Episode 323 - Obscure Christmas Traditions - The Odyssey Files Radio

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
The side. I call him eating of the north pole.

Speaker 2 (00:11):
There said listen, dear, this year we need a little
help to been so many good little girls and bars asleep.

Speaker 1 (00:18):
Wall hold all those toys, so heat up your hot
chunk of therms much There the Christmas toy convoy reving up.
The signe I gotta send I find out the road
south bound north Pool.

Speaker 3 (00:30):
Over lord gotta read on the drill, Start on the wood.

Speaker 1 (00:34):
He's checking off his list, so you better beat because
he's gotta speaker on the top playing James Bell fast
snow flaps on the uteen wils to tell me have
you ever seen stealing cop flying beat beat by by sing?
I gotta semi side. I called up the state patrol, said,
if you see him coming, bars let him roll.

Speaker 4 (00:56):
We got along out a head and a big jump
to do the city man a long time.

Speaker 1 (01:02):
But be real careful. I'm forgetting the buckle ucles.

Speaker 2 (01:04):
There's a whole lot of loving them big old chucks.

Speaker 1 (01:07):
Sign I gotta send. I find out a wood southbound
north Pool. Over Lord gotta wreath on the brill, start
on the nood. He's checking off his list of da
peak and he's got a sticker on the top of
playing James bear red store flats on me, majeen, We
tell me?

Speaker 4 (01:24):
Have you ever seen.

Speaker 1 (01:25):
Stealing gone flying? Beat me bye bye? Say I gotta senda.

(01:46):
So you see a big chuck with a start on
the nud you better think.

Speaker 2 (01:50):
Twice, say you better beat the call sign.

Speaker 1 (01:52):
I gotta send.

Speaker 2 (01:53):
I find out a.

Speaker 1 (01:54):
Wood southbound nor pool over the lord. Gotta wreath found
on the grill.

Speaker 4 (01:59):
Start off the Mary Christmas.

Speaker 2 (02:07):
To all of you in the paranormal community and elsewhere,
Thank you for partaking in this special edition of The
Christmas Files. I am your host, Michael and Neil with
me looking festive. Is our wonderful co host for the day,
mister David.

Speaker 1 (02:25):
Sorry, good evening, Dave, good evening, Mike, good evening everybody,
and Marry early Christmas.

Speaker 2 (02:31):
I suppose and we already got it wrong. What because
we all we both said Mary. We both said good evening,
an early Mary Christmas. Oh sorry, good morning morning. It's
the first Yeah, it's the first show.

Speaker 1 (02:45):
Good morning, Good morning, paranormal community A right. Sorry for
seven years, man, I did too. Yeah when every.

Speaker 5 (02:58):
Episode yeah sound a normal except for the fact that is,
although looking outside it looks like it's probably about six
o'clock at night because it's just gray and miserable outside.

Speaker 2 (03:10):
But that's all right, that's all right because it's warm
and loving here inside.

Speaker 1 (03:16):
Absolutely. I mean, look at my fireplaces roaring, yeah, soil roaring.
In fact, it's not even moving, well it is. I
just I just don't have a lot of keep going
right now, gotcha, I have one to behind me. I
see you. Yeah, I got dueling trees going though.

Speaker 2 (03:39):
Well, I guess you just beat me in the Christmas spirit, then,
don't you. I get so so great episode for everybody
this this morning.

Speaker 1 (03:50):
So now are we going to read.

Speaker 2 (03:52):
Your your letters about your favorite Christmas Christmas memories? Well,
I should say most memorable Christmas memories. Not everyone is good,
but but very memorable. And then at uh, Dave and
I will share some of our own as well as

(04:13):
we do you know, each and every year when we
do this, and then at the end of the hour,
there will be a trying or at least there was
supposed to be, but that's really not needed because like
only two people wrote it, and I have like five
different gifts. So the people who did write in uh,

(04:37):
I'll be contacting them. So both Julie and Deb thank
you for well, step for for trying. I guess there's
something wrong with with submission.

Speaker 1 (04:52):
So I only even be reading because I don't even
know what it is.

Speaker 2 (04:54):
But I'll give her full kudos for for for.

Speaker 1 (04:58):
The attempt, h uh. And for.

