It’s the first few days of November and I’m sitting in the recliner at my Dad & Mom’s house in Crown Point, IN.  The radio is piping 24/7 Christmas music to get people in the “spirit” while the leaves still have their full fall colors.  It seems wrong yet strangely fun all at the same time.

I’m not sure when the Christmas season began during the first week of November.  Probably when merchants realized that they could increase their profits if they some how convinced the public that they should start their Christmas shopping early.  I call this the Christmas Capitalists Conspiracy.  It all started with one aisle of Christmas decorations before Halloween in 1976 and has grown to a full blown leap frog over Thanksgiving.

I admit that I became part of the "conspiracy" during the Christmas of ’92 when I convinced Lara that we should put our decorations up in the house the week before Thanksgiving because I thought Thanksgiving fell too late in the month for my comfort.  I wanted my full 5 weeks of “Christmas”. 

What’s wrong with having the Christmas tree up during Thanksgiving dinner?  I wonder if  Lara’s distaste for the tree being up earlier that year had more to do with Keoni the Cat (Japanese bobtail cat with no tail) crawling up in the middle of the tree and tipping it over and knocking ornaments all over the tile floor of Navy Housing?  I won’t even talk about the tinsel he ate that day…

Now every year we put the Christmas decorations up the day after Thanksgiving.  We’ve done it that way so many times that it’s a bonafide Thompson Family Tradition (TFT).  While the rest of America is racing each other on “Black Friday” to get the best deal on the Red Rider BB Gun at the mall, we’re reminiscing about Christmas’s gone by and the new ornaments we’ll be adding to the tree on Christmas Eve.  (Another TFT).  I’m glad that Thanksgiving is early this year.  And hopefully no one will get hurt by the tinsel this time.