Dave is going South and Deb is irked about holidays

I've been remiss in reporting that Dave, our man of the woods, told me on Monday that he's moving in with a friend from Norristown for a couple of weeks and then he will he heading south to Florida. That's sort of good and bad news. The good news, for Dave, is that he'll no doubt be a lot warmer in Florida over the next few months than he would be here. The bad news, for me, is that I'll miss running into him in the woods.

The worse news is that Dave mentioned the possibility that he won't return north, at least this far north, next summer. He's thinking of summering in the mountains of Georgia. I told him to keep in touch, which he will hopefully do with Alex when he stops by the occasional library and can get on email.

In other news Debra showed up for a visit a couple of hours ago because she had dropped her mom Dolores off at the hairdresser nearby. We talked her into having a bit of dinner after which she complained that at her school they are not allowed to refer to Christmas and Easter as holidays, instead calling them winter and spring break. But they do refer to Yom Kippur and Kwanzaa as holidays. Kwanzaa, of course is a fake holiday invented by an FBI informant, if memory serves; but Yom Kippur is definitely a religious holiday.

Well. . . after Deb left I got on the computer and one of the first things I found was a post on The Corner by Jay Nordlinger of National Review complaining about the same sort of thing. Here's what he had to say in a post titled Unsilent Night:

"A reader from Boulder, Colo., sends a note that may interest you. It responds to an item in Impromptus today. She says, “In 1994, the Fairview High School Christmas concert was going to close with the students processing out of the auditorium singing ‘Silent Night.’ Huge controversy, with multiple cries against ‘religion in the public schools.’ The school district’s attorneys said no. Since it was too late for the music teacher to arrange for something else, the students began to recess in silence. The audience was having none of it, and started singing ‘Silent Night’ themselves. That story still gives me goose-bumps.”

Holy mackerel, that took brass (and I’m not talking about trumpets and trombones). By the way, I imagine the Boulder people were not able to call that concert a “Christmas concert.” “Winter Serenade”?

Another reader writes to say, “Every December in Chicago, they have the Christkindlmarket. If they called it the ‘Christ Child Market,’ the world would come to an end! And the local bank flashes ‘Happy Holidays,’ followed by ‘Feliz Navidad.’” True, true: You can’t say “Merry Christmas,” but you can say it in Spanish. “And, in my daughter’s public school, they banned Handel but allow black spirituals.” For sure, and thank goodness for spirituals.

We could do this forever, but I’m stopping now. Happy Halloween! (Actually, it’s the day of the Crash, but in any case . . .)"

You can find Jay's post here: http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=NGVjOTg0NzY1MmQ4MjRjOTEzZmM5YTFmZWU0OWFmM2M=