In a few weeks (on August 28), a new movie based on Warner Brothers Animation and desert dwellers Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner hits movie theaters.
While well aware that Warner Brothers Animation and Road Runner stalwarts Chuck Jones, Mike Maltese, Lloyd Vaughan, Ken Harris, Phil Monroe and Ben Washam are long gone, this trailer looks pretty darn good. Nonetheless, the Coyote vs. ACME preview emphatically sparks an uncontrollable urge to watch Road Runner cartoons!
Will's over-the-top performance in the Fly High Duluth sketch is a personal favorite and the ultimate statement on bad bands, enhanced by Fred Armisen as the group's animated and overenthusiastic drummer. Love the fact that both host Scarlett Johansson and the entire SNL cast are involved.
When everyday life, the annoyances of old age and unrelentingly lousy 2026 get the gang here feeling down, a fantastic way to get to that better place involves vintage Warner Bros. cartoons from 1935-1955 and the both gloriously unhinged and intergalactic country singers Clancy T. Bachleratt and Jackie Snad.
And, in closing, we respectfully tip our Michigan J. Frog top hats to the desert dwellers and all involved in making Warner Brothers cartoons and the high-wire sketch comedy at Second City, Groundlings, Upright Citizens Brigade, etc. Thanks to all who bring the laughs!
This blog has recently profiled 1920's and 1930's comics Harry Sweet, Lloyd Hamilton, Joe Rock's Three Fat Guys a.k.a. Ton Of Fun series and such Columbia Shorts Department stalwarts as The Three Stooges, Andy Clyde, Leon Errol and Harry Langdon in search of laughs. Now we travel across the pond and leap several decades later to 1980's and 1990's with French & Saunders and The Vicar Of Dibley.
Dawn French gets this comedy fan thinking of Melissa McCarthy, another amazing physical comedienne, whose six times hosting Saturday Night Live were invariably hilarious.
Among the numerous prominent comedy performers from The Groundlings on Saturday Night Live: Melissa and Kristen Wiig. There was a point when SNL, the late 1970's - early 1980's ABC sketch comedy show Fridays and (later) Mad TV were competing for ex-Groundlings. Surprises me that Melissa was not hired to be in the SNL cast.
One of my favorite bits from the past quarter century of SNL is the Lulu Diamonds sketch. It's both an extremely funny sendup of Mae West and exceptional physical comedy. Melissa and supporting cast Jason Sudeikis, Taran Killam, Andy Samberg and Bobby Moynihan are all excellent.
Her last stint hosting Saturday Night live was on December 6, 2025.
While all the sketches were excellent, the following one is particularly riotous.
The following SNL sketch written by Streeter Seidel & Mikey Day is quite funny and downright Monty Python-esque.
Indeed, laughs are getting harder and harder to find these days - and that brings us to Billy Crystal.
Billy, born on this day in 1948, was one of the last cuts from those scheduled to perform in the first episode of Saturday Night Live in 1975 and would be on the short list, along with Michael McKean, of those who hosted SNL before becoming a cast member.
Not that surprisingly, present-day comments regarding Mr. Crystal's stand-up act way back in the 1970's and 1980's demonstrate that many young people have no idea who Sammy Davis Jr and Muhammad Ali were. The superstardom of both Mr. Davis, the seriously driven entertainer/Rat Pack cornerstone and the heavyweight champ back in those days is downright difficult to explain to those 25 and under in 2026.
Suffice to say that while Billy Crystal has done a gazillion things in showbiz over the past five decades, the favorite of this blog remains his eulogy at Muhammad Ali's memorial service.
Billy started his career, way back before he started appearing in the Susan Harris Productions show Soap, with a very funny impression of Muhammad Ali. The pugilist/social activist saw it and the two became lifelong friends.
Before Billy hosted SNL in 1983, there was his prime-time Billy Crystal Comedy Hour, co-starring SCTV stalwarts John Candy, Rick Moranis and Dave Thomas.
We like Saturday Night Live season 10 a great deal, even given its reliance on pre-taped segments and the downright astonishing fact that producers Dick Ebersol and Bob Tischler opted NOT to have Geena Davis or Andrea Martin in the cast.
Guaranteed to leave young'uns completely, utterly baffled: the following spoof of the hit 1980's TV series that teamed formidable comic character actress and former SNL cast member Jane Curtin with Susan St. James, co-star of McMillan & Wife (who was married to SNL's second producer, Dick Ebersol). Here's hopin' Kate Hepburn and Muhammad Ali got the joke and at least found it somewhat funny.
