16 Things you never knew about Christmas

Its that time of year again.  A time to celebrate a holiday that has an interesting back story about a fat man and presents. We forget the true meaning of Christmas and that it is indeed a special person's birthday.  Over the years, Christmas has turned more into a shopping fest as Macys, Walmart and other HUGE stores seem to control the market for what it is you are supposed to get your loved ones.  Unfortunately, now we use this day to buy a years worth of presents and other crap we dont need for our households.  But how did this happen and how did Christmas even come about? 

With a HUGE holiday comes many interesting facts you may not even know existed.  I give you DBart's interesting Christmas facts:

1) In 350 AD, Christmas was started by Pope Julius I, bishop of Rome, declaring December 25 the birth of Christ.  Nobody else knew this before him?  Really??

2) Male reindeers shed their antlers around Christmas time.  But according to legend, most of Santa's reindeers have male names.  This would imply that either his reindeer are in fact all female or that somebody didnt fact check when creating this legend.  It also means that Rudoloph is a transgender reindeer looking for one on one action.  (not that there is anything wrong with this)

3) There are 3 colors that you see a lot of during Christmas time - red, green and gold.  Red represents the blood of Christ.  Green represents the symbol of birth and life and gold represents light.   I always just thought these were the colors because they looked soo cool and great together.  I was soo wrong. 

4)An average Christmas tree is grown for 15 years before being sold.  So basically we are killing something that has been around for years so we can put it in our living room for a few weeks.  Nice. Give it 30 years and liberals will form some Save-the-Christmas-Tree group and the next thing you know we will be placing our presents under a tree made out of recycled paper and plastic. Boooo

5)There are about 20,000 Santas in the US during the Christmas time.  They are trained for months on how to maintain composure, not touch children in a certain way and avoid certain foods such as beans and garlic.  I cant make this up. 

6)The Polish use spider webs as ornaments because they believe a spider wove a blanket for Jesus.  Stupid polacks.  (i am allowed to say this because i am in fact polish)

7)The 12 days of Christmas is December 25 - January 6 and is supposed to represent the time it took for the wise men to visit the manger of Jesus after his birth.  I am polish and always thought it was December 12 - December 24.  I am embarrassed.  Oh well, at least i dont put spider webs on my christmas tree!

8)Because these 3 wise men we are somehow subjected to spending thousands on every person we know.  Thanks guys.  Great job!  Jesus is proud. 

9)3 poor sisters who chose prostitution to pay the bills started what we call today "stockings".  Think about that the next time you "stuff a stocking".  uh huh uh uhh - Butthead laugh

10)Bing Crosby's White Christmas is the biggest selling single of all time with over 50 million copies sold worlwide.  2 things wrong with this.. 1 - who would buy this.  Its played 239 times a day between Thanksgiving and New Years.  2 - Back in 1941,  racist Bing totally was not referring to a snowy Christmas.  wink wink

11)Christmas comes from the contraction Christ's Mass.  Xmas comes from the first letter of Christ in Greek, the letter X.  This whole time i thought i was being sacrilegious for abbreviating Christmas as Xmas!!  I feel a lot better about myself and will continue to use Xmas for the rest of my life because Christmas is annoying to type out.   Keep in mind folks, that we are indeed still keeping Christ in Christmas if we say Xmas.  We are just speaking Greek instead. 

12)Christmas purhcases account for about 1/5 of all retail sales in the US.  Thats disgusting. 

13)US scientists have figured out that Santa would have to visit 822 homes a second to deliver all the world's presents on Christmas Eve, traveling at about 650 miles a second.  Dammmm those reindeer are fast as hizzel.

14)Many theologians believe that Christ was actually born sometime in September.  Ooops

15)Jingle Bells was  originally written for Thanksgiving.  There is no Christmas reference at all in this song. I just realized this now.  But wait.. what is all this dashing through the snow talk??  That John Denver was full of shit man.  

16)The candy cane was invented in a small town by a candy maker who wanted to spread the word of Jesus around the world.  He decided on a peppermint candy in the shape of a J for Jesus. He stained it red to make it more interesting looking and to represent the blood of Christ.  I understand that the blood of Christ is a big part of Christianity but come on! That's disgusting!!

Merry Christmas!!!!