It’s already December? How did that happen?

Thanks to an unusually late Thanksgiving, it completely caught me by surprise. Now I’m panicking. It’s the month that flies by in a week! I’m two power naps away from January! Screw that.

Renewing Dino Drac’s celebration of all things red and green is my latest ongoing feature, Classic Christmas Commercials. It’s a horse I’ve been kicking the shit out of since the early 2000s, but thanks to another assist from Larry P., I’m now armed with enough old holiday ads to… I don’t know. Fill a really stupid cannon.

Ancient TV commercials are some of the best windows into Christmases past, and I’m confident that at least one of these will shoot you back to an era of bad haircuts and smaller shoe sizes. Enjoy!

M&M’s Holidays Candy!
(1992)

Not everyone knows this, but “holiday-colored” M&M’s isn’t a recent invention. I remember them being around in the ‘80s, and the only way I’m wrong is if my best friend’s mother used to pick the red and green ones out of normal bags in the spirit of Christmas. There is no way she did that.

Even by 1992, the special M&M’s were still being sold in quaint, old-fashioned packages. If you’ll take my meaning, that made them feel less like “candy” and more like “dessert.” These were the fork-and-knifers of the M&M’s set, and eating them made us feel so fancy.

Pay close attention at the nine second mark. Notice how the kid breaks from decorating his Christmas tree to perform a touchdown dance, seemingly in response to the voice-over’s announcement that each bag now included 14% more candy? Even if I was willing to suspend my disbelief and allow the idea that he somehow heard that, I’d still think the touchdown dance was too much. Read More…

I bought a big pile of edible stocking stuffers.

Most of you would probably avoid these, whether because they’re made of dried meat or because they’re actually meant for cats.

Me? I don’t discriminate. I love all stocking stuffers. Here are 70-100 words about each. Read More…

Well, Thanksgiving kicked off with huge news.

I’m sitting there watching a giant Kool-Aid Man roll by, and what does Matt Lauer announce?

THE PENDING RETURN OF SHARKLEBERRY FIN.

Oh my GOD. YESSSS!

I’ll have more to say about this fantastic news later. This post is just meant to be my generalized “hey Happy Thanksgiving” message.

So hey.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I’m thankful for all of you. I cannot mean that more sincerely. At some point over the past six months, this site turned the corner for me. A while back, it’d evolved into something I did mainly because it was something I always did. Well, NOT NO MORE.

I’d been chasing a “remembered feeling” with this for so many years. It’s not something I often mention or could even properly describe, but I’ve managed to find that feeling again. I truly love the time I spend doing this, and I can’t thank you enough for making it worthwhile.

I’ll save the heavier sap for my Christmas post, but yeah, y’all are awesome. I’ve come to feel that my success isn’t in the volume of my audience, but the quality of the people within it.

To celebrate, I recreated Charlie Brown’s Thanksgiving. Many of you will remember the first time I did this, over ten years ago. It really deserved to be a yearly tradition, and brother, you gotta start somewhere. Read More…