Fernando may be my singular favorite Billy Crystal persona.
Another standout from SNL season 10: the masochistic night watchmen played by Billy Crystal and Christopher Guest.
Still find it amazing to see Crystal, Guest, Eddie Murphy, Martin Short and Rich Hall - yes, all of them - together in the Broadway Gumby Rose sketch.
We respectfully tip the Jimmie Hatlo hat and wish a Happy Birthday to Billy, with additional hat tips, kudos, bravos and huzzahs going to Muhammad Ali, Johnny Winter - and the YouTube channel Saturday Night Network for terrific summaries of each season of the show, plus interviews with cast members.
Wishing all a happy new year! This Blogmeister has two takes on the first day of 2026: happy to be here and good riddance, 2025! Rang in the new year this morning by watching musical sketches concocted for Saturday Night Live by John Mulaney and Colin Jost. Do we love Kenan Thompson and Kate McKinnon as singing lobsters? Yes.
Following the Diner Lobster extravaganza: the Subway Churro sketch. Again, the performances by the Saturday Night Live cast, especially Cecily Strong and the aforementioned Kenan Thompson, are stellar. Watching this creates a strong impression that John Mulaney yearned to star in West Side Story.
The last John Mulaney mini-musical was the Airport Sushi at LaGuardia sketch. Is Mulaney an avid fan of musical theater first, comedy writer/actor/comic second? Very likely the answer to that question is an emphatic YES.
Looks like the new year will be kind to incurable animation buffs.
First and foremost, the restoration of Ed Graham's funny, unique, clever and unusual mid-1960's Saturday morning cartoon series Linus The Lionhearted (featuring excellent voice work by Sheldon Leonard, Carl Reiner, Ruth Buzzi, Jonathan Winters, Stiller & Meara and more) is progressing nicely.
Tommy Stathes' latest Cartoon Roots Blu-ray, a tribute to Fleischer Studios and Ko-ko The Clown, is now available.
Time and space-bending adventures in this Out Of The Inkwell compilation include:
THE CLOWN'S PUP (1919)
THE BOXING KANGAROO (1920)
THE CHINAMAN (1920)
THE CLOWN'S LITTLE BROTHER (1920)
PERPETUAL MOTION (1920
THE RESTAURANT (1920)
THE AUTOMOBILE RIDE (1921)
MODELING (1921)
FISHING (1921)
MECHANICAL DOLL (1922)
BUBBLES (1922)
FLIES (1922)
SPARRING PARTNER (1922)
BIRTHDAY (1922)
REUNION (1922)
While it would be quite the understatement to designate 2025 as one seriously lousy year, at least animation fans could cheer up somewhat thanks to the long-awaited release of classic cartoons to Blu-ray on Looney Tunes Collector's Vault volume 1, released last June. Volume 2 of the Looney Tunes Collector's Vault Blu-ray series will be released in March.
Looney Tunes Collector's Vault volume 2 is quite a treasure trove of classic cartoon goodness, as was volume 1.
Been many moons since this blogger has seen the Bill Hanna & Joe Barbera Tom & Jerry cartoons, so it will be fun to revisit them.
The debut of the series, Puss Gets The Boot (1939) reflects the deliberate, Disney-esque Rudy Ising school of cartoonmaking rather than the fastier, brassier and outrageous slapstick-oriented approach that dominates the subsequent Hanna-Barbera and Tex Avery MGM cartoons.
In our view, the series hit its peak in the mid-to-late 1940's.
Here are a bunch of clips from Tom & Jerry cartoons. While tending to be partial to Avery's MGM cartoons over the Tom & Jerry series, must admit to laughing loudly and often during this compilation.
Author, animation historian and restoration expert Thad Komorowski has reviewed volume 1 and volume 2 and volume 3 of the Tom & Jerry: The Golden Era series in detail.
The gang at Way Too Lazy To Write A Blog extend big time thanks, kudos, bravos and huzzahs to everyone involved in these restorations and shall now make an earnest effort to find a modicum of optimism to begin the new year!
