So trivial, yet it really ticks you off.

[LizzieMaine]

I've never gotten a straight answer from anyone on exactly what "Boxing Day" is. I still don't know.

It's the custom of giving boxed gifts to employees and tradesmen and such on the day after Christmas. It's originally a UK thing, but it's become established in the US more as a day for organized post-Christmas appeals by charities. Our local community chest organization, striving to recover from being used as a personal checking account by its former president, puts on a benefit film at the theatre every Boxing Day, and we have a festively decorated box in the lobby for people to throw in their donations.

I still think Joe Louis ought to be involved though, perhaps as a mythic figure in purple trunks and robe who drives thru the night in his souped-up roadster delivering the gifts, or punches in the face to those who've been unworthy over the previous year.

 

[Stearmen]

what's "American" to me but a fried pastrami-and-cheddar sandwich on a baguette? Unless it's that Boys From Marketing vision of bland, synthesized Miracle Whip "Americanism" cooked up out of whole cloth in the twentieth century.

Oh great, now I have a craving for a pastrami & cheddar with Miracle Whip on a baguette! Lizzie, which beer would go best with that?

 

[Bamaboots]

Oh great, now I have a craving for a pastrami & cheddar with Miracle Whip on a baguette! Lizzie, which beer would go best with that?

Pre Belgian Budweiser or PBR.

 

[GHT]

It's the custom of giving boxed gifts to employees and tradesmen and such on the day after Christmas.

Exactly so: " A small present, especially of money, given at Christmas to the people who bring the post & milk, or remove the rubbish, (garbage) to and from your house during the year. The tip was known as their Christmas Box.

It's originally a UK thing.

As well as: The Bahamas, Barbados, Canada, Hong Kong, Australia, Bermuda, New Zealand, Kenya, South Africa, Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica and other former British colonies.

I still think Joe Louis ought to be involved though, perhaps as a mythic figure in purple trunks and robe who drives thru the night in his souped-up roadster delivering the gifts, or punches in the face to those who've been unworthy over the previous year.

Our school was so brutal with corporal punishment that teachers were banned from administering it. They issued you with a 'chit' that had to be presented to the Head or his deputy. Only those two could thrash you with the leather strap, then they would sign and stamp the chit to be returned as proof that you had received 'correction.'
However, the ban didn't prevent them cuffing you around the ears with an open palm, a slap known as: Boxing your ears. It was not only very painful, it was also dangerous to your hearing. It is done by slightly cupping your hands and then clapping them with a persons head it the middle so that your hands force air into the ear with similar pressure to that which makes the sound of the clapped hand. The recipient of the "box" usually will suffer intense pain for a few minutes and at least partial hearing loss for at least a day or two. It was a monumentally stupid thing to do to someone, but such was life in 1950's UK schooling.

 

[MisterCairo]

The day after Christmas became a time in England where the "masters" (upstairs) would give a day off, first, and a Christmas "box" of gifts, second, to their servants and other staff.

In Britain, Canada and other Commonwealth countries, the day is an official holiday, where, for the most part, we too have no idea what it's all about.

Except in Canada, where it became synonymous with post-Christmas sales ("Boxing Day Sale"! "Boxing Day Event"). We now have Boxing WEEK sales, and for nearly twenty years now, PRE-Boxing day sales.

And while still an official (statutory) holiday, relaxed rules allow many stores to actually open that day. Shops can clear out Christmas leftovers, "last year's models" and seasonal items.

The American Thanksgiving "Black Friday" sale idea is similar. And in another example of Canadian "culture", we too are now having Black Friday sales in order to lessen cross-border shopping at a time in November when there is no Canadian holiday.

Indeed, headlines are now appearing to suggest that Boxing Day sales "still" dominate over (Canadian) Black Friday.

So, there you have it.

And more.

I've never gotten a straight answer from anyone on exactly what "Boxing Day" is. I still don't know.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Oh great, now I have a craving for a pastrami & cheddar with Miracle Whip on a baguette! Lizzie, which beer would go best with that?

Around here they'd say a Haffenreffer Private Stock Malt Liquor -- "with the Imported Taste!"

