get from point A to point B without having a random person put their hand on point C, thank you very much. Under the auspices of security screening at airports, they now have free reign to pat you down on your Steeples, your Mass MoCA, or even your Appalachian Bean. Not only has this intrusive searching has caused some people to avoid flying out to see family over the holidays, but it has lowered our nation's average purity test score by three percent.

    This shouldn't surprise us though, in a climate where standardized test scores have been falling across the board. I know that President Bush has attempted to address this by cutting funding to under-scoring schools, to make sure that people who would lower the average don't even get as far as taking the test. And while this might raise average test scores, it doesn't really make our children brighter. Luckily, I can rest assured that our neighborhood is getting brighter every day.

    After all, more Christmas lights keep going up.

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    Seth Brown is a local freelance humor writer who will probably be added to the no-fly list after this article. He appears frequently in the Washington Post's Style Invitational, and his first book "Think You're The Only One?"was recently published by Barnes and Noble. His website is www.RisingPun.com.

All work on this page is copyright Seth Brown. If you are sharing it, please give attribution. If you want to reprint it, please contact me first.