Since we will not be able to attend Tommy Stathes' epic Christmas Cartoon Carnival: Santa Claus 4 U & Me program this coming Sunday at Rubulad in Brooklyn, and the annual winter edition of the KFJC Psychotronix Film Festival has been cancelled (postponed for now, returning to Foothill College in Los Altos Hills, California in spring 2025. . . we hope), the gang here shall try to get in at least a somewhat festive holiday mood by watching the following selection of Yuletide comedy sketches.
If you're in NYC and able to attend Christmas Cartoon Carnival: Santa Claus 4 U & Me at Rubulad (338 Flushing Avenue between Classon and Taffee in Brooklyn), here is the teaser trailer for the event.
There will be two shows and pianist Charlie Judkins shall provide excellent accompaniment for the silents.
Powerhouse comedian Chris Farley (February 15, 1964 - December 18, 1997) of Saturday Night Live and Second City Chicago fame has been gone a long time but still makes this writer laugh out loud.
Especially noteworthy: the Schiller Visions decaf coffee crystals sketch. . . No decaf for Chris!
With apologies to Tony Robbins, Matt Foley is by far my favorite motivational speaker!
A key assist on the following sketch, featuring Chris' proudly and defiantly unkempt "Bennett Brauer" character, goes to fellow comic and stalwart SNL cast member Kevin Nealon.
Particularly enjoyed the sketches in which Chris co-starred with Phil Hartman, arguably one of the greatest comic character actors ever in the Saturday Night Live cast.
The larger-than-life comedian's appearances on late night talk shows, especially those of David Letterman and Conan O'Brien, are frequently memorable.
Of his movies, Tommy Boy would be the one in which Chris transitions from pure Roscoe Arbuckle style slapstick to character actor in the same film. In addition to Farley's signature physical comedy, there is a vulnerability and likability.
He works quite well, especially in Tommy Boy, with SNL co-star and friend David Spade.
Adam Sandler paid tribute to his friend with this song.
Had Chris survived "comedians' disease" - which has been seen from silent movie comedians Lloyd Hamilton, Jimmie Adams, Charley Chase and bis brother, director/comic James Parrott to hard-partying standup comics too numerous to recount to Saturday Night Live's John Belushi - a second career excelling in character parts, a la John Candy, may well have been on the horizon.
Some of the most cutting and brutal satire this writer has seen in the past quarter century can be found in Robert Smigel's TV Funhouse series, which provided provocative laughs to the Saturday Night Live mix in 1996-2008.
Since the holidays are just about upon us, it is worth noting that there were a slew of Christmas offerings by TV Funhouse. While I love A Charlie Brown Christmas, the following cynical take on Peanuts definitely has its share of guilty laughs.
The Globetrotters' First Christmas is an outstanding spoof of early 1970's animation, specifically the extra cheesy cheesiness of Filmmation, represented by such TV series as Fat Albert & The Cosby Kids. Did anyone who helped make this sendup of 1970's TV cartoons work at Hanna-Barbera or Filmation?
Rankin-Bass gets both a skewering and a homage in The Narrator That Ruined Christmas.
Many of us who celebrate Hanukkahchristmas or Christmashannukah relate to the following. Love the inspired vocalizing by the great Darlene Love - the not so secret musical weapon of Phil Spector - in this TV Funhouse, which makes me want to go out to a Cantonese, Hunan or Sichuan (a.k.a. Szechwan) restaurant on Christmas and/or Christmas Eve. Stylistically, this reminds me just a tad of Art Clokey and Aardman Animations. . . after all, there is a Shaun The Sheep Christmas.
One can't have too much stuff that is questionable taste - no make that bad taste - during the holidays, so we shall finish today's post with an episode of the TV Funhouse spinoff series. Is it both funny and in incredibly bad taste? Yes.
What does Halloween mean to the guy who writes this blog? David S. Pumpkins! Don't know why this guy cracks me up, but he does. . . only every time, without fail! Kenan Thompson, Kate McKinnon and Beck Bennett, not surprisingly, shine in supporting roles.
Why post David S. Pumpkins two years in a row on Halloween? Because we MUST - David S. Pumpkins and his two dancin' skeleton assistants, played by SNL writer/performers Mikey Day and Bobby Moynihan, inevitably get this blogmeister at Way Too Damn Lazy To Write A Blog ROFL! "Ah'm David Pumpkins, man! Any questions?"
There was an animated David S. Pumpkins Halloween Special made in 2017. It's not bad, albeit not anywhere near as funny as the previous two sketches. However, you do get the excellent comedienne and SNL stalwart Cecily Strong, along with Tom Hanks, among the voice talents.
