June Christmas Party - 6 Months Until Christmas

[00:00:02] This is a Bramble Jam Podcast. Live from the North Pole, it's time for Christmas Morning, the daily show where every day is Christmas. Here are your hosts, Bran and Scott. Well, well, well, hello, everybody. It's your good friend Bran.

[00:00:37] It is the 25th, which means it's a very special Christmas morning party. Episode Scott's here with me, Scott. Hi. Hi. Happy party day, Brandon and Leon Day. If you want to go by that nomenclature, which you and I,

[00:00:53] I think are just happier with half Christmas, that's a lot easier. It is. But we know whatever. Call it whatever you want. We are halfway to Christmas, man. It's hard to believe. Just yesterday was Halloween.

[00:01:03] I know it feels like just yesterday we were back in the three hundreds. And now here look at us. Look at us now, Scotty. Yeah, but you know what else we should be looking at? What's that? Our wonderful guest host who's finally back with us.

[00:01:17] Hello, Shannon. Welcome back. Hello. Oh, my gosh. I'm so excited to be back. It has been way too long. I think it's been almost six months. Yeah. And I always forget how bad the traffic is to the North Pole. Like every single time. Like, that's right, man.

[00:01:32] What a ride. But I'm here. And that's all that matters. At least you get to go up to the North Pole by sleigh. Brandon, I have to take a bus. It sucks. Yeah, well, you know, it's like all the elves get on the sleigh, too.

[00:01:44] And, you know, some of them are like really grumpy this time of year, I feel like because they all want to just be on vacation. Yeah. So some of them smell. Yeah, totally. Now, Brandon, I've already kind of spoiled the countdown,

[00:01:55] so we should probably get into the countdown. That makes the most sense. Yes. Yeah. So if you already know that it's six months to Christmas, forget that for a second. Six months until Christmas! Six months. Halfway. Whoa, we're halfway there. We're living on a Christmas prayer.

[00:02:20] Something like that. Wow. And we've got some exciting news today about some Christmas in the wild spotting. And I think six months to go is a good time for that to start happening. I can understand it if people are like,

[00:02:35] I don't want to see Christmas stuff in the store in March. OK, fine. But June, July? Shove it. Come on, shove it. It's time. It is time. It is. Yeah, it's it's time. It's time. It's also too warm. I don't know about Greenville. I'm assuming it's plenty warm.

[00:02:50] Shannon and I have been dealing with some heat in Denver. So I'm I'm happy to feel cooler by talking about what's going on, especially in the wider world. But I think what we should start with are holiday traditions and memories because that's everybody's favorite.

[00:03:06] Makes the most sense to me. Brand, how are you going to introduce the segments today? In a very fun way. I've been working on my snapping. Oh, like beat poetry. No, no, it's going to be at something. OK. This is Christmas holiday traditions and memories. Yes. Yes.

[00:03:21] Holiday traditions, holiday memories, holiday traditions and memories. I actually like that quite a bit. Thanks. Yeah, thanks. Oh, I forgot you're supposed to snap your approval. Yeah, yeah. Exactly. Exactly. Shannon, would you mind reading our first email from Mark Rowley? Yeah, I sure would.

[00:03:40] Hello, Brand, Scott and Shannon, and Merry Christmas. I was interested to hear on your April Christmas party of a TV show you featured called Christmas Obsessives. Being a Brit, I'm very familiar with it and thought I'd give you an update

[00:03:55] on a couple of the people featured as the show is a good few years old. Great. Sadly, the wonderful Sylvia Pope, who held the world record for the most baubles hung from her ceiling, passed away on April 20th, 2023. My birthday. Small world.

[00:04:12] Her family did go on to honor her Christmas spirit by hanging her bauble collection around their home last Christmas. Andy Park, who celebrates Christmas every day, stopped. Oh, no. Yeah. Like, oh, he did receive a lot of online abuse after the show aired.

[00:04:29] Oh, my gosh. His daughter, his daughter pleaded with him to stop for his own health. He took his decorations down in 2016, if memory serves, on Boxing Day. However, it lasted less than two weeks before he put them back up. And I understand he still has them up.

[00:04:47] His daughter was bullied at school when he first started. So this is sad. This took a turn. When he first started celebrating Christmas every day two decades ago. So it seems his passion that hurts nobody makes him a target.

