If you've still got that Christmas Spirit and you have yet to help support News That Matters, click here. You'll make Santa very Happy
Good Friday Morning,
As has become tradition for those who have families far away, or don't have them at all, (agnostics, Jews, Muslims and Sufi, too!) and for whom spending Xmas eve alone is not exactly in your preferred plans, the Asylum is once again open for all comers. Call or write if you need directions otherwise just drop in any time before 9PM.
"The one thing women don't want to find in their stockings on Christmas morning is their husband." Joan Rivers
"Dear Lord, I've been asked, nay commanded, to thank Thee for the Christmas turkey before us... a turkey which was no doubt a lively, intelligent bird... a social being... capable of actual affection... nuzzling its young with almost human- like compassion. Anyway, it's dead and we're gonna eat it. Please give our respects to its family... " Berke Breathed
"I stopped believing in Santa Claus when I was six. Mother took me to see him in a department store and he asked for my autograph." Shirley Temple
"Once again we find ourselves enmeshed in the Holiday Season, that very special time of year when we join with our loved ones in sharing centuries-old traditions such as trying to find a parking space at the mall. We traditionally do this in my family by driving around the parking lot until we see a shopper emerge from the mall, then we follow her, in very much the same spirit as the Three Wise Men, who 2,000 years ago followed a star, week after week, until it led them to a parking space." Dave Barry
"Oh look, yet another Christmas TV special! How touching to have the meaning of Christmas brought to us by cola, fast food, and beer... Who'd have ever guessed that product consumption, popular entertainment, and spirituality would mix so harmoniously?" Bill Watterson
"And the Grinch, with his Grinch-feet ice cold in the snow, stood puzzling and puzzling, how could it be so? It came without ribbons. It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags. And he puzzled and puzzled 'till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before. What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store. What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more." Dr. Suess
"Santa Claus wears a Red Suit, He must be a communist. And a beard and long hair, Must be a pacifist. What's in that pipe that he's smoking?" Arlo Guthrie
“We are men of peace we are men who work and we want no quarrel. But if you destroy our peace if you take away our work if you try to range us one against the other we will know what to do. If you tell us to make the world safe for democracy we will take you seriously and by god and by Christ we will make it so. We will use the guns you force upon us we will use them to defend our very lives and the menace to our lives does not lie on the other side of a nomansland that was set apart without our consent it lies within our own boundaries here and now we have seen it and we know it. Dalton Trumbo - "Johnny Got His Gun"
"Merry Christmas, Nearly Everybody!" Ogden Nash
NORAD has confirmed that Santa and his fully-loaded, reindeer-powered sleightook off from the North Pole and soared into the arctic sky at 6:00 a.m. EST (5:00 a.m. CST, 4:00 a.m. MST, 3:00 a.m. PST). NORAD radar is tracking Rudolph’s bright red nose, and satellite imagery is providing minute-by-minute coverage of Santa’s location. If you'd like to track Santa's progress as he delivers presents throughout the globe, click here.
From John McCutcheon:
Oh my name is Francis Tolliver, I come from Liverpool Two years ago the war was waiting for me after school From Belgium and to Flanders, Germany to here I fought for King and country I love dear.
Twas Christmas in the trenches and the frost so bitter hung The frozen fields of France where still no Christmas songs were sung Our families back in England were toasting us that day There brave and glorious lads so far away.
I was lying with my mess mates on the cold and rocky ground When across the lines of battle came a most peculiar sound Says I now listen up me boys, each soldier strained to hear As one young German voice sang out so clear.
He's singing bloody well you know, my partner says to me Soon one by one each German voice joined in in harmony The cannons rested silent and the gas cloud rolled no more As Christmas brought us respite from the war.
Good Friday Morning,