On what day can it be considered a good idea to both watch David S. Pumpkins AND post a film in which comedian, actor and prolific cartoon voice artist Billy Bletcher is chased by a giant lobster? Halloween, of course!
It's no surprise to readers of Way Too Damn Lazy To Write A Blog that we're big fans of Halloween cartoons.
Produced in 1942 for MGM by Rudy Ising, the musical cartoon BATS IN THE BELFRY is, while not at all scary, very odd and very enjoyable. Sounds like at least one of the three goofball bats was voiced by the ubiquitous Pinto Colvig.
Since we've posted numerous Halloween classics from Fleischer Studios, including BOO, BOO THEME SONG, a skeleton and ghost-filled 1933 "follow the bouncing ball" Screen Song, the brilliant 1934 Popeye opus SHIVER MY TIMBERS and the super-surreal Talkartoons SWING YOU SINNERS and MYSTERIOUS MOSE before, let's find a Halloween-themed Popeye never posted before on Way Too Damn Lazy To Write A Blog.
Here's one: Popeye in GHOSKS IS THE BUNK (1939)
Is there something else we absolutely MUST do, while watching yet more spooky cartoons - or, as in the case of the following Columbia Color Rhapsody cartoon produced by the Ub Iwerks Studio, not that spooky - to get in the spirit of the holiday - and wishing all a Happy Halloween?
Yes - close today's Halloween post with a Count Floyd Monster Chiller Horror Theatre sketch from SCTV.
Today this blogger's fancy and short attention span turns from silent movies (and the great Raymond Griffith) to the world of sketch comedy. July 1 is Dan Aykroyd's birthday, so we shall doff our always battered fedoras to the prolific comedian, actor and screenwriter.
First and foremost, here are a few of Aykroyd's funniest and most original SNL skits.
Of the dozens of Saturday Night Live players, he is among the few who made a relatively seamless transition from TV to movies.
Trading Places, due to the superb and hilarious character acting from Hollywood veterans Don Ameche and Ralph Bellamy, lots of lively interplay between Akyroyd and the brilliant Eddie Murphy - and the presence of such SNL stalwarts as Al Franken & Tom Davis - remains my favorite.
Neighbors was an interesting homage to The Twilight Zone TV show. What makes it interesting? The Aykroyd and Belushi roles are reversed, with Dan playing the lunatic and John cast as a meek, mild-mannered nebbish. The excellent character actress Cathy Moriarty and fellow Second City/SNL alum Tim Kazurinsky are added pluses.
Spies Like Us, co-starring fellow SNL cast member Chevy Chase, is - like many movies featuring Saturday Night Live and SCTV cast members - in the flawed but still mostly funny category.
Dan was teamed with Tom Hanks for the 1987 sendup of Dragnet. All of us who watched the entire run of the unintentionally funny Dragnet 1967 TV show got a few laughs from this flick, and especially from Aykroyd's ability to mimic Jack Webb's distinctive walk and verbal delivery.
Last but not least, Dan produced, directed and co-wrote the creepiest and most nightmarishly disturbing of all 20th century horror-comedies, the Razzie Award winner Nothing But Trouble, a hallucinatory Beetlejuice-influenced compendium of Gothic grotesquerie.
The reviews of Nothing But Trouble were brutal, reminiscent of the In Living ColorMen On Film sketches in which David Alan Grier and Damon Wayans say in unison. . . HATED IT!
Described by Vincent Canby in The New York Times as "a charmless feature-length joke about the world's most elaborate speed trap," this haunted house flick presents an intermittently inspired one-of-a-kind fever dream. In the central role as the hideous 106 year old "hanging judge" of Volkenvania, Aykroyd presides as the ringmaster and frequently ventures into unabashed gross-out territory.
Why Warner Brothers released Nothing But Trouble to theatres in February 1991, instead of postponing it in October and specifically marketing the delirious American Gothic piece as a Halloween "monster movie," nobody knows.
Perhaps the suits concluded that Nothing But Trouble, originally pegged as a Christmas 1990 release, cost so much money to produce, it had to get out in the theatres post-haste to have any chance of recouping the investment. That strikes this writer as both a marketing failure and failure of imagination, as it is clearly a haunted house horror-comedy with a Halloween theme, even though David Lynch didn't direct it and the Three Stooges and Bowery Boys are nowhere to be found.