[00:05:00] He has retreated a little into his shell due to trolling. Oh, my gosh. Oh, my. This is awful. This oh, wow. And I like the part where the daughter was like, hey, maybe for your health, you shouldn't crack open a new can of gravy every day.

[00:05:15] That that part I was on board with. I feel bad that she was bullied. I understand. I've got an 11 year old and, you know, I try to keep my Christmas crazy private. Well, except for this. Yeah, this this was very sad. So, you know, best wishes.

[00:05:30] I will say he has a website, MrChristmas.co.uk OK, that seems I mean, he has a blog. Last blog was twenty eighteen. I don't know. Maybe we should contact. There's a contact tab. We want to contact him.

[00:05:47] You know what, Brian, as the official of what would you call it? Media representative of Christmas morning. Why don't you take that on and see what happens? I'll reach out to him. Have either of you been trolled for this? No, no. I think in a joking way.

[00:06:03] Sure. People are like, yeah, OK, Mr. listens to Christmas music all the time. My way of dealing with that has always just been a little self deprecating. Like if people feel like you're in on the joke, too. Yeah. You know, they usually just let it go.

[00:06:15] And no, I'm not picking up my daughter at school like in a Santa costume or something. I know limits. Except for once a year. Once a year. Yeah, yeah. That's right. Only on Flag Day. That's it. Flag Day, Flag Day, Flag Day.

[00:06:27] I, um, I got to say, I, uh, the reason why nobody trolls me is they wouldn't they wouldn't dare. They wouldn't dare troll me. Well, not to your face. I'll just start playing Christmas music even louder. I guess I do get trolled all the time by Dan.

[00:06:43] Does that count? For sure. No, because he's been on Good Morning America wearing like a Christmas blazer. That's true. Yeah, that's true. We should be trolling him. You lose. You lose right to troll if you do that. That's right.

[00:06:55] But I actually still have not watched the Christmas obsessives, although I do have that cruise coming up. Maybe I should download that to the iPad and, you know, pull up a deck chair and watch it. Yeah, now you're talking. That's a good idea. It sounds pretty good.

[00:07:08] Although now I know that it has kind of a little like not necessarily a sad ending. I feel a little about the whole thing now. Yeah, a little bit. His email wasn't it didn't even have like any just ended like. But, you know, everything's OK now.

[00:07:20] Like it was it was just like now he's in a shell. Dude, I'm trolling. Now no one talks to him. He doesn't talk to anybody. Yeah, exactly. Now he's just down in two cans of gravy a day. That's pretty sad. Let's lift the mood here.

[00:07:33] I've got an email from Joe Fulton. Joe Fulton, of course, is the Christmas aficionado, and we will hear from him later in the episode with a review. But he also sent in an email. So Joe gets a twofer, but he's Joe. So that's totally fine.

[00:07:47] He says, I want to share the story of when my dad got my mom a rocking horse for Christmas. I know what you're thinking. Why is this memory so special? Well, here's the story. The year was 1986 and I was 11 years old.

[00:08:01] My family had a tradition of visiting Kaufman's department store in downtown Pittsburgh to visit with Santa. Every year the store had a different theme for the Santa area. That year, the theme was toys, specifically rocking horses. During our visit, my mom casually pointed at a horse and said

[00:08:17] she loved that rocking horse. My dad, who loved to be unique with his gift giving, went back to Kaufman's and they agreed to sell him the horse. He hid the horse in his office at the church he pastored next door to our home.

[00:08:29] On Christmas Eve, when we were all sleeping, he quietly moved the horse into the house. The next morning, my brothers and I woke up excited to see what Santa had brought us. Coming down the stairs, we were all stunned.

[00:08:41] And I still remember my mom's face when she saw the horse in our living room, not only because it was something she casually mentioned she liked, but also because the rocking horse is over five feet tall with runners eight feet in length. It's huge.

[00:08:55] My dad approached Kaufman's about purchasing the rocking horse. They wanted twelve hundred dollars for it, but eventually he talked them down to five hundred. And that's in 1986, too. The horse was brought down on a service elevator and rocked back and forth

[00:09:08] in the truck on the way home, getting odd looks from passing cars. It was hard to hide the horse before Christmas, but somehow he could surprise my mom. The rocking horse is still a fixture at my parents' house in the family room 38 years later.

