Your editors are greeting today’s holiday with some favorite comics, some Christmassy, some not. Enjoy!
Here’s one for the great CIDU cat-admiration tradition!
Seems like the reindeer might take a lichen to an in-flight snack, also.
Gifts from the Four Wise(?) Men
Comics I Don't Understand 
Merry Christmas to you all!
Rudolph’s report card took me a while.
@ Pete (2) – Then please be so good as to explain it to the rest of us. It’s still a CIDU for me.
P.S. I first saw that “Wallace the Brave” strip about an hour after my son and I returned from cutting down our tree.† That was good, because if I had seen it before we left, I would have tried to get him to go through the funnel.
P.P.S. (†) – This was in a local forest tract that is maintained for the purpose, with flat-rate prices: €30 per tree, no matter what size. The one we snagged this year was just under nine feet tall, of which 7½ feet is standing in our living room.
P.P.P.S. I tripped over the third panel of Barney & Clyde: the word “trimming” doesn’t mean “decorating”, it means “cutting off small parts”.
P.P.P.P.S. I really like that Mutts, especially the hidden “meta” component.
Kilby,
As to the Rudoph one, sing the song and then when you get to the correct line, you will smile.
@ Karl (4) – I’ve been listening to my daughter play that tune (and many others) on her recorder all weekend; Rudolph is currently running at #1 on my list of “detestable earworms”, so I looked up the lyrics instead. Even if it was a groaner worthy of a Saturday Oy, on the way to the lyrics I discovered an NPR link to a copy of the original “Rudolph” manuscript. The story as written is much better than (and not nearly as sappy as) the song and/or film versions, so I’m very grateful that you sent me hunting, rather than just giving the answer.
@Kilby: If we are regifting earworms, I wish you to “Have a Holly, Jolly Christmas”.
Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good morning!
@Kilby, Rudolph’s grades have got a lot worse in one particular subject.
He;’s gone down in History.
Did anybody else see the Wallace one and mistake the wrapper for a chipper?
Chak: Yes! Scary!
What is up with Vic Lee Brunette’s body shape? Her robe(?) bulges out weirdly in front at butt level. It’s too low to be a pot belly.
Kilby: Here is the first Rudolph cartoon, made by Fleischer in 1948: https://youtu.be/Z2eZryCgzeM?si=TF4iZBLsYZG4FAhQ . This was the year BEFORE Johnny Marks wrote the song. The music under the titles was originally “Silent Night” but after the song came out, Fleischer re-released the cartoon with Marks’ song, as you can see in the link. Note how closely the cartoon follows the original. There’s even the scene with eight reindeer at the dinner table.
Make that four wise guys.
Slightly belated Christmas wishes to all!!
And if you think this is late – I just finished putting up and decorating our dining room tree – has Colonial Williamsburg member ornament on it and is in our pseudo 18th tavern decorated dining room. Put up the tree in our studio (only ornaments made by us are on us – though some of same are also on the main tree) on Christmas Eve. These are small trees.
I started on our main tree in the living room sometime last week (still not done due to following). It became a bit of contention between us starting last year as due to his smallish “big” TV it had to be relocated to the back of the room and while we thought we had taken everything into consideration before he bought the TV – I had not taken some tree decorating that I did into account and am not happy with the limited space which is viewable on the tree now. I have not finished this tree. Last year we put everything away in a rush as it was late to be doing so and packing away was not done right. So when I opened the last box (of 4) of ornaments I found an entire box of same which should have been in the first box. I am also missing a bag of ornament hangers (the other bag disappeared yesterday for about 5 hours and then reappeared where it had been left). I have not gotten to setting up my Teddy bear figurine (very small toys, etc) village to be Christmas yet, It is still partially same from last year and partially not as I never switched it over to other holiday setups during the other months.
Plus our reenactment unit is back at the Christmas evenings at the local restored village – we interpret the only house there which is set in 1700s (others are 1800s) for the village. Robert and I get to stay in 1775 for the entire night in “first person” – we do not know anything after the matching date in 1775. Have had good sized crowds most nights so far.
Happy and Merry!
Re: “trimming” – One reason that I was really happy to see that “Barney & Clyde” strip show up in this post was that I actually own one of those “official” Peanuts Christmas Trees (purchased at a CVS in 2019):
P.S. The battery powered lights are an addition of my own, of course, but the red ball was included in the box (and it has a tacky Peanuts logo on the other side).
As of New Year’s Eve I finished the downstairs decorations. I still have my teddy bear village to setup in its Christmas setup, but then again, it has been a bad year and is still partially setup from last Christmas. (It is changed in setup 11 times a year – January is split between Christmas and Valentine’s Day and is populated by bear figurines of various media, small stuffed bears, toy bears, and such.)