Speaker 2 (05:03):
Julie, I will be Knnie and you'll be able to
choose which one you want, you know, whatever you want.
And then I gotta think every everybody else for not participating,
because whatever is left over gets donated to my team.
So thank you for the new K two's or the

(05:25):
new spirit box.

Speaker 1 (05:26):
And and all that other stuff. Just we have the
supporters that just like to give absolutely. Oh yeah, I
was waiting for you on that one, the.

Speaker 2 (05:38):
Chime in a word or two, jad I did absolutely
that was my chi yep, perfect. And then obviously after
that we will be We're beginning into obscure Christmas traditions
from around the world, and there are some, there are
some awesome ones, so there really are, yes, yeah there are,

(06:01):
and uh so yeah, well some of them are my favorites.
I wish we would do something like that around here,
but sadly not so much. And not only that, but
the We even have one where the Vaticant gets involved
in a just just an amazing, amazing Christmas tradition in

(06:26):
the backstory of it just made me laugh so hard.

Speaker 1 (06:29):
But we'll get to this. But anyway, we're gonna be
like Santa Claus today, we're gonna be zooming around for
every country, like we're going to be zooming to this
country and that country. We're going to travel the whole world.

Speaker 2 (06:43):
Yeah, for the most part, and and we're giving out gifts,
and we're giving out gifts to We're very much.

Speaker 1 (06:51):
Like Santa and you haven't had on so you can
be Santa and I'll be the jolly off the fact
that you're bigger than me. But that's okay, that's okay.
I did happen to see Red one. I did too,
so I was just gonna say, because the Rock is
bigger than Santa Claus and that too, so.

Speaker 2 (07:13):
Well, I wasn't even going with the Rock. I was
going with the Polar Bear.

Speaker 1 (07:16):
Oh, polar Bear. That's true. I'll be the polar Bear. Yeah,
I like that guy, the polar Bear.

Speaker 2 (07:22):
Well, you know damn well, like Red two is going
to feature like the Polar Bear.

Speaker 1 (07:27):
Yeah, it was so for.

Speaker 2 (07:33):
Those of you, it's if you have Prime, which I
think almost everybody in the freaking world does. Probably Red
One is now on Prime and for free, so you
can't get much better than that.

Speaker 1 (07:48):
And it's pretty good too.

Speaker 2 (07:50):
It's not bad. I'll say that it's not bad. I
don't I was expecting some twists and turns. Yeah, Like
I'm like, okay, it's going to turn off that Santa
Claus kidnapped himself, you know, for whatever reason, like he stayed.

Speaker 1 (08:07):
Yeah, there's that little TWI I'm not going to say
what it is, but there is the little twist and
turn of like who the bad guy is? So because
I never saw that coming, that's because they made it up. Yeah, No,
she's actually I was doing my folklore research. She's actually
in there no ship under under obscure Christmas characters. So yeah,

(08:32):
so I'm gonna bring her name up, Okay, sometime today.

Speaker 2 (08:37):
It's so hard to change because even you're like, I'll
bring it up tonight, like no, no, you won't.

Speaker 1 (08:43):
Sometime today, sometime this morning, sometime during the show. So again,
going forwards, this this is our last.

Speaker 2 (08:51):
Show of the year, yep, and so we will be
starting again January fifth. It's the first Sunday, and our
new time is ten am to noon, so and then
obviously the show will go out after that. So I mean,
if you listen on audio, it's not going to affect
you whatsoever, except that you'll be able to get it like.

Speaker 1 (09:12):
Ten hours earlier or whatever it is. So, yeah, you
that's our Christmas gift to you. Yeah, right, and our
Christmas gift to ourselves is Sunday night football. So well,
just football the rest end of the season. Yeah, football
in general, right, yeah, because we'll be done noon and then.

Speaker 2 (09:32):
But because of this early time, we'll be able to
bring on more people from across the pond, like Barry Fitzgerald,
who we definitely want to have back on in the
beginning weeks of the new year. But that will make
it far easier for us to have people like them on.

Speaker 1 (09:54):
So we're expanding. We're going worldwide in an action international
because we got international a couple of years ago, you
got to get more international.

Speaker 2 (10:06):
Uh. In fact, I found out recently not only are
we international, but we are interdimensional.