[00:09:21] An adult can easily ride the rocking horse, and they have. Over the years, my mom has used the horse for Christmas events, raising money for charity. I have included a few photos of the horse over the years,

[00:09:31] including a more recent picture of me standing next to the horse for size comparison. I hope you enjoyed this story and that it inspires others to find that unique gift. Now, can you guys see these pictures? Oh, yeah. Oh, I'm looking at them, Scott.

[00:09:45] Yeah. And I will put them on our Instagram as well. I especially like the one of Joe next to the horse for size comparison, although I've never met Joe in real life. So now I need a size comparison for Joe as well.

[00:09:58] But I'm just going to go with it that this is huge. It's absolutely enormous. Yeah. And the horse hair itself also very high on the head. Yeah, it is. It's quite the tall mane on it. I can imagine being a kid and just wanting to play with this.

[00:10:14] Probably not rocking on it. I probably would build a fort with it or something, but it's so cool. Right. My concern would be like sometimes your significant other says like, that's cool. And then you go like, I'm going to get it.

[00:10:25] But what if it was like not like I want it? Five hundred dollars. Cool. What if it was like, that's neat, that I'm happy that I saw it? Yeah. But apparently it worked out for them. So, yeah.

[00:10:35] Have you guys ever done this with your parents where you just casually mentioned something and all of a sudden it turns into the gift giving theme for the next handful of years? All the time. Like I mentioned, I like Cookie Monster when my daughter was watching Sesame Street.

[00:10:47] And oh, my God. Shirts, a cake once. Cookie Monster cake came like it just it just never stopped. And finally I had to say, OK, I really appreciate this. But yeah. Oh, my mom definitely.

[00:11:00] Like if we were at a store and I said I liked something, she's like, well, she would often be like, do you want it? But and I'd be like, no, it's fine, you know. And then she would like buy it for me.

[00:11:09] And she's like, you said you wanted it. And I'm like, well, I was just I was just looking at it and saying, hey, that looks nice. I have to be careful the way I say things, Brian.

[00:11:18] I don't know about you, but I'll say something like, oh, that's really nice. I wouldn't want to have it myself, but it's fun to look at. Yeah, yeah. There you go. Yeah. Just get it. Get ahead of it. You get way ahead of it.

[00:11:28] Otherwise, you've got a whole room full with Cookie Monster. So thank you for both bringing up the mood, Joe. That was great. And also for sharing this. This is one of the most unique things I think we've ever received, Brian.

[00:11:40] I got to be honest, Joe's been sending in stuff for a long time. The fact that we just now saw this makes me wonder what else Joe's holding back for future episodes of Christmas. What's in that next room? I would like to know.

[00:11:52] All right, Brian, can you introduce our next segment? This is a new one. It's probably one we're not going to do very often. It's Christmas in the wild. Christmas in the wild. Wow. Not as good as the snaps, but I still like it.

[00:12:06] You guys, everybody got to turn that up real nice. It's really good. It's like you've been practicing. I know. It's like you've been doing some, you know, show. I mean, it's definitely not like I forgot that I do this every month and didn't come prepared.

[00:12:18] It's not like that at all. Not that at all. I'm still jealous I wasn't here for the wrapping when Jax was on because that was that was pretty epic. So yeah, that's fair. Yeah. All right. So this segment, it's a little bit of an odd one.

[00:12:32] And Shannon, I know you've been really busy and you probably haven't caught it up on your Christmas morning episodes. But I put the call out a couple of weeks ago and said, hey, Hobby Lobby is usually the store that puts out Christmas stuff the earliest.

[00:12:45] And I haven't been over. So if anybody is by in their town and sees Christmas stuff, please let us know. It would be fun to hear. And a bunch of people heeded the call. And indeed, there is some Christmas stuff.

[00:12:58] I wouldn't say it's the full deal, but it's starting to show up. And I've got a handful of emails here. And the last one from David Hatfield has a whole bunch of pictures. Those will be on our Instagram.

[00:13:09] It's a little bit hard to describe pictures of Christmas at Hobby Lobby on an audio medium. But Shannon, could you read a couple of these these shorter emails from people just saying, hey, I got something? Sure. And the first one.

[00:13:21] OK, I'm going to date myself here, but I want to sing. Where in the world is Deborah from San Diego? OK, so. Oh, yeah, that's right. I had to on the June. So on the June. That's a new segment. There you go.

[00:13:36] On the June 12th podcast, you were wondering if Hobby Lobby had any Christmas merchandise yet. I was in my local store last Saturday and saw fall merch up and saw the beginning of a display of Christmas garland.

