Shorty McShortshort

A quickie post today, because I don't want y'all to get distracted from writing your Wordsmiths stories.

You ARE writing one, right?

I have vested interest in your participation, because, after all, I am one of the owners of Wordsmiths and NEED you to show some love or I might start thinking y'all are a bunch of scardey cats who think you're not good enough and act all shy when in fact you're wildly talented and insightful and could blow the doors off of any contemporary novel if you'd just dust off the mental workings, grease up the typing fingers, and WRITE SOMETHING ALREADY!

Ahem.

Anyhow, here's what I have to offer today by way of a non-diversion from that most important task:

For the past 2 years I've participated in Weetabix's holiday card exchange. It's kinda cool to do, because cards come flooding in from people you don't know from all corners of the globe, and for a little while you get to feel connected in some little way to random people. You send cards to them, they send to you, and the world is sparkly and pretty. Yay for pretty!

As a card exchange alumnus this year, I got the added extra bonus goodie of musical swag from Weetabix herself, which is a little like having Brad Pitt ask for your permission to kiss you - it's an unexpected (yet oh so welcome) brush with fame that can cause tingling.

The swag this year is a CD with 19 holiday songs recorded therupon. Classics like "Christmas is going to the dogs" by The Eels, and "Great Big Sled" by The Killers. Kelly Clarkson makes an appearance, and by God can that woman sing - who knew? Celine Dion does something or another with a choir of French-speakers that is pretty awesome, and I don't like Celine all that much so there's some pretty high praise for THAT particular tune.

Song after song; some wry, some insightful, some doleful (because what's Christmas without some Dashboard Confessional?), but the one that blew me away completely was "Better Days" by the Goo Goo Dolls.

I know. I should have heard this song before. I know I'm old. Don't hate. I'm catching up, through the auspices of the very cool gal from Green Bay.

"Better Days" goes straight to the top of my favorite holiday songs list, which I just started in order to put this song at the top of it. Even with a slightly formulaic melody line, the message got to me. Give it a listen, see what you think.

All of which begs the question - Now that we're past the BIG DAY OF CHRISTIANITY, why not tell me what your favorite obscure Christmas/Yuletide/Holiday song is? Maybe together, we can create our OWN holiday soundtrack.

(BTW - I fully expect SOMEONE to nominate Adam Sandler's Hanukkah song....)