My neighbors already have a Christmas Tree in their window, and I want to smash it. The window, that is. The tree should be set on fire.

A wise man once said, "I think there must be something wrong with me, Linus. Christmas is coming, but I'm not happy. I don't feel the way I'm supposed to feel." Hear, hear, Charlie Brown. I like peace on Earth. I like the idea of good will toward men. I even like candy canes, gingerbread houses, and getting gifts. So why don't I like Christmas?

I'm sure some of it has to do with the fact that Christmas is a disruption of my regular schedule. That's not fun for me. And maybe I don't like seeing other people enjoy themselves. Keep your happiness in Whoville, you jerks!

But I think what I hate most is how commercialized the holiday is. The mindlessly rapacious American consumer is encouraged — nay, expected! — to buy a whole bunch of tchotchkes and gewgaws they don't want or need, crap like this:

We're tearing down forests and melting the icecaps so that someone can grow some faux hair on piles of poo? Bah, humbug.

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That there, that's homemade spaghetti. And I made it! And it tastes great!

Yeah, I know. People have been making homemade pasta — essentially just flour and eggs — for centuries, maybe millennia. But none of those people have ever been in my kitchen.

As it happens, my father gave me the pasta roller/cutter and drying rack you can see in the image above for Christmas... Christmas 2019. (I might even have asked for them.) Which means I've had them throughout the pandemic of 2020-21. Despite all the "free" time that gave me away from restaurants, I never made any pasta until now. Why not? I guess I was intimidated. I thought it would be a lot of work. Turns out it is.

I got the recipe from my favorite cookbook, The Joy of Cooking, and I used advice I've picked up over the years watching Joe Bastianich criticize would-be Italian cooks on MasterChef. ("Salty like the ocean!") I understand now why that show always has so much footage of people struggling with pasta rollers. While the dough itself is a breeze, the little home consumer counter-mounted pasta roller is a bastard. I christened mine "Mussolini's Revenge."

So it is all a lot of trouble, but it might be worth it. I can now attest firsthand: fresh pasta is good eating.

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Celebrate Christmas in June with Superboy!

What I heard: solve poverty by giving poor people money. That Superboy, he's a thinker.

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Finally! These are the final entries in my 2020 new-to-me movie list, all coming from December.

199. (1853.) Going Attractions: The Definitive Story of the Movie Palace (2019)
This is a documentary about the kind of movie houses that barely exist anymore, those built to worship the mythology of the big silver screen. It's equal parts nostalgia and an oral history of the decline and fall of western civilization. I loved it.

200. (1854.) Monster Zero (1965)
This is one of the Toho Godzilla films (also released as Invasion of Astro-Monster). Here's the plot: a group of aliens beg Earthings to lend them Godzilla in order to eradicate the threat King Ghidrah presents to their home, Planet X, but it's all really a trick to get Godzilla off Earth so the aliens can take over. I have to assume it made more sense in the original language, because this thing was nutso in all the best possible ways.

201. (1855.) Black Christmas (1974)
A slasher flick which treads heavily on the "The call is coming from inside the house" ghost story. I did not find it particularly satisfying, despite the presence of Margot Kidder and John Saxon.

202. (1856.) Teen Titans GO! To the Movies (2018)
I watched this only to see Booster Gold, and I was pleasantly surprised. Fans of comic books will enjoy.

203. (1857.) Downhill (1927)
This early Alfred Hitchcock silent doesn't have a cameo appearance by the director, which is a shame, because the film is equally devoid of any real substance. (Rich boy gets blamed for knocking up a shop clerk and his life goes quickly, well, you get the idea.) For Hitchcock diehards only.

204. (1858.) Red Sun (1971)
Did you know there was a spaghetti western starring Charles Bronson and Toshiro Mifune, the samurai who inspired The Man With No Name? Well, there is. And it's very good.

205. (1859.) It Happened on Fifth Avenue (1947)
Another very good film, this time a light comedy of errors featuring class warfare butting up against Christian spirit. It could easily have ended happily several times, but to its credit, it never takes the easy way out and still resolves excellently. A Merry Christmas to us all!

Onward to 2021! More to come.