[00:13:49] That's always exciting to me, Shannon, when you just see the tiniest little hints. It doesn't have to be the full regalia, you know, the giant section where you turn the corner and you're assaulted by Christmas. It's just nice to know it's coming.

[00:14:01] And even seeing the fall stuff gives me feels because we got Halloween coming. We've got Thanksgiving. I like all those holidays. Yeah, totally. I know I don't need any of the Fourth of July merchandise. Screw that. Oh, my gosh. Are you anti-America? Yeah, that's exactly what it is.

[00:14:15] Yes, exactly. Scotty, the communist. No, I just I'm just not into celebrating like a holiday outside in the heat. I don't like the sound of fireworks. So nothing about Fourth of July does it for me. But, yeah, America, happy for you. Great.

[00:14:30] Do you like the hot dogging contest? I would if Joey Chestnut was going to be there. But now because of the whole controversy. Yeah, now you've got to watch it on Netflix. Well, now I get to watch the Labor Day. They did. Did you hear about that, Scotty?

[00:14:42] Yes. Very excited about that. So we got but we got both this year, but it's not going to be nearly as fun. But it does open up the competition for other contestants because it's usually a runaway win. Yeah, I honestly I like it.

[00:14:53] I like that there's going to be a fresh crop. We're talking too much about hot dogs, but I like the fact that we're going to get a bunch of people that have kind of been down there

[00:15:03] and we can see what they who's the best of the best in that regard. And then we'll see the two champions of champions compete against each other in their own little battle. I like what's the other guy's name again?

[00:15:14] Brandy, I love where you were talking about it on the on an episode deck the hallmark this week about how he doesn't find Shannon. Listen to that one. Not the Christmas morning episode, Brian. Quiet. Yeah, no, he isn't hungry anymore. So I'm like, wow, that's wild.

[00:15:32] No, no, Brian, this gives me an idea. Yeah. Christmas cookie eating contest. Well, we've done that. We know how that one turned out. I clearly would not not do well in any sort of competition. No, probably not. Let's get back to Hobby Lobby, though.

[00:15:48] Sean from the Christmas podcast's podcast wrote in and said, I wanted to let you know that my Hobby Lobby in Eau Claire, Wisconsin has Christmas, fall and Halloween stuff out now. They've got the trio brand. Wow. Look at that. The Trinity, if so to speak.

[00:16:03] More fall and Halloween. But there is some Christmas stuff out. I went there yesterday. That was the 11th of June and I was in heaven. So thank you, Sean. I like that. And Joe W. wrote in and said this week, you happen to mention

[00:16:15] if anyone has seen Christmas decorations at Hobby Lobby. Coincidentally, my wife and I were there today. First, we saw some fall decorations. And then as we walked to the back of the store, much to our surprise, we saw Christmas wreaths.

[00:16:28] The store is located in Horsham, Pennsylvania, about 10 minutes outside of Philadelphia. So many good so many people doing the Lord's work. Yeah, yeah. We've got the scouts out in full force. Dan Ivins wrote in and said, I'm sharing the dismal view

[00:16:42] at our local Hobby Lobby in Reno from the past week. It's never a good sign when the ladder is blocking the Christmas section. That said, I'm going to give the Hobby Lobby an honorable mention

[00:16:52] for having some Christmas in the store in June and even sent in a photo of the orange ladder on its side in front of the Christmas stuff. But hey, you know what? It's got to go up sometime. So I give Hobby Lobby a pass on that.

[00:17:04] Yeah, lots of balls. I'm sure it was a coincidence. OK, first of all, Shannon, chill. Second of all, I'm sure it was a coincidence. I'm sure they weren't like, let's block the Christmas stuff. I'm sure maybe. You know what?

[00:17:17] I'm going to be out in Reno next week, so maybe I will go and I will see for myself. That's right. Has the ladder moved? I'll give you a ladder update. I might have tripped over the ladder to get a free tree. It'd be called Scotty Lobby.

[00:17:32] Scott. Wow. And then finally, we have an email from David Hatfield. This is the one with a whole bunch of photos. And he said they have a ton of fallen Thanksgiving stuff at the Hobby Lobby nearest me. But there are Christmas sections.

