I’m back. Thanks to Rob for taking care of things here while I was busy conquering, uh, I mean guest blogging at Faustus’s web log. And thanks to those of you from there who are now reading and linking to me here. (I will be returning the links today or tomorrow. If you have linked to me and haven’t let me know, please drop me a line.)

Now back to our regularly scheduled program.

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I hate the phrase “Christmas in July,” and come to think of it, Christmas in December doesn’t do much for me, either. So you can imagine that celebrating Christmas would not be high on my list of things to do on November fourth. If nothing else, that would make it harder for me to pretend that all of the unreciprocated holiday gifts I receive are actually birthday presents, as my birthday is 24 December. (Just forty-eight more shopping days, by the way!)

Two nights ago, I received two free, front-row tickets for a preview of the Radio City Music Hall’s Christmas Spectacular from my friend David. He is in the show as Mr. Spruce, Santa’s chief elf, who sports a towering red pompadour. Rob was busy, so I took my friend MAK.

To say I was not in the mood for such an event would be an understatement, but the show ended up winning me over. All of the male performers were cute, with the exception of Santa Claus, but his defects were to be expected. Further, they were all relentlessly cheerful, which was somewhat terrifying to witness from the front row, but I suppose that for a smile to “read” from the back of the theater, it has to look maniacal from a few feet away.

If I had one major criticism, it would be have fewer segments featuring the “World-Famous” Rockettes. As always, they were sort of impressive at first, when they showed up in some sort of green outfits, but as far as I’m concerned, a little of them goes a long way. Their subsequent reappearances as toy soldiers, rag dolls, reindeers, and some sort of snow creatures were grotesque overkill. Or perhaps I’m just prejudiced against such displays of regimentation, which always reminds me of Nazis and right-wing pundits.

If I had two major criticisms, it would be to get rid of the crap at the end about Jesus. Jesus was so clearly out of place in a Christmas Spectacular that they had to tack him on at the end, after the finale in Santa’s Workshop. It was absolutely schizophrenic: ninety minutes about commercialism and snow and candy and toys and glitter and dancing girls, followed by ten minutes of bible readings and bizarre interpretive dances by Mary and Joseph in the living nativity. I had just been wondering why they didn’t make it a more inclusive Holiday Spectacular, featuring the Rockettes as dancing dreidls, and then they go and pull this.

Oh well. At least I got to see a camel.