 

[Trenchfriend]

Männer wie Wir, Wicküler Bier!! (it's like Jever)

 

[GHT]

"And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward." -- Matt. 6:5

That quote from Matthew, I understand the literal meaning, but it's difficult to square the circle when you visit The Wailing Wall, where, in the open to all and everyone, the Jewish faithful, pray unashamedly, in full view.

 

[vitanola]

I honestly don't remember ever seeing "public square" nativity scenes or similar public religious displays anywhere when I was growing up, so I don't have any emotional investment in such things -- if it was a common custom in other parts of the USA, it never was in mine. All we ever had in my town was a completely secularized Christmas tree at the end of the wharf, until the year some clowns in a pickup truck threw a rope around it and dragged it thru the streets after a few 'Gansetts too many. Being Methodists, we didn't even have a nativity scene in church, unless you count little kids reciting memorized pieces as part of the Sunday School pageant.

In my part of Protestant New England, it was common to drive thru a Catholic neighborhood and hear wisecracks and ridicule about "Mary on the half shell" and such things. Any sort of gaudy public display of religion was considered in poor taste, and I still feel that way about it today. It's not offensive to me so much as I find it gauche.

There was little to none of that nonsense until the 1960's. In reaction to the rulings of the Court in both the Engle and Abington cases there was a determined effort to promote ostensibly prohibited religious symbols in the primitive regions of the country. Much of this resistance to Abington ended up being conflated with the resistance to Brown v. Board of Education into a perfect storm of purely oppositional religiosity. The supposed memories of many who purport to decry their imaginary "war on Christmas" are generally faulty, as least as far as the pre-1960 period is concerned. If one looks through thousands of news papers one can find few examples indeed of commercial speech which include the phrase "Merry Christmas". On the other hand one finds many, many examples of "Happy Holidays" and "Season's Greetings".

One may search in vain for any images of religious oriented window or store displays. Typical decorations include depictions of Santa Claus (already an entirely secular figure), pine trees, snow, stars, elves, Poinsettias, secular slogans (from the inoffensive and ubiquitous "Happy Holidays" to the more pointedly commercial "Get the boy something that he really wants for Christmas", which although it specifically mentions the holiday is hardly an expression of faith), merchandise, and cozy winter domesticity. No Crêches. No crosses.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Another example is the sudden proliferation of public "Ten Commandments" monuments in the late fifties/early sixties, as part of an orchestrated publicity campaign for Cecil B. DeMille's movie epic "The Ten Commandments." DeMille's company and Paramount Pictures financed these monuments, donating them to a lodge with roots in the entertainment industry called the "Fraternal Order of Eagles," who would sponsor their installation in communities that agreed to take part. Most of these monuments were constructed in the South, Lower Midwest, and West, not coincidentally areas where anti-Brown sentiment ran the strongest.

The campaign was also endorsed by the "Religion in American Life" organization -- which, as historican Kevin Kruse has well documented, was a front for the National Association of Manufacturers, organized to promote the idea that unregulated, unbridled capitalism was in full harmony with the "Judeo-Christian Tradition." RAL was behind much of the so-called "spiritual resurgence" which flared up, seemingly out of nowhere, in the early and mid-1950s.

 

[dh66]

Aaahhh.....the 10 commandments monument - specifically one Judge Roy Moore's 10 commandments monument - a symbol surpassed in it's political divisiveness here in the great state of Alabama only by the Confederate flag. And I think, honestly, there for a while not even by that.

Sent from my XT1030 using Tapatalk

 

[swanson_eyes]

I'm irritated. A friend is having a Christmas party tonight and I don't want to go because I've been sick for 2 weeks, my neck is really bothering me (enough that I need to do traction) and I have a ton of laundry to do because it's Sunday and I need to prep for the week. A mutual friend knows all this but just called to encourage me to go. Why can't people accept "I'm not feeling well" or "I haven't been feeling well" as a viable reason for staying home?

 

[tonyb]

^^^^^^^
Perhaps your friend just wishes the pleasure of your company and wishes for you to know that?

I don't know the situation well enough to know that, of course. I've received invitations I wished to accept, but couldn't. And I've received invitations I didn't wish to accept, and didn't. And I've received invitations I didn't wish to accept, and did. Still, though, I'd rather be invited than not be invited.

