The Popcorn Stand: It’s never to early to wish Happy HallowThanksMas

HallowThanksMas is upon us. A couple of days ago, I saw a commercial on television for the first time advertising something about Halloween. I’m surprised it took this long for me to notice a commercial about Halloween as normally I see one before Labor Day.

I also saw something on the web about the 25 best Halloween songs of all time. So the OFD (old fuddy, duddy) is bracing for the HallowThanksMas season. I refer to it as the HallowThanksMas season because beginning with Halloween there doesn’t seem to be any separation of Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas any more. Of course I’m just part of the problem by already writing about HallowThanksMas in early September.

By the time Black Friday arrives, I’m already suffering from Christmas fatigue. And Black Friday, I think has turned into Black Wednesday or maybe even earlier than that.

I’ve written before about how this Black Friday phenomenon is pretty recent. I remember covering Black Friday for the Porterville Recorder in California back in the early 1990s. I didn’t go out to the stores until Friday afternoon and only a few customers could be seen shopping in each store.

Back then those who got an “early” start on Christmas shopping were definitely the exception. I mean, who wanted to go Christmas shopping the day after gorging themselves, anyway?

I do want to make something clear. I actually enjoy Halloweeen. And Thanksgiving. And Christmas. I love looking at the Christmas decorations around town when I drive around. I just don’t like the holidays merged together into HallowThanksMas like they are now.

I long for the days as a kid when I could watch a college football game the day after Thanksgiving and see just one Christmas-related commercial (something I’ve also written about before).

But the OFD realizes now, HallowThanksMas is just around the corner.

— Charles Whisnand