Tossing Salt Presents:
12 (Dougie) Days of Christmas
Day 7: Peeling The Labels, Deep Sinking Feeling, and Christmas Carols
December 20, 2022
DougMaynard.com

I have been awake for less than ten minutes and this damn loving family of mine has given me a freakin’ headache. It’s 9:29 in the morning. Is it too early for day drinking? It probably is so I’ll go ahead and do something else. How about Day 7 of the 12 (Dougie) Days of Christmas? And for fun, I’ll make a notation every time I get interrupted by other people in this household. Let’s see how many times it happens in the course of trying to write one quick column. This should be fun. Yeah, fun. Let’s go with that.

So let’s get the Magic Bag, find three topics of discussion to talk about, and as Larry, the Cable Guy would say, “Get er done!”. Our topics from the depths of the MagicBag are Christmas Carols, Deep Sinking Feelings, and Peeling The Labels Off A Bud. Okay, that’s not really much to work with, but it might be fun and interesting. I’ll do the best I can. Let’s do this.

Peeling The Labels

Who else remembers this? Drinking the ice-cold beer in the bottles and then peeling the labels off as you drink? Maybe it was a generational thing, but during my heavy drinking years, when I decided to switch my usual twelve-ounce adult beverage for a bottled version, part of my goal and mission in life, as I finished each cold beer, was to carefully peel the label off the bottle, trying to get it off without ripping or tearing the label in the process. I don’t know why we did this, but we did. It was a thing. I think it was early signs of ADHD setting in. Or maybe I was just anal. Maybe it was both, but it was a thing I did. And now you know. I’m going blank here so let’s move on. And by the way, I’ve been interrupted to answer a question of absolutely no relevance twice so far as I wrote that paragraph, plus we’ve had two phone calls, one from my sister and one from a spam caller. So the interruption counter is at four so far and I’m only about six minutes into this. And people wonder why my nerves stay so frazzled and shot to hell.

Deep Sinking Feeling

This is when you know something isn’t right or good, but you continue to do it anyhow and get that feeling in your gut that you should stop, drop, and roll. No, that’s when you’re on fire. But you should stop and make a change in your course of direction. You know things are bad and not going to get any better anytime soon. Yeah, that sounds like my life. And add three more interruptions to the count. In less than a minute, I’ve been asked if anyone needs a new billfold, asked if I bought any Banquet sausages at the grocery store last night even though the person asking is the person who emptied my grocery bags when I came home last night after work, and has been told what our neighbor is doing in his own yard. Newsflash: I don’t care. So in less than fifteen minutes, we’re at 7 interruptions. No, make that eight now. I really do hate this place sometimes.

Christmas Carols

Who else remembers groups of people going around, door to door on Christmas Eve, singing Christmas Carols? I remember this from the 70s when I was a kid and admittingly, I may have even been part of those groups once or twice. But in my defense, I was like 9 or 10 years old and I was part of the choir at school and had a voice, kind of.

And I just got informed that when the dog poops in the yard, he goes way to the back of the yard. Yeah, okay. Now, what was I saying? Can you imagine the response people would get if they tried to do that whole Christmas Caroling thing in today’s world? No one would come to the door and listen to the singing. Police would be called about “a group of drunks disturbing the peace” and there would probably be several lawsuits filed by liberal clowns saying that these people singing Christmas carols offends them and is violating their religious freedom. Yeah, it’s a totally different world now.

Wouldn’t it be nice if it was possible to get together with a group of friends and walk around the neighborhood singing Christmas songs, and people actually appreciating it as they pretended to do in the old day? Now, you’d be shot before the first “fa la la la” comes out. It was a simpler and better time. I miss those days.

And add four more interruptions to the count. So that’s what? 11 interruptions, plus two phone calls in less than thirty minutes. And that’s not including the cats jumping up on the table and trying to “help” me write. What was it that I said earlier about day drinking? It’s so damn tempting. But I’ll refrain… for now.

And there you go. Hopefully, this wasn’t too bad for you. Now only one more to go and I’ll be caught up. I’ll do that this afternoon along with an edition of the Ultimate Wrestling Q&A, so watch for those. My thanks for reading. And for now, I’m just like the Kennedy Assassination. I’m history. Have a great one and stay safe. I’ll see you later. Merry Christmas.

Ubuntu!