While Nothing But Trouble is a tad too grotesque to get laughs, it succeeds as American Gothic with garish flying colors, reverb-filled echoes of theremins and imagery a la horror-meister Tod Browning's The Devil Doll, Freaks and West Of Zanzibar viewed through a shattered funhouse mirror. . . with a musical number by Digital Underground thrown in for good measure.
We raise a toast of Crystal Head Vodka to Dan and hope he's doing well on his birthday. Cheers - and thanks a million for the laughs!
We wish our readers a Happy Halloween that's chock full of inventive animation.
We'll start Way Too Damn Lazy To Write A Blog post #1250 with the trailer to The Corpse Bride, a very good Halloween flick.
Would Halloween be complete without the inimitable Mighty Mouse, who, as part of his superhero duties, must rescue singing rodents enjoying a Halloween party from a witch and her patented Terrytoons cat? Well, not for us, it wouldn't - that's why we've posted this cartoon on this blog several times!
Next up: by far the least scary but most jaunty and tuneful Halloween cartoon of all, SCRAPPY'S GHOST STORY (1935). As always, this blogger's love of Scrappy and Charles Mintz Studio cartoons remains a mystery!
Those who cringe at Mighty Mouse and Scrappy generally go for Fleischer Popeyes, so here's one of the best, Shiver Me Timbers (1934).
The Max Fleischer Screen Songs series included BOO, BOO, THEME SONG, a gratuitously grotesque cartoon about ghosts, ghouls and spiders who run their own radio station, which they use to sell a poisonous drink named DeKayo.
Another poster has uploaded the song segment from BOO BOO THEME SONG featuring The Funnyboners (a great name for a group). Must watch the following on YouTube. The song by The Funnyboners begins at 3:34. If you resample both videos as mp4 files and combine, that's the entire ghoulish cartoon.
Alas, we missed the chance to plug this weekend's fantastic spooky Halloween movie screenings (A Psychotronix Halloween at the Orinda Theatre, Lon Chaney at Niles, Saturday Afternoon Cartoons: A Haunted Halloween in Manhattan at the Metrograph) a few days ago (uh - before they actually happened), but can post a ghost-filled Fleischer "Inkwell Imps" cartoon seen last night as part of the Niles Essanay Silent Film Museum's splendid Halloween show.
Sometimes this animation buff believes that the gang at the Van Beuren Studio really, really wanted to produce cartoons every bit as bizarre as Fleischer's. In the otherworldly Gypped In Egypt, starring "Don & Waffles," the bizarreness gets a full court press!
Don & Waffles soon became Tom & Jerry and kicked off their series with a Halloween cartoon, which gives Fleischer's a run for the money in the grotesquerie and bad taste departments.
Another classic Van Beuren cartoon is not specifically a Halloween film, but its storyline about the search for a pot of gold over the rainbow includes demons, apparitions, singing frogs and assorted weird characters, including an odd naked guy carrying around a sack of money while dragging a ball & chain. We love it so much we've posted it two consecutive Halloweens! Wonder if Sally Cruikshank, animator of Quasi At The Quackadero, Face Like A Frog, Make Me Psychic and Quasi's Cabaret, ever saw it. . .
The Ub Iwerks Studio, not wanting to be outdone, made several Flip The Frog cartoons that delved into imaginatively spooky territory. This must be at least the fourth time we have posted The Cuckoo Murder Case, one of the very best Flips and Iwerks cartoons, on this blog! Along with The Wild Goose Chase and Mighty Mouse in The Witch's Cat, The Cuckoo Murder Case was a cornerstone of our Halloween 2010 post!
Since we somehow forgot all about Warner Bros. cartoons, here is one of the spookiest Looney Tunes, an "old dark house" tale directed by the great Frank Tashlin.
Switching for no reason from animation to live-action, Halloween presents as good an excuse as any to post a certain Saturday Night Live bit featuring Tom Hanks as the not all that scary David S. Pumpkins!
A Saturday Night Live Halloween sketch that got this blogger laughing out loud featured Chris Farley's always over-enthusiastic motivational speaker Matt Foley.
Love those Vincent Price's Halloween Special sketches co-starring Bill Hader, Fred Armisen and Kristin Wiig.
How can we close this Halloween post? Well, this way - with the song It's Halloween by The Shaggs. Who were The Shaggs? Three young ladies, the Wiggins sisters from Fremont, New Hampshire whose crazy father wanted more than anything to make a successful rock band out of them. He was so desperate he bought his daughters studio time and recorded an album before they actually learned to play their instruments.