[00:17:43] And I'll put all of these photos on our Instagram. His Hobby Lobby seems to have taken the lead. Oh, my gosh. I love it. Wow. Grinch, you stole Christmas section. They've had a lot of Grinch stuff over the past years.

[00:17:56] And I know that because my wife loves the Grinch and always gets excited. Although she's careful to say, I like this, but not in our house. Right. So I like I like the Grinch themed Christmas tree with the like curved top. Yeah, yeah.

[00:18:09] That's a lot of Christmas stuff at this Hobby Lobby. Holy cow. I really like that ceramic Christmas tree with the lights. And, you know, that looks very 70s because my neighbor reminds me of them. So totally everyone has one. Erin, who works over here at the Bramble Jam,

[00:18:24] Erin, she has a part time job at the Michaels, and she says they have just recently put out a bunch of Thanksgiving stuff. So she is thinking that Christmas stuff cannot be far. Just likely, my guess would be out right after July 4th or like

[00:18:39] maybe next week, that stuff will be able to come on out. Makes sense. Well, I'm looking forward to all of this. Thank you, everybody who went and did some scouting reports, took some photos and let us know what an exciting time.

[00:18:51] I love the build up. Yeah, it's the best. It's nothing more exciting than when you see this stuff coming out in the wild. And then it gets really excited when you see it in like the non hobby stores,

[00:19:02] you know, like the Lowe's, the Home Depot, the wall, the Mart of the walls and stuff like that. It's not hard to find Christmas in October. It is hard to find Christmas in June. And I love this. So thank you, everybody. I really appreciate it.

[00:19:13] Scotty, let's take a break and we'll come back and we'll get to so much more stuff. People really came in, came in hot over here on the half Leon day, whatever you want to call it. And that makes me happy.

[00:19:25] So we got a lot more on the other side of the break here on Christmas morning. Welcome back, everybody, to Christmas morning. The June Christmas party, the halfway to Christmas party. Call it what you want. We're partying hard. So much stuff that we've already talked about.

[00:19:46] A lot of fun out there. Even more ahead of us. Scotty, what do we got up next? We got a holiday decorating. What do you got for us, Brian? Decorate. Decorate for the holidays. Not bad. Not bad.

[00:20:01] Shannon, I forgot to put in the notes that this email is from our wonderful listener, Ara Evans. Could you read her email? Sure. Hey, Scott, Bran. And hopefully. Yep. I'm here, Shannon. Yeah. First of all, happy belated birthday, Scott.

[00:20:16] Hope it was a great day for you this year. Thank you. Writing in to tell you what I did to celebrate my own May birthday while keeping the Christmas spirit alive. And maybe it will inspire someone else to do this for their birthday.

[00:20:28] At the end of the Christmas season last year, I picked up a 15 day sock advent calendar on clearance. I held on to it. And 15 days before my 35th birthday, I began opening the calendar. It was a fun way of counting down to my birthday and extra fun

[00:20:44] to see the cute Christmas socks each day. This particular calendar was cat themed and so festive. So keep your eyes peeled for advent calendars at the end of the season this year. They make a great countdown for birthdays. Happy birthday, Ara. Merry Christmas. And we're halfway there.

[00:21:02] Yeah. And she sent in the photos for this. I love this. The Oh, Christmas tree. Oh, Christmas tree. Your ornaments are history with a picture of the cat on the front of it. I'm interested in the fact that this is 15 days.

[00:21:14] This advent, I don't think I've ever seen a 15 day advent calendar. That's interesting. That is very interesting. I do love this idea of using an advent calendar outside of the Christmas season. Shannon, Brandon and I were talking last week about I think it's the Utah

[00:21:29] Symphony is going to do a Christmas in July and play Christmas music. And we both agreed that these things come around at the holidays and you're so busy and you're like, yeah, I don't really have time to do that.

[00:21:40] But how cool would it be to experience that in the off season? I want more advent calendars in my year. Well, yeah, yeah. No, I like this. I like this cat themed one, though. It's kind of funny. It's got like little words on the little funny cat faces.

[00:21:53] And it is fun. And you get new socks every day. Maybe they were like, no one needs 25 socks. They're like, maybe they were like, no one needs 25 pairs. 15 is enough, right? Maybe that's what their thought process was. Not even 12. You know, like the 12 days of Christmas.

[00:22:08] Brian, what is the year that you as an adult, that you start getting excited about receiving socks? Because I'm 48 and man, I would love to have some new socks right now. Oh, I'm there, man. I'm there.

