The one with an actual story

It's 1:30 and I am such a lazy bastard...all I've done is listened to the complete works of Boz Scaggs, stabbed an old man with a fork, got overly zealous at a southern high school football game, went to a tent revival, screamed "Thank you Jesus" really loud at said tent revival, worked on my Jeff Foxworthy impression, made "you might be a redneck" jokes, punched my rat of a neighbor in the fucking face, enjoyed a glass of Five Alive, washed down some Anacin with said glass of Five Alive, smoked cigarettes, laughed with my kids at peoples FaceBook pics, colored in my Transformer coloring book, did running commentary for gymnastics in my living room, wrote death threats to Condoleeza Rice, and made a soggy napkin and cigarette butt sandwich for my Alzheimery neighbor.


I thought I'd write a little Christmas story for you hookers...enjoy.

The Christmas Picture
By: Angela Noel Zakrzewski

 I have the obligatory pictures of my kids sitting on the mall Santa’s lap, but I don’t have a Doc Brown or a flux capacitor, and there is nothing I can do about what I did, but maybe I can make you think twice about “pictures with Santa.”

My kids are teenagers; they are far past the days of believing in Santa... It’s been years since I’ve dragged my kids and their frightened asses to the mall to get a picture taken with Santa. But it wasn’t so long ago that I don’t remember how awful those outings were. 

It starts with trying to get each kid ready and kept clean for the 4 to 6 hours that it’s going to take to get to the mall, park, wait in line, etc…So, pretty much that means that your child is going to be fed nothing but saltine crackers and apple juice from then on out…a malnourished child is preferred over a kid with a food stain on their Christmas dress. Of course, your child is going to be hungry, and they will remind you…80 fucking times. In return you'll give them another cracker, and pray that they'll shut the hell up for 5 minutes.  Of course, unless you’re a complete douche bag your kids will be wearing those same clothes to midnight mass or whatever the hell it is you do on Christmas.  So, the fucker has to stay clean…

The parking situation. Yes, parking. You’ve got your kid all safely buckled in the least wrinkles possible position in their car seat to drive around a full parking lot for 20 minutes. After a few minutes of looking for a spot, you’re already irritated with everything and everyone.  So, you yell like a lunatic to your husband to “just drop you off at the god damn door already.”  I assure you, his ass is just as eager to get rid of you as you are of his  He drops you off with your 2 or 3 bratty kids, where you wait another 20 minutes, answering your kids’ question of “when’s dad going to be here?”  with some CUNextTuesday answer like "I don't know, maybe never."  Meanwhile, your husband or whatever jackhole you conned into going with you finally finds a spot, and runs his ass at least a quarter of a mile, to hear you say “what the hell took so long?” Now that you're are happily reunited, you get to maneuver through a packed ass mall, probably with a stroller or a car seat, and push your kids through swarms of people who are more than likely, hot, tired, and pissed off.

This brings me to the line, ah, the line that that you knew was going to be long as hell, but never this bad. The line is awful, it’s a bunch of hungry, miserable, a-holes. They might not normally be a-holes, but this whole taking your kid to get his picture taken with Santa nonsense brings out the worst in people.  For me this part is probably the worst, you get to wait in a line for no less than an hour with fucking crying ass kids listening to every mom say “See, there’s Santa, and if you’re good, you can sit on his lap and tell him what you want.” Remember when I said taking my “frightened ass” kids to see Santa? Your kid is afraid of the fucker and rightfully so! All their young lives we’ve warned them of the dangers of strangers, and here you are plopping your kid in their Sunday best on a strangers fucking lap.
Standing in any line is hell, but a 200 foot long line of bitchy kids and their even bitchier moms is torture.  Ah, the bitchy moms, the reason why we’re here.  I blame you for this casserole of nonsense. There is no man that says “let’s get the kids all gussied up like pageant kids and head to the mall.” So, the blame lies solely on your shoulders. This is one of those instances that since I’m a mom, I can talk smack about other moms…y’know that unspoken rule? This is also one of those instances where I think I can give you better parenting advice than “just poke holes in the top.”  Taking your children to see Santa is not fun, it’s a fucking pain in the ass.

So, we wait, and we wait. I’m not going to get into how miserable everybody actually is, because as you can imagine, that line is my own personal hell.  We’re 10 kids back, and 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2…Showtime.
Now, here’s where you think it’s all over, but no, no. It’s not. You kid is fucking terrified of the ratty looking bastard.  As your kids cling tighter to you, you really want to give up; you’ve pretty much run out of options at this point. Here’s where you can either hold your child and be in the picture, looking haphazard, overwhelmed and probably sweaty, or you can put your red faced, crying kid on Santa’s lap,  while you effectively though unconsciously  give your kid abandonment issues, or you can leave. You realize what an absolute pain in the ass the day has been and there is no way you’re leaving now.

The process of getting the picture isn’t actually long enough, you have essentially about 3 minutes to calm (if necessary) your child down, make them look presentable and move out of the way. You only get 2 or 3 tries, so you have to make one of them count. You are prepared to do anything to get your kid to smile.  You somehow think that standing next to the photographer who’s dressed like a stripper elf (“Candy Cane,”as I call her) while jumping up and down, calling your kids name while waving their favorite toy around will be enough for your 2 year old to pull themself together and smile.  Not only do you look like a jag-off, but you’re also pissing everyone off.  First and foremost, you’re pissing off the moms in line who just keep saying to themselves “just take the fucking picture already,” you’re pissing off Candy Cane who just wants you to get the hell out of the way so she can take the picture, and last but not least, you’re pissing off Santa. That creepy fuck gets paid to let kids sit on his lap…so, you’re not really concerned, you just want him to look decent in the picture. I mean, the best you can hope for at this point is that Santa doesn’t smell like weed like he did last year.

So, enjoy  your obligatory generic picture with the superimposed holly in the corner and your kid crying his ass off on pissed off Santa’s lap taken by a stripper named Candy Cane.  Merry Christmas a-holes.