Superficial question: What are your favorite things at Christmas, and that kind of stuff?
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I get to go first! (I invented it.)
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1) What"s your favorite Christmas music - you can only name 3 different genre, style, songs, what have you:
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*Motown, Beach Boys, and Renaissance Christmas.
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2) Favorite Christmas Carol:
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*Angels we have heard, or whatever that title is.
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3) Favorite Christmas movie:
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*"Christmas Vacation" - what else!
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4) What makes you cry at Christmas?
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* Beautiful Italian Bambinos, and old people and young men or women kneeling and praying before the creche - oh, and little kids and babies at Mass - even if they are misbehaving, loud, crying or commanding attention.
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5) Do you have a real tree or an artificial tree?
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*Both.
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6) What is your favorite type of decoration?
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*Old World European traditional.
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6) What is your favorite Christmas Eve food?
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*Bacala - Italian breaded and fried cod. Angel hair pasta sauteed in olive oil with garlic, anchovies, and pine nuts - served with greens, while popping lupine, and stuffing down Italian bread.
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7) Favorite style of creche?
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*Authentic Neapolitan - I just cannot afford it. Once I had an antique shepherd which I sold in order to get money to pay medical bills - and that was when I had insurance.
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(8) Do you believe in Santa?
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*YES! He is St. Nicholas and is in disguise in modern times because of creepy people who can't tolerate any mention of saints. - some guy named Luther f-ed that up for kids.
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(9) Do you go to Church Christmas Eve or Christmas morning? And the same question can be applied to when you open gifts.
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* I once went to church on both days, now I usually go to the earliest Mass on Christmas morning.
* When I did gifts, it was always after Mass on Christmas Eve.
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10) What do you think of commercial Christmas?
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* Thanks for asking. First off - many people today would never even know it was Christmas without the ads, the movies, the programs on TV, despite the fact that most of the people who work in these industries turn to alcohol to cope - while feeling more holiday-ish, even though they are on thee verge of a nervous breakdown from constant replay of bad Christmas music and mandated "Happy Holidays!" while uttering "Bitch" under their breath. Yep - and then, thank God that even with pagans and secularists, they too keep the Christmas spirit alive for many. many people. Though they bitch about the holiday and public displays, even the biggest air-head on the planet has to wonder what all the fuss is about - and wow! They investigate the matter and realize that Christmas is really all about the birth of Christ. So yeah. I like commercial Christmas. No one does it like NYC either.
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11) What is your favorite Christmas memory? (This has been asked in other meme but for me it can change from moment to moment... So don't ask again.)
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*When I was in high school and visited my friend's houses on Christmas Eve - I made the trip after my family was safely passed out, and my little brother was asleep. All of my friends were Italian and we would go to midnight Mass and return to one of their houses - usually Linda's. This is how I found out about my favorite foods, and we got to drink home-made vino, and we listened to Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra. Then we went downstairs with our own bottle of wine and listened to Motown, the Beach Boys, and believe it or not, more Dean Martin and Sinatra when Linda's dad came down to drink with us.
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12) When do you consider the holidays are over? (Take down decorations and stuff?)
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* Easy - the day after 12th Night, or Epiphany (not liturgical Epiphany).
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That is it folks - my own meme. Do it if you are so inclined. Does ANYONE ever read this blog? Whatever. Happy Christmas!
(2) Favorite Christmas Carol:
ReplyDelete*Angels we have heard, or whatever that title is.
LOL!!!
Angels we have heard on high...
It's a great meme. I'll put it on the list with the others I need to do. First I need to get some sleep before Elle comes home.
ReplyDeleteP.S. It's bacala and the original called for salt cod which had to be soaked for days and days to get off the salt. It is then layered with potatoes, cheese, and tomato sauce (which is how my grandma made hers) Some people use polenta instead of potatoes. There are as many recipes for bacala as there are little old Italian ladies.
Eat it hot Christmas Eve and cold for Christmas breakfast with eggs.
I cheat and use frozen cod and my grandma would be the first to say, "smart move!"
Thanks Adrienne - I'll change the spelling immediately - all my friend's moms prepared it the same, but they breaded and fried theirs. I love it.
ReplyDelete"*Bacala - Italian breaded and fried cod. Angel hair pasta sauteed in olive oil with garlic, anchovies, and pine nuts - served with greens, while popping lupine, and stuffing down Italian bread."
ReplyDeleteI would like that.
Sure I read your blog everyday and have for quite a while...oh and you might enjoy the fact that I am 100% Italian, was my first language too even though borh here...from memories you share I would guess we are soemwhere around the same age (you might be a tad older).
ReplyDeleteDavid
I blogged the meme.
ReplyDelete1. Old English Carols;
ReplyDeleteBenjamin Britten -- Ceremony of Carols & Rejoice in the Lamb;
Vince Guaraldi
2. O Come, O Come Emmanuel & Jesu, Ducis Memoria = the two most sublime, simple melodies ever composed.
3. The Bishop's Wife
4. Thinking of families who have nothing.
5. Fake now. My preference is for a living tree that I can plant in the yard.
6. Old German ornaments, or anything crystal.
6. Huh? I don't recall eating anything special on Christmas eve. But I love the sound of what you suggest!
7. I don't know enough to express a preference. The little creche I have now was made in China and cost a couple of bucks. Who knows, it probably has toxic paint and was recalled.
