OT: "happy holidays" starting early?

Don't know about general conversation, but the bellringers have been out for a week or ten days already around here!

We've had the bellringers out here too. Plus, for a change, the most outrageously dopey argument is going on in this town.

For the past 8 years they have bought a very expensive, very beautiful and very tall tree that would be decorated as a Christmas tree. For the past 8 years the tree has died a horrible death a few months later and has had to be removed at a very high cost.

This year they decided to rent a tree for $11,000.

Now there are two factions arguing. One side says paying $11,000 for a temporary tree is outrageous, me included, and the other side says why not simply buy a nice artificial tree, stick some decorations on it and end the problem. My thought as to spend $1,000 on Christmas and Chanukah decorations for the lawn for the next 11 years just makes sense to me and it would be pretty and fresh each year.

But what do I know--- lol

This has been going on and on and on.

Lucille

I don't know about in conversation, but I know Halloween stuff and "fall décor" was up in August and I started see Xmas stuff in September....

I've wished people I'm not likely to see "Happy Thanksgiving" already, but that is about it.

C

Totally outrageous Lucille. Why don't the idiots just grow a nice tree that they can decorate each year without killing one. There must be some kind of tree that resembles a *Christmas tree* that can be grown there. Hell, decorate a telephone pole. Don't you just wonder what is running our world at times? :-)

Sharon (N.B.)

This is very hot, very wet not very far south Florida. Just yucky enough weather for nothing resembling a Christmas tree to survive our summer storms. That's why I think a pretty artificial one would make so much more sense.

Or, as an alternative, just plant a low growing palm and decorate that. Just like they do in all the cartoons.

Would a Norfolk Pine grow well down here, Lucille. They are pretty any time of year!

Gill

I'm not sure about that. The only one I remember in recent years was a victim of the hurricanes and since then I haven't noticed any.

L

I don't wonder, I know the inmates are running the asylum...

C

Speaking of hurricanes, I have noticewd that this year Florida seems to have been spared ANY hurricanes. About time.

Toss a string of lights over a palm tree and be done with it.

If you really want to get fancy, wrap more lights around and around the trunk.

Oh Yeah !!! ;*)))

Lucille

>

That's what I said but try to tell that to our brilliant government officials.

A local radio station switched to all Christmas music the day after Halloween. The owner of my favorite fabric store, who usually has the sound system tuned to that station, has forbidden anyone to play it until the first week in December.

BAH HUMBUG coming on -- It really sickens me to see people who look like they're not well off stocking up on shoddy stuff in the so-called dollar stores and paying just a little less or about the same as they would for better quality merchandise in another store.

Sheesh

Our local guv't does away with all that, and just decorates downtown:

lights up to the courthouse building from the buildings across the street. Lights are also strung on all the other trees around downtown - living, permanent trees!

The thing my ex never understood: I spend more for quality the first time, and then take care of it. His theory that you buy cheap and buy another when it inevitably breaks was actually more expensive in the long run.

A friend talked him into a pair of $100 sneakers on clearance for $40. Those shoes fit and lasted well over a year. When they finally wore out, he went back to buying $10 sneakers at Payless that lasted for about a month and complaining that they hurt his feet besides. But, somehow, it made more sense to him to spend $120 a year ten bucks at a time than to spend $100 once every 18 months.

Why don`t They plant a real tree in mid town which they can decorate on holidays and enjoy as present to Earth the whole year through ????????? mirjam

That's what they did. What I was referring to was that for the past 8 years the tree that was planted in the ground died and had to be removed. It's a very windy area and apparently much too wet for most trees to thrive. They had the horticulturists do everything they could to save the trees but no one could work enough magic to let it live.

That's why I said they should now buy an artificial one and not pay this exorbitant amount for a cut live one that was doomed from the start.

Lucille