[00:22:17] I think it's probably like late 20s, I think is what it is. Yeah, somewhere around 30. It turns and you're like socks to socks. Socks are cool. And I got to be honest, the nice thing about getting new advent calendars

[00:22:32] is you never know whether it's going to be one of those count up or countdown advent calendar. Right, right. Both are acceptable. We learned last year. Totally normal and acceptable. And that's just that's one of the added bonuses. Right. Well, thank you, Aira, for sending that in.

[00:22:45] Happy belated birthday to you as well. And we look forward to hearing from you. It's been quiet. You know, I always think it's weird, Brian, if I'm going to reach out to some of our more regular contributors and be like, hey, y'all good.

[00:22:58] Yeah. So it was great to hear from you. Absolutely. But that's the bonus of being a Christmas morning person. Is Scott will personally check in on you. You know what? I should do that. I'm worried about you. You good? Yeah, you're all right there.

[00:23:12] You're all alive. You doing okay over there? Totally. All right. Our last segment today, of course, we do it every month is holiday TV and movies. So would you lead us in, Brian? Yep. Here we go. You ready? Yeah. Give me a holiday. Give me TV.

[00:23:29] Give me some movies. Give me some TV holiday TV movies. Now, you might think that we paid for an expensive handbell choir, but you'll be shocked to know that was Brian's keys. No, it was not. It was actually one of the bells from the elves.

[00:23:43] OK, wow. That's he borrowed them. Oh, yes. If you don't believe you can't see them. So that's true. It was Larry. So, Scotty, that's why you saw the keys. That's right. That's right. I got to work on my Christmas spirit around here.

[00:23:55] That's interesting that you heard Bell, though, but didn't see Bell. You know, my ears are tuned to Christmas. My eyes are not. We have an audio clip from our wonderful friend Lenora Gilbert. She sent us a review of the movie Surviving the Holidays with Lewis Black.

[00:24:12] So let's hear that. Hello, Christmas morning party people. It's Lenora here, your Christmas freak from Arizona. And I'm not coming to you from the street today because it's hot here now. And we stay inside from 11 a.m. until November 1st. And happy halfway to Christmas.

[00:24:31] I'm here today sharing about a movie I bring out every year just before the holidays. It gives me a really good laugh every single time. And it is called Surviving the Holidays with Lewis Black. It's from the History Channel and it was made in 2009.

[00:24:48] A lot of people know Lewis Black from being a regular on The Daily Show. He is well known for his rant. And the premise of the movie is that Lewis is interviewing comedians about how to survive the month long marathon from Thanksgiving to New Year's.

[00:25:05] He interviews over 50 comedians and gets them to share memories, funny stories and advice about surviving the holidays. And that's what Lewis refers to as the month long festival of consumption. I enjoy this old movie every year because it's so fun.

[00:25:23] I enjoy this old movie every year as there are many comedians featured in it that have passed away, including Bob Saget, Shelley Berman, John Panett and Rip Taylor. So if you like stand up comedy, this is a great movie for you. You can watch it on Apple.

[00:25:39] You can still order the DVD from Amazon. Yep, I'm old. On a totally another topic, I just want to remind everybody that the price of postage stamps is increasing on July 14th. So if you send out a lot of Christmas cards like I do,

[00:25:53] you might want to just go purchase some stamps. Now, I took a quick look on the USPS website and they have a few Christmas stamps you can order right now. So happy halfway to Christmas, everybody. All right, Brian, I've never heard of surviving the holidays with Lewis Black.

[00:26:09] And when I started introducing it, I got this feeling like, oh, it's about how to survive the holidays. And usually something with that kind of tenor is is about like, oh, they suck. It comes too early. But then she said that they talk about memories and stuff.

[00:26:25] And then I was back on board. So I'm going to check this out. Yeah, sounds great. I'm intrigued by it. I'm intrigued. I'm nervous that it is from the History Channel because I'm notoriously not a fan of history. But this seems not like your standard history channel.

[00:26:40] Do you used to have a podcast called History or His Story? Yeah. If you listen to it, you'll understand. I was on it. You'll understand what I'm coming from there. I was not the one that was pushing the history. So I'm I'm intrigued by it, though.

[00:26:56] I like funnies. So we'll see. I'm going to give it a go. Yeah, I like the funny angle, Shannon. That part kind of pulled me in because sometimes documentaries can be a little on the dry side. But this sounded, you know, kind of quaint. And I don't know.

