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Christmas or Christmas Day (Old English: Crīstesmæsse, meaning "Christ's Mass") is an annual festival commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ, observed most commonly on December 25 as a religious and cultural celebration among billions of people around the world. A feast central to the Christian liturgical year, it is prepared for by the season of Advent or Nativity Fast and is prolonged by the Octave of Christmas and further by the season of Christmastide. Christmas Day is a public holiday in many of the world's nations, is celebrated culturally by a large number of non-Christian people, and is an integral part of the Christmas and holiday season.
The celebratory customs associated in various countries with Christmas have a mix of pre-Christian, Christian, and secular themes and origins. Popular modern customs of the holiday include gift giving, completing an Advent calendar or Advent wreath, Christmas music and caroling, an exchange of Christmas cards, church services, a special meal, and the display of various Christmas decorations, including Christmas trees, Christmas lights, nativity scenes, garlands, wreaths, mistletoe, and holly. In addition, several closely related and often interchangeable figures, known as Santa Claus, Father Christmas, Saint Nicholas, and Christkind, are associated with bringing gifts to children during the Christmas season and have their own body of traditions and lore. Because gift-giving and many other aspects of the Christmas festival involve heightened economic activity, the holiday has become a significant event and a key sales period for retailers and businesses. The economic impact of Christmas is a factor that has grown steadily over the past few centuries in many regions of the world.
Hanukkah-December 6th-December 14th
Chanukkah or Ḥanukkah), also known as the Festival of Lights and Feast of Dedication, is an eight-day Jewish holiday commemorating the rededication of the Holy Temple (the Second Temple) in Jerusalem at the time of the Maccabean Revolt against the Seleucid Empire of the 2nd century BC. Hanukkah is observed for eight nights and days, starting on the 25th day of Kislev according to the Hebrew calendar, which may occur at any time from late November to late December in the Gregorian calendar.
The festival is observed by the kindling of the lights of a unique candelabrum, the nine-branched menorah or hanukiah, one additional light on each night of the holiday, progressing to eight on the final night. The typical menorah consists of eight branches with an additional visually distinct branch. The extra light, with which the others are lit, is called a shamash (Hebrew: שמש‎, "attendant") and is given a distinct location, usually above or below the rest.
Other Hanukkah festivities include playing dreidel and eating oil based foods such as doughnuts and latkes.
Hanukkah became more widely celebrated beginning from the 1970s, when Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson called for public awareness and observance of the festival and encouraged the lighting of public menorahs. Diane Ashton attributed the popularization of Hanukkah by some of the American Jewish community as a way to adapt to American life, because they could celebrate Hannukkah which occurs at around the same time as Christmas.
Winter Solstice-December 22nd
Winter solstice is an astronomical phenomenon marking the shortest day and the longest night of the year. Winter solstice occurs for the Northern Hemisphere in December and for the Southern Hemisphere in June.
The axial tilt of Earth and gyroscopic effects of its daily rotation mean that the two opposite points in the sky to which the Earth's axis of rotation points change very slowly (making a complete circle approximately every 26,000 years). As the Earth follows its orbit around the Sun, the polar hemisphere that faced away from the Sun, experiencing winter, will, in half a year, face towards the Sun and experience summer. This is because the two hemispheres face opposite directions along Earth's axis, and so as one polar hemisphere experiences winter, the other experiences summer.
More evident from high latitudes, a hemisphere's winter solstice occurs on the shortest day and longest night of the year, when the sun's daily maximum elevation in the sky is at its lowest. The winter solstice itself lasts only a moment in time, so other terms are used for the day on which it occurs, such as "midwinter", or the "shortest day". It is often considered the "extreme of winter" (Dongzhi in the Chinese calendar). In meteorology, winter in the Northern Hemisphere spans the entire period of December through February. The seasonal significance of the winter solstice is in the reversal of the gradual lengthening of nights and shortening of days. The earliest sunset and latest sunrise dates differ from winter solstice, however, and these depend on latitude, due to the variation in the solar day throughout the year caused by the Earth's elliptical orbit (see earliest and latest sunrise and sunset).
Worldwide, interpretation of the event has varied across cultures, but many have held a recognition of rebirth, involving holidays, festivals, gatherings, rituals or other celebrations around that time.
Kwanzaa-December 26th-January 1st
Kwanzaa (/ˈkwɑːnzə/) is a week-long celebration held in the United States and in other nations of the Western African diaspora in the Americas. The celebration honors African heritage in African-American culture, and is observed from December 26 to January 1, culminating in a feast and gift-giving. Kwanzaa has seven core principles (Nguzo Saba). It was created by Maulana Karenga, and was first celebrated in 1966–67.
Maulana Karenga created Kwanzaa in 1965 as the first specifically African-American holiday. According to Karenga, the name Kwanzaa derives from the Swahili phrase matunda ya kwanza, meaning "first fruits of the harvest". The choice of Swahili, an East African language, reflects its status as a symbol of Pan-Africanism, especially in the 1960s, although most East African nations were not involved in the Atlantic slave trade that brought African people to America.
Kwanzaa is a celebration that has its roots in the black nationalist movement of the 1960s, and was established as a means to help African Americans reconnect with their African cultural and historical heritage by uniting in meditation and study of African traditions and Nguzo Saba, the "seven principles of African Heritage" which Karenga said "is a communitarian African philosophy".
During the early years of Kwanzaa, Karenga said that it was meant to be an "oppositional alternative" to Christmas. However, as Kwanzaa gained mainstream adherents, Karenga altered his position so that practicing Christians would not be alienated, then stating in the 1997 Kwanzaa: A Celebration of Family, Community, and Culture, "Kwanzaa was not created to give people an alternative to their own religion or religious holiday." Many African Americans who celebrate Kwanzaa do so in addition to observing Christmas.