Speaker 1 (10:17):
Oh apparently. Uh it's a conversation I had with Sena. No,
I can't believe it. Came from that source. Totally dumbfounded.
I never saw that coming.

Speaker 2 (10:32):
So yeah it uh, I don't, I can't even I
don't even remember the contact the conversation is. I think
I had a stroke during it.

Speaker 1 (10:47):
So who what what dimension is listening to us? I don't,
I don't know. I just said I don't ever any
of the contents.

Speaker 2 (10:53):
Okay, so yeah, just uh it's something.

Speaker 1 (11:01):
We'll let's talk about that later. I'm not. Yeah, that's
not getting so that's fine. We'll be on that for
forty five minutes, do it all.

Speaker 2 (11:07):
That's right, and that's that's it's not Christmasy. So so anyway,
I want to start out before we get into the stories,
so just get into the the Christmas spirit. So I
have a set of just one or two questions, top

(11:28):
threes for for for both Dave and myself. So let
me ask you this, Dave Yep, top three Christmas songs
in your opinion, your your favorites, I.

Speaker 1 (11:42):
Should say, okay, well, one would be Lucy and Linus
the piano thing from the trio No shit, that's uh
that I just I think from my childhood and watching uh,
the Charlie Brown Christmas and that was like one of

(12:04):
the ones that always stuck with me. The music from
that just has always been my favorite music for Christmas.
So I'm gonna throw that in there. I like the
Hawaiian one. Alca is the way to say, from National
Lampoon's Vacation, right, Yeah, that one always grabs my ear

(12:26):
every time it comes on, and I kind of get
excited and I perk up and listen. Uh And then
I'm gonna say, probably White Christmas. That's uh not Barry White,
Burl Lives. I think Burl Lives did one of it, Yeah,

(12:50):
but don't I know, uh not Frontus Stare, but oh
I can't remember his name now, but anyway, he was around
that same time for in the forties, as far as
there saying, did a version of it that I really
like because I always like white Christmases, you know, I mean,
I grew up in the Midwest. We always had a
White Christmas. And that song is just kind of so

(13:12):
mellow and like you could just imagine sitting buy a
fire and just not really doing anything but just listening,
you know, and enjoying the crackling of the fire. A
couple of golden retrievers laying at your feet snoozing waiting
for their Christmas presents? You know, so what are yours?

(13:34):
So this is tough because I like them all. I
just too. I've been listening all season, so so have I.
I've been listening for like two weeks. Okay, so let's
see here. The theme to this episode Keith Hartley's sand
It's got a semi. I love that one. It makes

(13:57):
me laugh. I love singing along.

Speaker 2 (13:58):
It's just jolly and because obviously I'm in the transportation industry,
it has a meanly. It has a meaning to me,
you know, a relation to it. Uh, I probably.

Speaker 1 (14:14):
I haven't heard it this year. I haven't heard it
in years.

Speaker 2 (14:17):
But again from my childhood, loved it. And it's I'm
getting nothing for Christmas. Oh oh, it's hilarious. This is
this kid that's naughty and he starts listing all of
these he did wrong. He's like, so I'm getting nothing
for Christmas and he's like, Mommy and Daddy are mad.

(14:42):
It's like nothing for Christmas because I ain't been nothing
but bad. And it makes me laugh so much because
that again was me for my childhood. But like I said,
I keep meaning to look it up, like on YouTube.
Because I know it's on youtubete. Yeah, and uh, I
just I keep forgetting.

Speaker 1 (15:02):
To do so.

Speaker 2 (15:06):
And then you know, it's kind of a I heard
it last night and it yeah, that's really good. But
you know what, there's one that I like more, and
it's it's a Glee song. Now, no a whole lot,
so Glee mostly does covers, so I mean it would
just be ah, it would just be uh, you know

(15:30):
whatever that that song was sung by whoever. But I
think this song it was specifically for the show Okay,
and it's called Extraordinary Merry Christmas. I believe, very uptune,
very uh It's it's good and I since I've heard

(15:53):
it a few years ago, I've really enjoyed it listening
to it, and I've probably heard at least a dozen
times this year, some card to get sick.

