Full disclosure. I did this back in December of 2015, a sort of extra-length dad joke, I guess. And my wife has been listening to hours and hours of Christmas music. So ... I've gotta do it again ...
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I don't know. Maybe I'm missing something. I just don't get what everyone sees in these Christmas songs you hear all around.
Some of them do it to themselves. On what planet, for instance, could you see "three ships come sailing in to Bethlehem", a landlocked town in Israel? And everyone knows that you put decks on ships or on patios, but not in halls. And I have to say I think it is cruel to be pointing to the mother who just delivered her first child and referring to her as "round yon virgin". Mean ... just mean. And, seriously, how exactly do you "troll the ancient yuletide carol"? Seriously. Say, when did "jingle belling" and "mistletoeing" become verbs? And what, do you suppose, the verb tenses would look like? "Jingle belled", "jingle belling", "have jingle bellen"?
Others, however, just seem really out there if you're not paying close attention to the words.
Take, for instance, the Nat King Cole classic, The Christmas Song. I mean, sure, it's true. I'm sure that everybody does know a turkey -- that office clown or the conspiracy nut down the street or something -- but why put it in a song? "Everybody knows a turkey, and some mistletoe helps to make the season right." In what way does some mistletoe make it better knowing a turkey? Or is it safe having Santa flying around while under the influence? "We know that Santa's on his way. He's loaded; lots of toys and goodies on his sleigh." I mean, that's just not right.
And, seriously ... in Jingle Bells ... The horse was lean an lank, ran into a bank ... "And then we got upsot"?? I didn't mess with that at all. That's the actual word in the song.
Bing Crosby was known for his song about his thoughts about the girth of Christmas. Why? Who dreams of a wide Christmas? What does that even mean? Winter Wonderland isn't much better. "Later on we'll perspire while we sit by the fire." Ooo, that's really appealing, isn't it?
And tell me, why did Olive pick on Rudolph? You know, "Olive, the other reindeer, used to laugh and call him names." Someone should have done something about that bully reindeer.
Something I've never figured out is exactly who Harold Angel is. (Someone told me he was a famous journalists whose full name was Harold Angelsing.) You think about that a moment while I try to decipher "In egg shells is Dale."
True story. I was in a choir in my youth and the leader told us, "The words are important. If you don't understand something, ask." So I said, "What is 'See the blazing yule before us'?" My friend said, "It's Euell Gibbons picking a hickory nut in a forest fire." (I guess you'd have to remember Euell Gibbons's commercials for Grapenuts cereal where he'd hold up some nature item and say, "This is a pine tree. They are edible, you know.")
Strange stuff in those cheerful tunes.
Afterthought
Do you suppose what I've just been doing would be correctly termed "trolling the yuletide carol"?
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