Have a great month, Ranter!
milk and Girl Scout cookies ;-)
Save your breath-You may need it to blow up your date.
Why Italian Fathers and Grandfathers pass their hand guns down through the family.
An old Italian man is dying. He calls his grandson to his bedside. "Guido, I wan' you lissin ame. I wan' you to take-a my chrome plated .38 revolver so you will always remember me."
"But grandpa, I really don't like guns..how about you leave me your Rolex watch instead?"
"You lissin ame, boy. Somma day you gonna be runna DA business, you gonna have a beautiful wife, lots a money, a big-a home and maybe a couple of bambinos."
"Somma day you gonna come-a home and maybe finda you wife inna bed with another man. "Whatta you gonna do then? Point at you watch and say, 'times up'"?
milk and Girl Scout cookies ;-)
Save your breath-You may need it to blow up your date.
Why Italian Fathers and Grandfathers pass their hand guns down through the family.
An old Italian man is dying. He calls his grandson to his bedside. "Guido, I wan' you lissin ame. I wan' you to take-a my chrome plated .38 revolver so you will always remember me."
"But grandpa, I really don't like guns..how about you leave me your Rolex watch instead?"
"You lissin ame, boy. Somma day you gonna be runna DA business, you gonna have a beautiful wife, lots a money, a big-a home and maybe a couple of bambinos."
"Somma day you gonna come-a home and maybe finda you wife inna bed with another man. "Whatta you gonna do then? Point at you watch and say, 'times up'"?
"The liberals can understand everything but people who don't understand them." Lenny Bruce
"The cleverest of all, in my opinion, is the man who calls himself a fool at least once a month." Dostoevsky
An attractive blonde from Cork , Ireland , arrived at the casino. She seemed a little intoxicated and bet twenty thousand dollars in a single roll of the dice.
She said,"I hope you don't mind, but I feel much luckier when I'm completely nude." With that, she stripped from the neck down, rolled the dice and with an Irish brogue yelled, "Come on, baby, Mama needs new clothes!"
As the dice came to a stop, she jumped up and down and squealed, "Yes! Yes! I won, I won!" She hugged each of the dealers, picked up her winnings and her clothes and quickly departed.
The dealers stared at each other dumbfounded. Finally, one of them asked, "What did she roll?" The other answered, "I don't know-I thought you were watching."
MORAL OF THE STORY
Not all Irish are drunks, not all blondes are dumb, .....but all men....are men!
milk and Girl Scout cookies ;-)
Save your breath-You may need it to blow up your date.
An attractive blonde from Cork , Ireland , arrived at the casino. She seemed a little intoxicated and bet twenty thousand dollars in a single roll of the dice.
She said,"I hope you don't mind, but I feel much luckier when I'm completely nude." With that, she stripped from the neck down, rolled the dice and with an Irish brogue yelled, "Come on, baby, Mama needs new clothes!"
As the dice came to a stop, she jumped up and down and squealed, "Yes! Yes! I won, I won!" She hugged each of the dealers, picked up her winnings and her clothes and quickly departed.
The dealers stared at each other dumbfounded. Finally, one of them asked, "What did she roll?" The other answered, "I don't know-I thought you were watching."
MORAL OF THE STORY
Not all Irish are drunks, not all blondes are dumb, .....but all men....are men!
"The liberals can understand everything but people who don't understand them." Lenny Bruce
"The cleverest of all, in my opinion, is the man who calls himself a fool at least once a month." Dostoevsky
Gosh! Remember what a terrific president Ronald Reagan was, what with taking credit for ending the USSR and taking credit for a mild economic expansion (but not for either recession during his terms), and Making America Proud Again? Oh, and how it took until 1985, after more than 5000 people had died of AIDS, for Reagan to say the name of the disease? It was his second term, so he could say it without electoral backlash, and besides, Ryan White had already made it OK for straight people to say “AIDS” in 1984. Let’s relive those exciting early days of the epidemic with this documentary short by Scott Calonico, When AIDS Was Funny, released Tuesday on Vanity Fair to mark World AIDS Day.
Oh 1985, such good times!! It wasn’t yet politically incorrect to talk about "those people" without exaggerating a lisp and a limp-wristed sashay. Don't worry!!! Donald Trump is bringing this style of comedy back as merely one part of President Trump’s plan to Make America Great Again™.
A truck driver was driving along on a country road. A sign came up that read, “Low Bridge Ahead”. Before he realized it, the bridge was directly ahead and he got stuck under it. Cars were backed up for miles.
Finally, a police car arrived. The policeman got out of his car and walked to the truck’s cab and said to the driver, “Got stuck, hay?”
The truck driver said, “No, I was delivering this bridge and ran out of fuel!”
I am waiting for Bill Engvald to say "Here's your sign"!
milk and Girl Scout cookies ;-)
Save your breath-You may need it to blow up your date.
![[Linked Image from w-8ben.com]](http://w-8ben.com/p/2015/10/wishing-merry-christmas-xrtneklp.jpg)
![[Linked Image from ffyr.org]](http://www.ffyr.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/319.jpg)
![[Linked Image from passyunkpost.com]](http://www.passyunkpost.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/winter-solstice1.jpg)
![[Linked Image from iex-wordpress-images.s3.amazonaws.com]](https://iex-wordpress-images.s3.amazonaws.com/blog.interexchange.org/career-training-usa/2014/12/kwanzaa-kinara.jpg)