Speaker 1 (16:01):
Of it, but it's still really good. So well, I'm
gonna I'm gonna say we each get an additional present
this year from Santa for not picking Mariah Carey song,
because if that never played on the air again, I'd
be a happy man. I'm sorry to Anny Mariah Carey
fans out there.

Speaker 2 (16:17):
But it's so hilarious that even before Christmas usually comes out.
You get those memes like on Facebook or whatever, like
She's thawing out or something like that.

Speaker 1 (16:28):
You know, he he comes. But yeah, I like it.

Speaker 5 (16:35):
It's a good tong but yeah, I'm a little burned
out by it.

Speaker 1 (16:40):
People and people have made it like a Christmas like,
oh my god, that's like the start of Christmas when
Mariah careys no, no, I think they mean that sarcastically though,
Oh christ I hope. So all right, okay, so here,
and that was off the cuff, by the way, because

(17:01):
you didn't tell me you were going to be grilling me.
In my top three Christmas songs, I know, yeah, but
I figured, you know, I have top I have, Yeah,
I have top three. I mean I got a lot
more than that too, but I mean those were the
three off the top of my have for sure that
Charlie Brown is probably number one. All right, here we go, yep.

Speaker 2 (17:19):
Top Top three Christmas movies slash TV shows.

Speaker 1 (17:25):
Okay, the Original Santa Claus with Tim Allen. Absolutely phenomenal movie.
Love that movie. Watched it last night. Yeah I didn't,
but I watched it. I wonder how much bus Oh oh,
that new one that's out about the where they try

(17:46):
to bring the bag on board for the terrorist thing.
I can't remember the name of my Definitely not Christmas. No,
definitely not a Christmas although, although we were laughing about
it afterwards because I'm like, it starts with christ this music,
and it ends with Christmas music, and it's at Christmas time.
So I'm like, is this going to be the new
debate like die Hard? This is like throwing into the

(18:08):
Diehard category of whether this is a Christmas movie or not?
So all right, So the original Santa Claus with Tim Allen,
I mean, I gotta go back to. Oh, it'd be
a toss up between the old claymations, you know, like
Rudolph and and those guys, Yeah, and Frosty and stuff

(18:31):
and Charlie Brown Christmas. I guess that would be kind
of a conglomerate number two, and then number three would
be Oh, I just had it right now. I was
just thinking about it before I diverted my brain to
the other what we've Oh, come on, Santa Claus, Tim Millen, Oh,

(18:57):
Christmas Vacation. M I think that's I watch that like
three or four times, five times, six times a year,
like the Holidays so wow, and I watch it even
when it's not the holidays because it's just so funny.
You want to know, what's sad is that? Uh?

Speaker 2 (19:16):
Obviously I've seen Christmas Vacation, but I have not seen
which is even I would say even more of a
staple of Christmas movies that I have not seen this
is It's a Wonderful Life.

Speaker 1 (19:26):
I still have not seen that movie.

Speaker 2 (19:29):
I know, you shake your head and I every year
I'm like, Okay, this is here, I'm gonna watch it,
and then like if I see it on like the
Guide or whatever, it's like an hour in and I'm like, oh,
I'm like, well, I can't watch it from there, and
then I and then I just saw I think Prime

(19:50):
has it, but like in.

Speaker 1 (19:51):
A bridged version. No you don't want that, And I'm
just like, no, I don't want to the bridge version.
I'm like, what the hell.

Speaker 2 (19:59):
I'm like, you guys are every year I get teased
by the way It's a wonderful life, and then I
miss it.

Speaker 1 (20:06):
Unable honorable mention the Christmas Story, you know what.

Speaker 2 (20:11):
I I don't find that to be.

Speaker 1 (20:18):
Like epicness. It's an honorable mention for me. I mean
I like it.

Speaker 2 (20:24):
Well, I mean people love it so much, Like what
is it like T and T or something like that
does twenty four Hours of the.

Speaker 1 (20:30):
Christmas That's yeah. No, I'm just like what I No,
it's not that great, but it gets an honorable mention
just because it's got some great just just a family relationship.
There is so real to where I grew up, and
it was filmed right in my neck of the woods
where when I was a kid. I'm just like, it's

(20:52):
just so reflective of blood well, like life was really
like in that neighborhood. So okay, I can get that
all right for me. Number one Mickey's Christmas Carol. Good movie.
I have to watch it every year.

