Before you accuse me of being the Grinch, I'm not trying to "steal" Christmas. I'm not a holiday-spirit killer. I've just noticed, and I know I'm not the only one, that the so-called "holiday season," as we so affectionately refer to it, gets just a little bit longer every year. And it's not that I don't love this time of year; it's actually my favorite season. It features two of the best things in life: cold weather and the day I was born. I'm just saying that we need to put a cap on how much time we spend celebrating.

I work retail, probably the single worst job for someone who easily tires of all the senseless holiday spirit. We started playing Christmas tunes on the first day of November, which is way too early. Way. Too. Early. If I hear one more time that all Mariah Carey wants for Christmas is me, I'm going to go insane. And if you haven't heard Macy Gray's Christmas album yet, consider yourself lucky. The worst is that when I'm at work, I find myself singing along with the store's soundtrack. For those few hours, I become a mindless holiday drone. It's frightening. As soon as I leave the building, I snap out of it and I seem to have no memory of where I was or what I'd just done. I'd rather listen to that Yoko Ono album where she just screams; the music is that bad.

And the decorations. All right. There has to be some kind of deadline by which holiday decorations need to be taken down. If you have the energy to put 'em up, you should be able to take 'em down. I give it 'til May 1. That way, even if you feel like leaving the icicle lights on your trees through Easter, you can. After that, it all seems pretty silly to me. Don't want to go through the trouble of untangling all the lights? Fine. But don't turn them on once we reach August. I've never seen an icicle in August, and neither have you.

I know what you (at least those of you who know me) are thinking: Alec, you're Jewish! You're just a spoilsport because they don't play the dreidel song at Macy's! But this is simply not the case. To prove it to you, I interviewed someone who loves Christmas, senior Matt Plagge. "There are few things I like more than Christmas music," Plagge said. "[But] it's a little ridiculous [how stores are ready for] Christmas before Thanksgiving even begins," Plagge said. You're right, Matt. But it isn't just "a little ridiculous;" it's sheer madness!

Don't get me wrong; I'm certainly not saying "NO CHRISTMAS MUSIC EVER" or "I WILL KILL YOU IF YOU DECORATE YOUR HOUSE." I'm just saying that we should save it until the day after Thanksgiving. That way, we won't be tearing our hair out after we hear Jessica Simpson and Nick Lachey belt out "Baby, It's Cold Outside" for the twelfth time in ten minutes.

So, um, yeah. Happy holidays.

Oh! By the way, we have these nifty new Fanscotian e-mail addresses, and I would love nothing more than to hear from all of you. So I dare you, e-mail me: ajacobs@fanscotian.net.