Frazz by Jef Mallett for December 18, 2018

Been listening to the Monkees new “Christmas Party” album. Two very nice tracks by the late Davy Jones.

The aggravation. He misses it. I’m very happy the soundtrack is only there when I want it to. https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3i5gbg

I’m giving out home-made cookies this year, so I’ve spent very little time in the stores, lowering my exposure to Christmas music. I’m still trying to decide if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.

If you really want to annoy people, start playing Christmas music in January.

Not only do they play the same songs every year, they aren’t even particularly good songs.

Probably like me…. After hearing it since August, I’ve pretty much tuned it out.

I can’t say I’ve been missing it, Bob.

I loved this, totally tapped into something I didn’t realize at all. I’ve actually turned on the Christmas music station in my car because I don’t hear it anymore. Another reason is I do more online shopping so not going to the mall and such and hearing it. I definitely did not hear any of it before Thanksgiving, and I like hearing it! Thanks for your comic today.

Spaetzle is just looking for an outlet. He’ll find something else eventually.

Went to Santa Claus town in Indiana at Christmas time it was closed

They should at least wait until after Thanksgiving!

There’s a down side to everything.

Does he miss the “incessant Christmas music”, or the “urge to scream ENOUGH!” Either way, he seems pretty hard to please!

I rather like it. My sanity isn’t taking quite the beating this year.

Frazz13 hrs ·

While I haven’t been pummeled into a Christmas-carol coma the way I used to be, when the radio was always on (and tuned to not necessarily NPR) and I might have been in more shopping establishments, I do still hear plenty of Christmas music. But there’s only one song that has me wishing for deafness.

That song, of course, is “Baby, It’s Cold Outside,” the song I was calling The Date Rape Song for a very long time before some radio stations noticed the same thing and opted to remove it from their playlists, which, as these things go, launched it to ubiquitospheric levels of airplay.

Look, it’s a well-written song, musically. Loesser knew how to write, and it’s been performed well by a long, long list of greats. The interplay between the two vocal lines is masterful. It’s got terrific flow. But in terms of lyrical content, it’s a train wreck, and a gruesome one at that. I know it was written in a different era, when men were men and women were helpless (like, that’s something to miss?) and Internet porn wasn’t a thing, but metoo era or no metoo era, that guy is creepy. Then again, since I’m the kind of guy to look at things from different angles, it’s worth noting that the song ends without establishing whether or not the woman changes her mind, gives in, succumbs, passes out, or what. Maybe this is a song about a strong woman who holds her ground. In which case this loser’s pathetic begging gets old faster than that Reindeer who Ran Over Grandma. Geez, dude. She’s not interested. Do the right thing. If you’re man enough to coerce, you’re man enough to call it a night, get out in the snow yourself and escort her home safely. Where, hopefully, her husband isn’t still putting the moves on his own prospective mistress. Because it was a different era, you know?

My daughter’s orchestra’s Christmas concert once featured a couple of students doing this song, rewritten along the lines of “I really must go” “Okay, I’m good with that” etc.

Just don’t play the Little Drummer Boy or I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus GAD!