A Sunday night party? What's the occasion?

 

[swanson_eyes]

Christmas. This couple does this every year. The other friend probably does feel the way you described, and I'm probably overreacting because in the past people have questioned my enthusiasm. It's not that I don't want to see people. It's that chronic pain limits me. People know this, but they don't really know this.

 

[tonyb]

Well, if I were hosting a party on a SUNDAY night, I'd expect the turnout to be limited by that alone. Perhaps the hosts don't rise early on Mondays, or at least on a Monday falling during the week between Christmas and New Years Day. Wish we could all be so blessed.

 

[ChiTownScion]

I honestly don't remember ever seeing "public square" nativity scenes or similar public religious displays anywhere when I was growing up, so I don't have any emotional investment in such things -- if it was a common custom in other parts of the USA, it never was in mine. All we ever had in my town was a completely secularized Christmas tree at the end of the wharf, until the year some clowns in a pickup truck threw a rope around it and dragged it thru the streets after a few 'Gansetts too many. Being Methodists, we didn't even have a nativity scene in church, unless you count little kids reciting memorized pieces as part of the Sunday School pageant.

In my part of Protestant New England, it was common to drive thru a Catholic neighborhood and hear wisecracks and ridicule about "Mary on the half shell" and such things. Any sort of gaudy public display of religion was considered in poor taste, and I still feel that way about it today. It's not offensive to me so much as I find it gauche.

It's definitely a regional cultural norm as to how such matters are treated in the US. In rural areas, particularly in the South for example, asking a stranger which church he attends is just being folksy/ friendly. I tend to follow a more English or European standard: asking such a question of someone you barely know is bad form, akin to asking them their bank balance, or how often he and his wife "do it."

It isn't that I won't discuss religion: as someone who was raised Catholic, educated by the Jesuits, dabbled in Evangelicalism (in many incarnations) and now consider myself a dispassionate mainline Protestant, I can go on for hours on the subject. I've seen and lived it from many angles, and I have my own views that were formed- obviously- by experience and study. Perhaps asking "Which church do you attend?" is really a superficial take on it, to my way of thinking. It's as if they're fishing for a label to pin on you... and you never really get to know other people by doing that. "Gaudy public displays of religion" are just that- form with no substance as to questions of faith or spirituality.

 

[TimeWarpWife]

In East-Germany, there are just 10% christians and 90% us lovely communists. So, shut up, Jesus, and give me the dishes.

As Molly McGee so often would say to Fibber, "Tain't funny, McGee."

 

[LizzieMaine]

The cat needs some way to drag in what the cat drags in.

 

[Fading Fast]

And back to our theme: so many manufacturers design bottles / containers that make it difficult to either control the amount of their product that comes out (so you over squeeze / shake / etc. and end up with too much) or make it difficult to get the last 5-10% out. I get that this increases their profit (in theory), but do they realize that it embitters their customers?

My girlfriend uses generic, Neutrogena or Roc face lotion and products (and, now, that I am 51 and my skin gets dry and flakey, I do too) based on who has the best price as they are all interchangeable, not-fancy products - but of the three, we try to avoid Neutrogena as their products are difficult to use in the above referenced way; whereas, the others aren't. Hence, so away from the lack of integrity issue, it probably isn't even a good business decision as in any near tie in price we'll always choose the not-Neutrogena product.

To emphasize, how can a company think it is good to have this repeated (I'd bet) by its customers in small conversations all across the country daily as someone squeezes one of their intentionally poorly designed tubes - "Damn Neutrogena and their horrible containers - you know they are just cheating us?" How many millions of dollars in advertising goes out the window when that happens?

 

[LizzieMaine]

Squeeze containers for condiments fill me with violent rage. If I spend two dollars for mustard, I want every drop of the mustard. So I squeeze all the mustard I can into a glass jar, and then hack the squeeze bottle open with a knife and scrape out every bit that's left inside. And then I throw the squeeze bottle in the garbage and spit on it, just to be sure it gets the message.

We use "bag in box" containers for soda syrup at work, and when the fountain starts to sputter, I make sure the kids rip the box open and take out the plastic bladder, and manipulate it in such a way that we get every drop of the syrup we paid for.