Boxing day

Do you know what's the best thing about Christmas? Boxing day.

I'm not one of those shopaholics. In fact, I hate shopping and I usually spend the least amount of time possible to shop. I love online shopping though since you don't have to spend that much energy finding things. My approach to normal shopping in 3 easy steps is:

Step 1: walk around. This is the most time consuming steps and I hate it but it's an essential step since the rest of my shopping are based on this.
Step 2: pick what you like. This might include try whatever it is on to see if it fits.
Step 3: pay for it. That's it, just pay and get out of there.

Please note, there's no thinking involved in here. I hate going shopping with people who think too much and just keep changing their mind, before you know it, half the day is over and they're still in the same shop agonizing over what to buy.

Boxing day is the best time to shop really. You can't stay anywhere long enough since people will actually PUSH you out of their way. It's a wonder the Myer building in Melbourne City didn't crumble to dirt today with so many people flocking into it. I almost became the victim of a stampede by a horde crazy girls trying to find the shortest route to the reduced price table. I really should give credits to those girl, they did figure out the shortest route to that table: over my body. Too bad I succeed in getting out of their way in the nick of time by stepping onto some old lady's foot. It seems that the new fashion this summer is stripy t-shirts. I expect I'll see hordes of girls wearing those. Why would you wear something that make you look like a zebra? Albeit a very weird zebra considering the colour combinations like green and red, blue and gray, orange and white stripes.

Apart from that incident in Myer, my shopping trip went relatively incident-less. I got myself a late-Christmas present: a pair of kick-ass headphones. It actually blocked out everything. I really appreciate not having to listen to some girl bragging about a pair of G-strings she got for a song from some adult shop, thank you very much. People just talk about all sort of weird things on trains.

Christmas Day (yawn...)

I know I should be more excited on Christmas day but I'm not. There's no presents to be opened (they're already opened about 2 days before Christmas day and no they're not from my parents or anyone else, they're from myself and I).


I found that people don't usually give you something useful or something that you want for Christmas. Let's get a run through with 2 brilliant Christmas present ideas I've encountered:

1. Candles. This is the present that wins my "most sarcastically practical present of the year award". What possible use can you have for candles in this century? Please don't tell me they're relaxing because every time I have to light up a candle scented or not it's because there's something wrong with the electricity line and the power is cut right when I'm doing something important on my laptop. So every time I light up a candle I'm stressed about losing what I was typing. And that's not the only thing I have to worry about. Do you know how easy it is for houses to be on fire especially in Australia in summer? The damn candle can fall, set the carpet on fire and then the whole house's gonna be on fire. I can really do without these worries. Scented candles are worse and nowadays people only give scented candles. Not only I have to worry about losing data and setting the house on fire, I have to deal with the nauseating, supposedly "relaxing" scents. Relaxing my ass, they set my sinuses on fire and give me sneezing fits.

2. Bath stuffs. You know the, again, scented bath stuffs like bath salts, bath oil, etc... Again, they're supposed to be relaxing and again their purpose just fails me completely. I don't take baths. It takes at least 20 L of water to fill the bath and frankly that's a waste of water.

Those are the big no-no when it comes to buying Christmas presents for me and luckily I didn't get any of those this Christmas. Maybe you're wondering what I got. My family are a practical bunch and we don't usually give presents. If we do it's usually money or gift cards so people can get what they want themselves. It saves time and energy. You don't believe me? First you have to have an idea about what to buy, then you have to go buy it and it doesn't stop there, you have to wrap it in preferably Christmas wrapping papers, which are sold at heavily inflated prices. With gift cards, you just have to buy them and then pop them into an envelop and Voila! a present to please anyone, albeit a very lazy present.

Ok, back to my family, we don't usually give presents. Birthdays: definitely, Luna new year: definitely, Christmas: nah. There you have it, I don't get any presents from my family. It's not that devastating anyhow. I've never gotten anything on Christmas and I don't expect to get anything. This year however, I decided to start a new tradition. I got myself presents and am I happy. So these are what I bought:

1. Books. I bought Sam Harris' "The End of Faith" and Richard Dawkins' "The God Delusion". I've been looking for them in Australian book stores for a while and they're actually available at Christmas. From what the bookstore cashier told me, many people bought them as Christmas presents for their friends. That's actually a good idea. I might even do that next year.

