Christmas Trees and Matzo Ball Soup

I've always been a stickler for not doing anything Christmas related, until after Thanksgiving. You see, poor Thanksgiving always gets the shaft. People ask what you're doing for it, and then you get together with family and become completely gluttonous for a few hours, and then it's over. There is no Thanksgiving tree. Nobody makes Thanksgiving cookies. And who ever heard of Thanksgiving carolers? In the meantime, Christmas is totally overstepping its bounds and crashing Thanksgiving's party. Christmas songs are playing. Houses are lit up with Christmas lights. Christmas sales are already starting at stores, and people are gathering their cheesy outfits for the annual family Christmas photo (to be accompanied by the annual obnoxiously detailed family Christmas novel that will be sent out to 158 of your closest friends). All of this before it's even December yet. Normally, I'm like, "Back off, Christmas! This isn't your turf yet, dammit!"

But not this year.

A paradigm shift has occured in my head. I have no explanation for it, other than the fact that I actually managed to make my plane reservations for Christmas earlier than two weeks before the day I leave. So maybe that's why I have Christmas on the brain. Whatever my main malfunction is, I'm actually putting up my Christmas tree tonight AND listening to Christmas music while I do it. Oh, the horror!! It's a good thing I have an apartment and not an actual house which would require outside decorations, because I would probably be receiving a visit from the Angry Pilgrim. I just found out about said pilgrim last night from my friend Katie. Apparently, one of the local radio stations sends people out to scour the local Chicago neighborhoods in search of pre-Thanksgiving Christmas decorations. When they find a house that meets the criteria, they take a picture of the decorations, and then they take them all down and steal them. After Thanksgiving is over, they go back to the house and, using the picture, put everything back just the way it was originally. Moral of the story? Don't piss off the Angry Pilgrim by doing Christmas before Thanksgiving. I'm glad my tree will be inside on the second story of my building because the pilgrim wouldn't be the only one who was angry if any of my ornaments got broken by his anarchist shenanigans.

In addition to Christmas-ing it up, and since I think Thanksgiving deserves to get equal shafting under the law, I'm also making matzo ball soup. My dad's family is Jewish, and while my immediate family has always been way more swayed by the enticements of Christmas (decorations, way too many gifts, music, the actual acknowledgment of the holiday, etc), we've also tried to pay tribute to my dad in some small ways. We have a dradle ornament on the Christmas tree, a menorah on the mantle, and we always have lox and bagels (what my cousin referred to as "pink fish and donuts" when she was little) for breakfast on Christmas morning. I think I'm subconsciously continuing the muticultural tradition up here by dining on Jewish fare while I decorate the Christmas tree.

But don't worry, Thanksgiving. I still love you and your overabundance of stuffing.