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For Christmas, my aunt gave me a Libra 2021 Calendar ("Personalized Daily Horoscope Presented by The International Astrological Alliance, a Leading Resource on Astrology and The Zodiac").

Personally, I have never seen anything to make me believe there's one all-powerful force controlling everything. But maybe that's because I've never been exposed to someone who really understood it all. Reading the back of the calendar, it says that "Libra can be possessive, smothering, insulting and sarcastic." If that wasn't written for me, I don't know what was.

Yesterday, on the first day of the year, my horoscope recommended that I should hang out with friends so that I could meet "someone who brags about every little thing." That doesn't sound like fun, but hey, maybe because I now know about it, I can avoid it, right? Thanks, horoscope.

On the other hand, today's entry reads:

Wedding bells may ring for many Librans in love. Others might get engaged. You can also meet interesting people at the wedding reception of a friend.

Um, I thought this was supposed to be personalized. Not only does that not sound like me or anyone I know, it also doesn't seem to have anything to do with 2021. Doesn't my horoscope know there's a pandemic on? "May ring"? "Might get engaged"? "Can also meet"? I've read things in cookies that were more definite and useful.

But maybe that's just one bad entry. Rather than throw it out, I've decided to hang the calendar in the most appropriate place I can think of: in my bathroom over my toilet. May the stars continue to be my guide in 2021.

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The year 2020 has been horrible in so many ways, but Christmas was not one of them.

Because the family was minimizing the amount of time we were spending with one another outside our households, I woke up at 1:30PM and opened presents — provided by friends and relatives who were much too generous — at 3 with just my Mother. When we were done we delivered pound cake and key lime pie to family elsewhere in town, and then came home to a ravioli dinner and a rerun of Jeopardy!. I finished the day watching a silent Hitchcock film and a spaghetti Western staring Toshiro Mifune.

I recognize that most people would disagree, but as someone who generally finds the holiday chafing, I think it was the best Christmas of my life.

Thank you, COVID-19.

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Batman #219, February 1970

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Four days before Christmas, while the nation was busy with other, bigger problems, the Virginia-sponsored statue of Robert E. Lee was quietly removed from the U.S. Capitol.

Each state has two statues in the Capitol, most in the National Statuary Hall. But the hall isn't large enough for 100 statues, so some had been moved to other locations, including the Crypt below the Rotunda. It's called the Crypt because it was originally intended to be the final resting place of the mortal remains of America's patron saint: George Washington. That made it a fitting place for a statue of Washington's great-grandson-in-law.

The statue is being moved to a history museum, which is frankly a far more suitable location for the man famous as leader of the slave-owning armies in the War Between the States. It'd be nice to say that Lee's statue was the last Civil War remnant in the Capitol. However, Statuary Hall still includes monuments to Confederate Colonel Zebulon Vance (sponsored by North Carolina), Lieutenant General Wade Hampton (South Carolina), General Joseph Wheeler (Alabama), Vice President Alexander Stephens (Georgia), and Jefferson Davis (Mississippi). Maybe you can see a theme there.

Prior to this year, I believed we should preserve all works of art, even those that could serve as political propaganda for causes of hatred. While I never thought such pieces belonged in the same building as the working seat of government, the current political climate has me thinking that maybe museums are also too public. There are very clearly too many in this country willing to use the imagery of the past for their own political purposes without regard to the damage they inflict on others. That's just plain wrong.

The ancient Olmecs, like us, used to make giant statues of their leaders. Then, when the leaders fell from power, the statues were disfigured and buried so that the people could move on without being encumbered by old grudges and failed ideologies. I'm increasingly of the opinion that might not be such a bad idea.

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I think all commercials should be like perfume/cologne commercials.

I want to see a movie star digging holes in the desert to sell me the invigorating fragrance of Charmin Flushable Wipesâ„¢.

I want to see a model riding a unicorn across the Seine to hold up a magical box of Hefty® Ultra Strong Drawstring Kitchen Trash Bags.

I want to see a rock star BASE diving off the Empire State Building to showcase the ethereal sensation of eating Campbell's® 25% Less Sodium Cream of Mushroom Soup.

Sell me a feeling this Christmas, Madison Avenue. I've already got plenty of stuff.

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