Yes, The Shaggs play out of tune, out of time and out of measurable reality, but there is genuine charm in their utter earnestness, likability, honesty and New Hampshire accents.
The Shaggs try hard and clearly want very much to sing and play their instruments at least reasonably well. Find this admirable.
This blogger is, among many things, an amateur guitarist who got started attempting to play chords on an acoustic guitar around the same time The Shaggs' Philosophy Of The World album was recorded - and totally gets how one sounds - fumbling, stumbling and often failing - when trying to learn to play an instrument. So, while attempting to play a finger-busting Ted Greene guitar chord, we say HAPPY HALLOWEEN!
Here we are, downright amazed to be here with the second-to-last post for 2021 - and delighted to wish all readers a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Thrilled to be cheerful and drawing breath on Christmas Eve - and quite busy redefining what can be considered Christmas music.
Sincerely hope that nobody brings fruitcake to your Christmas Eve or Christmas party.
The temptation is to simply recycle our 2016 Christmas Eve post every year, but instead Way Too Damn Lazy To Write A Blog shall go through a few holiday favorites, after swilling Borden's Egg Nog spiked generously with two double shots of Myers Rum and brandy!
This great tune, our all-time favorite, was first released on Capitol Records epic Merry Christmas To You! compilation LP (Capitol T-9030).
The great jazz saxophonist Booker Ervin (1931-1970) waxed this blogger's favorite rendition of Irving Berlin's White Christmas in 1966, on his outstanding Structurally Sound album.
Booker's fellow tenor saxophonist and occassional collaborator Dexter Gordon waxed this jazz fan's all-time favorite cover of The Christmas Song.
We now turn to some Christmas-themed animation, starting with Bill Hanna and Joe Barbera.
Across the pond, former Disney director David Hand made cartoons for Gaumont British Animation. Ginger Nutt's Christmas Circus is his studio's contribution to the 2021 Yule log.
The late, great Gene Deitch made many fantastic cartoons, first at UPA's East Coast branch, then at Terrytoons and afterwards from his studio in Prague. Gene directed and/or produced a slew of original and strikingly designed animation gems. One of the best is THE JUGGLER OF OUR LADY.
Based on "Le Jongleur de Notre Dame," THE JUGGLER OF OUR LADY is narrated by none other than Boris Karloff and adapted from the Anatole France's book by R.O. Blechman.
Next up: the National Film Board of Canada. We tip our Santa hat respectfully to friend of this blog, archivist supreme and showman Sci Fi Bob Ekman, who is responsible for this blogger seeing this terrific NFB cartoon, Christmas Cracker.
That said, it's comedy for the writer of this blog throughout the holiday season - and it just wouldn't be Christmas without favorite comedy sketches. Leading off, invariably, from SCTV, is Ed Grimley in The Fella Who Couldn't Wait For Christmas. . . I must say.
We'll raise that SCTV sketch with Liberace's Christmas Special!
Arguably, the single greatest pure physical comic ever to be a Saturday Night Live cast member was the late great Chris Farley.
In the SNL Christmas sketch pantheon, love seeing Chris' motivational speaker character, Matt Foley, as a department store Santa!
And then there's A Debbie Downer Christmas Eve, co-starring one of our all-time favorites at Way Too Damn Lazy To Write A Blog, the one, the only Jack Black. Quality time spent with Tenacious D is guaranteed to cheer this blogger up!
That sketch invariably brings the Debbie Downer out of this blogger.
Have mixed emotions about the Christmas holidays and especially the supercharged commercialization, stressing buying stuff you don’t need in the first place. Stan Freberg’s Green Christmas still resonates in a big way.
On the one hand, love the holiday season and especially love hanging out with friends and family. On the other hand, for those whose family members have either all passed away or are gravely ill, the unrelenting ultra-sentiment regarding family gatherings seems quite cruel.
Noting that for those who lost their jobs and/or are stone broke, the mass onslaught of advertising represents a big upraised middle finger, the Debbie Downer "bwaa bwaa" sound effect is definitely in order. Now, after asserting that feline AIDS is the number one killer of domestic cats, it's time for more Stan Freberg records.
We wish all a safe and Merry Christmas, with a touch of mambo!
The Christmas Eve closer: a Season's Greetings calypso from Robert Mitchum.