2. An USB flash drive. It's not just any USB flash drive. It's one of those new released Toshiba flash drive. It was quite a stressed experience buying flash drives from eBay. After I paid for the drive and was waiting for it to arrive by mail, I found this article: "Beware of fake flash drive on ebay". While reading that I did a mental check list: Toshiba - common counterfeit brands on eBay: check; misleading slogan - new product not yet available in your country: check; high capacity flash drive: check; low price: check. So chances are I bought a fake and I was worried coz I paid more than a hundred bucks for that USB flash drive. The drive arrived 2 days before Christmas and it wasn't fake. I'm just too lucky, aren't I? From now on I'm not gonna buy USB drive from ebay.

3. Battlestar Galactica pins. These are also bought from eBay. I think I'm gonna start a collection of these, they're quite rare maybe one day I'll sell them for ten times what I paid.

Yup, that's it I think. May be I bought a new Xbox game but I can't really remember now, I think I did. It's really quite hard typing a post off the top of your head while you're still recovering from a mini-hangover. I'm still recovering from my Christmas Eve dinner. I think I drank too much beer + wine. Anyhow, Merry Christmas everyone, maybe I should say Merry fictional character's birthday, that's more fitting.

For the atheists out there, here are 2 links I think you would enjoy if you haven't stumbled upon them already:
10 ways to qualify your atheism this christmas
Religion does more harm than good - poll

Blasphemous Santa

Don't bash Santa

Kelly Ryan

December 08, 2006 11:00pm

Article from:

A PASTOR has slammed Santa as a counterfeit God who teaches children to be greedy and selfish.

New Life Christian Church's Pastor Steve McNeilly has accused Santa of being a blasphemous stand-in for God who makes liars of parents and causes confusion among children.

The Santa story creates commercial rivalry and encourages materialism and selfishness in children's hearts, he said.

"Santa has usurped the love and devotion and faith of little children," the Warrnambool pastor added.

Mr McNeilly's comments have sparked a storm of protest.

Senior church leaders and a child psychologist described the attack on Father Christmas as absurd and undeserved.

The Catholic Church's Monsegnieur Les Tomlinson said Christmas was a time for parents to teach children the joys of gift-giving.

"What we are celebrating in the birth of Jesus is the manifestation of the infinite love of all humans which is reflected in our concern for the needy and the sharing with others," Monsegnieur Tomlinson said.

Psychologist Michael Carr-Gregg said Santa was a crucial part of a child's Christmas celebration.

"These claims are an absolute outrage for the vast majority of children who are healthier and happier because of their vast memories of Christmas," he said.

But Pastor McNeilly said Santa detracted from the "true message of Christmas that God sent his son to save us from our sins".

Remember my post on how Christians should boycott Christmas tree? I think Pastor Steve McNeilly is either reading and taking the Bible literally or is being nagged to buy a 1000-buck Playstation 3 package for his kids (if he has any that is). The latter reason is, certainly, more understandable to me. I have this problem with Christmas, ok, make that 2 problems. First, Christmas music. They're ok in small doses but every Christmas I get this massive dose of Christmas music everywhere I go and on every channel on TV. There's just so much Christmas music you can take. Second, presents. I'm fine with buying presents and shopping in general. However, I tend to buy more presents for myself than for anyone else. Maybe it's a combination of boredom (from having nothing to do since Christmas coincides summer holiday in Australia) and the urge to spend for Christmas.

What's not so understandable is the fact that the pastor can say with absolute certainty that Santa Claus doesn't exist and God does. I mean, Santa Claus is just as real as god himself. In some aspects, Santa rocks the socks of god. You see, there's no "words of Santa", Santa doesn't tell you to go and kill all those people who don't believe in his existence, there's no Santa's hell and he lives on the same planet as us. What makes him so certain? True god was invented before Santa but that doesn't constitute existence!

I also have to disagree with Monsegnieur Les Tomlinson.

The Catholic Church's Monsegnieur Les Tomlinson said Christmas was a time for parents to teach children the joys of gift-giving.

I suppose children do learn a joy during Christmas but it's not the joy of gift-giving. It's more like the joy of being on the receiving end of gift-giving.