My real-life friends will be expecting this...here is the 2004 edition of Helly’s TEN REASONS WHY I HATE CHRISTMAS!!!

1. PAUL McCARTNEY: Oh, how the mighty have fallen. Hard to believe that the same musical genius who gave us Yesterday and Hey Jude also gave us (Simply Having A) Wonderful Christmastime, a tune so bad it not only negates every bitchin’ Beatlething Paul ever did, but plunges him deeply into negative on the cool points scale. Boy, ol’ Paul was sure stretching his lyrical capabilities when he came up with this poignant gem: "the choir of children sing their song: ding dong, ding dong" - but thankfully, he elaborates for us: "ding dong, ding ohhhhh". And yet, Chapman chose to shoot John.

2. CHRISTMAS LIGHTS: Bad enough that my neighbors feel the need to string glittering displays of driver-blinding, energy-wasting incandescence up and down my street, bad enough that we’ve got lighted outlines of reindeer, snowflakes, snowmen and Santas strewn about everywhere, but this year, my neighbors up the street have spelled out a portion of John 3:16 ("For God so loved the world") in big red lights on the front porch wall of their house. Oh, how I wish I were making that up...

3. A CHRISTMAS CAROL: Now, this is a pretty good tale right up to the last bit. We read of entrepreneur Ebenezer Scrooge, a likeable old gent just trying to run a business and live out his golden years in a little comfort and quiet; as he looks back upon his life, we admire his strength of character as he makes many personal sacrifices and works hard to build a successful business. Then, BAM! He suddenly goes completely insane. He should have fired that stupid Bob Cratchit for insubordination. What’s someone who only makes a clerk’s salary doing with that many damn kids anyway? Besides waiting for his rich boss, who worked hard all his life, to randomly redistribute his money, I mean. What a bunch of friggin’ Marxists.

4. HOLIDAY COMMERCIALS: I am convinced that sometime in September, every ad agency in existence instructs every copywriter and creative director on every single account they have to write at least four commercials per product to the tune of Deck the Halls and no other tune whatsoever. And then the corporate types authorize a budget sufficient to run each of those commercials at least six times per hour. Do us a favor, cut the ad budget and write a check to the Salvation Army instead - then maybe they will quit that damn bell-ringing (but that’s a gripe for another list).

5. BUYING GIFTS: I always buy gifts for a few people who didn’t buy gifts for me - don’t get me wrong, it’s not about return on investment, but it makes them feel bad and awkward, which I know because I always receive gifts from a few people for whom I didn’t buy anything. Then I feel bad and awkward in turn. There are also people on my list that I don’t even like and the last thing I want to do is spend my hard-earned (by which I mean "ill-gotten") gains on their gifts, which they aren’t going to like anyway, but etiquette demands that I participate in the whole sordid ritual.

6. GETTING GIFTS: Have you ever opened something, then scrabbled amongst the shredded wrappings to re-check the "from/to" label, because you just know this can’t be intended for YOU? I have. Don’t even get me started on this one...but I will say that past award-winners have involved macrame. And not in a good way.

7. SLEIGHS: Why are there so many sleighs in Christmas carols and on Christmas decorations? As a mode of transportation, I understand that they were never all that popular, they are totally unsuited to the climate of vast portions of the world, they’re kinda weird looking AND hopelessly outmoded. You know what Christmas needs? More motorcycles. Kris Kringle on a vintage panhead: I could dig it.

8. MY FAVORITE THINGS: As if Holly Jolly Christmas and the aforementioned McCartney opus weren’t bad enough, year after year we are inundated with endless repetitions of this piece of crap. What bugs me the most is, how in the heck did it become a Christmas carol anyway? I guess the fact that she mentions "sleigh bells" and "snowflakes" is supposed to qualify it...even though there isn’t a single freakin’ sleigh in the entire movie and the only snow is on top of some Alps when they flee Salzburg. Oh, goody, there are nine of us, we’re homeless and the only one of us with a marketable skill is now a navy-deserting government fugitive who just pissed off the Third Reich! God bless us, every yodeling one!

9. IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE: Frank Capra’s stinking, sappy, maudlin piece of holiday pablum. Yes, it makes the list every year. Yes, I hate it that much. That bumbling half-wit Clarence doesn’t deserve wings, he deserves HELL! HELL! HELL!

10. SANTA CLAUS HATS: They look kinda stupid on ol’ Saint Nick himself, if you ask me, so I fail to see what has sparked the proliferation of them on the heads of everyone else, upon whom they look even worse. The most optically-offensive Santa hat wearers I’ve spotted include: an octogenarian Wal-Mart greeter, a way-too-perky clerk at Dillards, a Chinese waiter at Hsu’s, and Terry Bradshaw.

MONTOYA DELENDA EST!