8. Yes. St. Nicholas of Smyrna.
9. Used to be both, but I can't seem to stay up for Midnight Mass now. I go in the morning. Growing up, we always opened gifts on the Eve, after a ride through the countryside. Now, I get together with family & friends whenever.
10. Hate it.
11. Serving Mass at Midnight, and giving candy canes and rosaries to each of the other servers, from Father. I was the tallest boy, and usually had preferred duties... :) I still treasure one of those rosaries, more than forty years later.
12. Epiphany.
I love your meme.
ReplyDelete:>
read [as in 'red']
ReplyDeleteOk since u seem like a nice kinda guy here are my entries:
ReplyDelete1. Favorite Christmas music genre?
Boy Bands, Young Country, Traditional
2. Favorite carol...hmmmm....O Holy Night (if done well and with a modern twist)
3. Totally...CHRISTMAS VACATION baby...I become Clark when putting up the lights.
4. Cry at Christmas...Well sometimes the fact that God became a baby in order to die for me (rare but it happens to me) and next...when I go downtown and see homeless young people who really OUGHT to be with a family around the tree, go to school, have a life and some happiness...the thought of what they must have suffered and are suffering to be out on the street...
5. Artificial but only because it seems to be a lot easier to get, put up, take down, clean up after...just light a glade pine candle or oil to provide a scent. WIth THAT said I always lose the vote and we end up with a real one.
6. Well if it can't be a nice sprig of mistletoe with a handsome caroler underneath it then....I would say the Creche, yeah it HAS to be the creche. I have an olivewood hand carved one from Bethlehem and blessed by priest at Bethlehem.
7. you have two "6."s) Gin and tonic with lime for the seasonal green....wait does that count as a Christmas food? LOL Ok...I would say homemade Italian panattone....if its commercial it sucks but homemade...mama mia!
7. (see above as to why I have another "7"). Favorite type creche is one that has the figures looking like adorers of the Word and not dancers in a circus (you know, some modern ones have postures that look like gymnists or swing dancers). I like ALL styles...very eclectic art lover here.
8. SANTA??? You bet!!!! Only I am devoted to him on his original form of Good old St. Nicholas of Myra (or Bari), pray for us.
9. Ok now this is tricky. It depends where I am and who I am with. IF I can chose then I go to Midnight Mass and then a late morning Mass (like 11AM or noon). Gifts are on Xmas morn bro...exceot for those that I HAVE to open at relatives house on the eve. BUT being 100% Italian we give gifts throughout the 12 days so I open them a different times.
10. The positive side of commercial Xmas is that it keeps it in mind and allows us to talk about the REAL reason and meaning of the season. I hate the capitalism of it but love its effects (GIFTS!!! LOL)
11. Well...I guess it was my first Xmas away from the family home (which was a battleground no matter what season it was). This first Xmas was at a monastery. We had like 28 acres of land with a creche about a half-mile walk from the chapel. Nearing midnight we all (about 15 of us) lit candles and sang hymns as we processed out to the creche in the field. That was real nice man...real nice.
12. As mentioned above we celebrate the TWELVE DAYS so it ends on REAL Epiphany (Jan 6) which we also call "Little Christmas". We have a big dinner and give the last of our gifts.
1) Handel's Messiah, Bach's Pastorale in C, Carols
ReplyDelete2) Lo, How a Rose E'er Blooming
3) It's a Wonderful Life
4) Remembering loved ones who have passed on
5) Fake
6) Retro stuff
7) Chicken noodles
8) Fontanini (but can't afford it)
9) Sure!
10)Maybe both, depending on when our choir sings; I am usually organist for 10:30 am.
11) I don't get all bent over the commercial aspect, I figure I only have to be as commercial as I want to. But I think it's sad if people think that's all there is.
12) When I got my engagement ring in 1971
13) The Baptism of the Lord. Because I am a big procrastinator and might only have gotten my decorations up a few days before Christmas. I want to enjoy them a little longer.
It's a great Meme! and my answers are pretty much ditto yours, except for an answer here or there, like fave type of music, fave foods, fave memories, etc. But almost the same ;)
ReplyDeleteOh! I love your question number 10!
This is my take on commercial Christmas:
It is the sole thing (along with booze) that will evenutally keep our culture from going over to Islam entirely. People just dont' want to give up their Christmas sentimentality.
Oh and I don't think it's a bad thing at all. God works with everything, and sentimentality has brought many fallen-aways back to Him throughout the centuries! (Even the Prodigal Son came back in part due to sentimentality).
And think about the lyrics to the Christmas carols! Even on secular radio stations, they're playing hymns about the Son of God, Love's Pure Light, calling us to O Come Let us Adore Him, etc, etc! I mean, it's pretty doggone miraculous, really. It will be commercialism itself that will keep Christmas alive forever. Even in the future, when they no longer call it Christ-mas, but Winter Holiday, folks will still be singing those hymns, and looking up the quaint history of their meaning--and maybe even finding Truth and conversion because of it!