[00:27:09] I like to see this side of celebrities. You know, you don't get to see it that often. So to hear somebody having a nice memory and OK, it's fine if they have a little bit of like, you know, comes too early. OK, OK. As long as it's balanced.

[00:27:22] I think fan of comedy stuff, stuff with comedians and it's, you know, their actual like their real life memories and stuff like that. So I think that actually could be really fun. I've never heard of this. So yeah. And Bob Saget, filthy, filthy, filthy.

[00:27:38] Probably not suitable for her. Oh, my goodness. That one about the aristocrats. Holy cow. Not safe for even adults. So thank you, Lenore, for sending that in. I believe Lenore is on assignment camping on a beach somewhere. So I hope she's having a wonderful time.

[00:27:55] And then finally, we have the review that comes every month. Like clockwork from Joe Fulton, the Christmas aficionado. Joe, we can't thank you enough for all that you do. So Joe reviewed the Brady Bunch Christmas episode called The Voice for Christmas.

[00:28:10] Will Carol get her voice back to sing a church on Christmas Day? Here's my review and recap of my favorite Christmas episode, the Brady Bunch Voice for Christmas. Here's the story. The episode begins with Mike and Alice wrapping Christmas presents,

[00:28:23] including the tape recorder he got Carol to record her singing a church on Christmas Day. Carol comes home upset. She lost her voice. She can't speak and she can't sing. You lost your voice? The Christmas service. How are you going to sing without a voice?

[00:28:40] Carol went to the doctor and Mike is on the phone to get the test results. Laryngopharyngi. More commonly referred to as laryngitis. Turns out that Carol has laryngitis, straining her vocal cords from too much rehearsing. The doctor wants her to rest and avoid talking,

[00:28:56] but Carol can't rest because there's so much to do. Alice makes her grandmother's secret remedy to cure laryngitis. What else have you got in that witch's brew? Oh, olive camphor, tar, pepper, mustard powder. My grandmother's secret remedy. How could she keep it a secret?

[00:29:12] You can smell it for 15 miles. Mike heads to the department store to exchange a tape recorder for something else. He doesn't want to remind Carol that she can't sing on Christmas Day. While he returns the gift, Cindy visits with Santa.

[00:29:24] She tells Santa that her mom is real sick. Mommy's got laryngitis real bad. She doesn't want anything but her mom's voice back so she can sing on church on Christmas Day. Unable to tell her no, Santa assures Cindy that her mom will have her voice back for Christmas.

[00:29:42] Overwhelmed with happiness, Cindy kisses Santa on the cheek and runs to tell Mike the good news. I promise mommy can sing on Christmas morning. Oh, honey, how could he do that? He's not a doctor. He's better than a doctor. He's Santa Claus.

[00:30:02] Meanwhile, the Brady kids get each other presents. Greg and Peter test Bobby with hiding the presents, warning him not to get caught. Just make sure the girls don't catch you hiding these. If they catch me, should I eat the present?

[00:30:15] On Christmas Eve, Greg, Marsha, Peter and Jan are all depressed and sad that Carol doesn't have her voice. Christmas just isn't fun this year. Marsha wants to postpone Christmas until she gets her voice back and everyone agrees. Alice points out that this will disappoint their parents.

[00:30:31] They were looking forward to celebrating the first Christmas as a family. On Christmas morning, Mike is awakened by Carol humming in her sleep. He wakes her up and tells her to sing. Sing? At this hour? I can't even talk. I just did. Oh, Mike! Sing, honey, sing.

[00:30:47] Oh, come all ye faithful. Carol, realizing she has a voice, begins to sing Oh, Come All Ye Faithful, where we transition to her singing in church. Listening to his wife sing, Mike looks at Cindy and puts his arm around her,

[00:31:02] almost admitting that Carol getting her voice back was a Christmas miracle. So final thoughts. This episode is one of my favorites and where I discovered my love for sitcom Christmas episodes. It has everything you want. Humor, heart, Christmas feels. And of course, a bit of Christmas magic.

[00:31:20] I give this episode an A+. Well, that's my review of the Brady Bunch Voice of Christmas for the first season. What Christmas episode should I review next? If you watch it, let me know what you think. I'm the Christmas Aficionado. And remember, stay off the Naughty List.

