Town Crier Articles

 

Let the holiday races begin!  No doubt this is joyous time of year for many and while agendas become packed with old traditions to manage and new ones to implement, stress becomes a serious burden and many slide into January exhausted and a little dismayed. Please keep your wits about you, whether you’re shopping, cooking, baking, decorating, wrapping or traveling, no matter how short the excursion. The Electrical Safety Foundation International (ESFI) offers some fairly dismal holiday statistics on its website from candle fires to falls off roofs—and there are other websites that offer so many dangers from toys and games. Well, checkers seems like the only gift to give without a serious risk attached. Highway safety? Let’s not even go there. While it would not enhance our holiday joy to rehearse all the gloom here, it is wise to advise the reader to be careful out there. Try to avoid haste and exhaustion. Rest. Improvise or shorten your to-do list when time gets short or fast-curves are thrown. One less dessert for the table, a few gifts thrown into bags instead of individually wrapped, one holiday luncheon canceled won’t matter in the long run. In the end, there won’t be a holiday if you’re not around to greet it.

 

 

Holiday Riddle:  What was the first company to use Santa in its advertising?

 

Curious Info:  Christmas 1914--Roughly 100,000 British and German troops were involved in the informal cessations of hostility along the Western Front in 1914. The Germans placed candles on their trenches and on Christmas trees, then continued the celebration by singing Christmas carols. The British responded by singing carols of their own. The two sides continued by shouting Christmas greetings to each other. Soon thereafter, small gifts were exchanged, such as food, tobacco, alcohol and souvenirs, such as buttons and hats. The artillery in the region fell silent. The truce also allowed a breathing spell where recently killed soldiers could be brought back behind their lines by burial parties. Joint services were held. In many sectors, the truce lasted through Christmas night, continuing until New Year's Day in others.

 

Historical Fact:  Because the holiday falls near Christmas, it's a common belief that Hanukkah is the most important holiday in Jewish tradition, but it’s actually not. Those would be the High Holy Days: Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. 

 

Holiday Quote: 

"Hanukkah is about the freedom to be true to what we believe without denying the freedom of those who believe otherwise." —Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth

 

Holiday Hack: Protect outdoor light cords by placing the plugs in a lidded plastic container; store small, fragile ornaments in an egg carton to prevent them from breaking; and keep holiday lights wrapped around a clothes hanger to prevent them from tangling.