[00:31:38] Bram, were you a fan of the Brady Bunch? I've seen episodes. Yeah, I liked it. OK, how about you, Shannon? Here's the story. Uh-huh. A lovely lady. Right, right. You just wanted to be in one of those nine boxes on the screen.

[00:31:50] No, I did watch a lot of the reruns on like Nick at Night or whatever it was called at the time. Right. Yeah. Yeah, I remember that's that's how I remember it, too, because it was either on on like daytime television as filler

[00:32:03] or it was on Nick at Night and I watched a good handful. Yeah. No, it was fun. Yeah. I and they don't do theme songs like that. No, they do not. Gilligan's Island, a bop. Other ones are good, too. Was there a Gilligan's Island Christmas episode?

[00:32:17] I'm sure that there is. Beverly Hillbillies, another great track. We'll put our research department on there. Thank you, Joe, for doing that. Please go to YouTube and search Christmas Aficionado. Check out all of Joe's videos. He does a wonderful job and he's always giving us wonderful content.

[00:32:32] Very selfless of him. Thank you, Joe. Yes, thank you, Joe. Joe's the goat. Has the Christmas goat? It should be. It should be Joe, the Aficionado goat. So I don't know. There's something working on it. Yeah, still working on it. Yeah, that's us. The PR department.

[00:32:50] Yeah, we did it. It is we are officially halfway to Christmas. And the good news is, is if you're now suddenly full of a ton of Christmas spirit, Scott, you and I are going to be back tomorrow with our regularly

[00:33:02] scheduled Christmas morning episode, which is going to be a lot of fun. Then we're going to be off for a week and then we're going to be off for a week because of July 4th and travel and whatnot.

[00:33:11] And so but we'll be on a boat on a 4th of July boat. I don't think there's going to be any Christmas on the boat. But what I'm hoping for is a Christmas store in Alaska. I always like to buy an ornament when I'm on vacation.

[00:33:25] What's your what's your route? What are you what's your route that you're going? I don't know. My wife planned the whole thing. I get on a boat in Seattle and then I return to Seattle nine days later. After that, I don't know. Dog sleds and glaciers and stuff.

[00:33:36] I'm looking forward to it. It's a lot. That's a long cruise. That sounds like a lot of fun. Sounds really amazing. I don't have to cook for nine days and I like to cook,

[00:33:43] but it'll be nice to have a break where I can just kind of wander by the buffet. And, you know, I'm working on my fitness while I'm gone, too. I'm going to be fitting this whole steak in my mouth. And I'm really looking forward to all of it.

[00:33:55] Exactly. And your is your kid coming to? Yep. The whole family. Big family. That's going to be fun. Yeah, we all get to share a room. That's going to be something. I don't know. Well, well, it's going to be it's going to be an experience.

[00:34:07] I think we're all going to appreciate, you know, having separate places to sleep when we get back. Hopefully not too many things to complain about for Scotty while he's there. No, no. I'm going into this with open heart, open mind, open eyes,

[00:34:20] just trying to take in all the new. But I will have any full Christmas report of anything that I might see while I'm there. I mean, I might see Santa. You might. It could be. Might be on the coast in Alaska.

[00:34:33] If there's if there's karaoke on the boat, will you sing a Christmas song? I would sing Fairy Tale of New York. Yes. There you go. That's not bad. You make sure you are.

[00:34:42] And I'm hoping to run into, let's see, Candace Cameron as a as a vet in a town. Yeah, she's a vet out there. I believe. Yes. Yeah. So I'm looking forward to that. So that's one of my plan stops.

[00:34:52] Although in the sequel, they don't really deal with her. But whatever. I'm sure she's up there. All righty, everybody. We're going to be back tomorrow with another episode. Unless you want to wait and hold on to that episode until next week.

[00:35:05] However you want to do it is totally up to you. All planned travel after this is done. So don't worry. This is it. Yeah, I think that's right. I think that's right. Yeah. Like we don't have anything on the any other surprise vacations coming up.

[00:35:17] Shannon, you could take all the vacations you want as long as you send us in field reports. And we can't wait to have you back. Yeah, I need to I need to be doing more field reports or something. Field reports. That's right.

[00:35:28] All right, everybody. We'll be back tomorrow. Until then, Merry Christmas. You're about to hear some ads that help pay for our trip back and forth to the North Pole. Feel free to listen. Feel free to bail now. But either way, thanks for being here. Ho ho ho.