Speaker 2 (21:07):
I have it on my computer download even though I
have Disney Plus, so I'll just turn it on that.

Speaker 1 (21:12):
But for whatever reason, I don't have access to.

Speaker 2 (21:14):
Disney Plus, I have access to Mickey's Christmas Carol. Have
to watch it every year. As much as I love
the Santa Claus. And like I said, I watched it
last night. I actually enjoy the Santa Claus two more. Okay,
so Santa Claus two and then I am going to

(21:38):
have to go with Santa Sleigh.

Speaker 1 (21:41):
I knew what I knew, one of those B minus
movies was coming in here somewhere. Santa is an A
plus movie.

Speaker 2 (21:48):
I bite your tongue there, Missus shawyering, but I mean,
come out Bill Goldberg as Evil Santa.

Speaker 1 (21:57):
It's amazing, amazing.

Speaker 2 (22:01):
Although I bought Violent Night, which is the newer one
that came out last year, I believe I haven't seen
it yet. And then there is actually a movie that
I saw last weekend at my buddy Stein's place, and
I bought it immediately, and I still haven't watched it here.

(22:22):
But it's called Fat Man and it's Mel Gibson as
Santa Claus and he's it. It's an interesting dynamic to it,
but completely not what you would expect for Santa like

(22:43):
a Christmas Santa movie. He doesn't wear the red he
doesn't wear the red coat, like you never see him
dressed up. As said, he's tending to like this farm
in Alaska, and he's like being hunted by by this
like uh, this guy who's been hired to kill him
by like this twelve year old.

Speaker 1 (23:04):
Jesus.

Speaker 2 (23:05):
I mean, the setup is it makes sense when you
watch it, but it means he's talking about like that
just sounds absurd. Honestly, he does a pretty good job,
so okay, But yeah, I had never heard of it
either until I was at my buddy's house last weekend.

Speaker 1 (23:26):
So the one you said before that is that the
one where Santa gets all is all hammered at the
bar drinking and he's the real Santa at start of it.
I can't remember the name of that movie, but it
was actually pretty good, where Santa is just like he's
just tired of Christmas, so he's just wasted at the
bar and there's other like mal Santa's are in there

(23:48):
kind of grousing about life, and it's just this dive
bar and he's just drinking like whiskey by the bottle,
and then he goes to the house and then the
hit team comes in because they're trying to steal the
ladies money out of Revolt. I can't remember the name

(24:09):
of that movie, but that gets an honorable mention too,
even though I don't know the name of it off
the tops, so honorably Kenny, remember it, Kenny, remember it?
But yeah, I'll tell you. I'll write it down. Note
to Dave, January fifth, So in case you didn't watch
it during the holiday season, you can start to new
you're off with it. What I said, when we do

(24:33):
our show on January fifth, yeah, I'll make sure I
have the name of it available. Oh. I was just like, yeah,
I know, you were kind of like off in levet Field.

Speaker 2 (24:43):
There I was, because I well, when you started that sentence,
I was thinking about where I wanted to go next,
and I was looking at the time, you know, and
so I missed like the first couple and all of
a sudden, You're like, January fifth, you can do it.
I'm like, wait, that's the day of our show. What's
going on the marsha I wanted.

Speaker 1 (25:01):
The morning of our show. If we get called the
morning show, paranormal morning show, I don't think there is
a paranormal morning show. I don't think there is either.
But we just broke that ground. Oh and before I forget,

(25:22):
you heard it here first. Last week, the New Jersey
drone crisis is getting severe. They're shutting down airports. Really,
they shut down two airports in New York. Not obviously
the Guardia, but they shut down two airports in New
York because the drones were flying over installations at the airport,

(25:47):
like spying, and they were in the runway like flight
pass and stuff at these airports, and one of them
was buzzing the tower. There's this guy and I don't
know if he's right, but everybody thinks he's a but
I think it's like the Senator from New Jersey. He
thinks it's the Iran's the Iranians drone ships because I

(26:09):
guess they converted some some ships to drone ships. It's
supposed to have these like wicked like wardrones type of thing,
and so he thinks that's who's doing about it. The
and they're kind of well they they they you know,
they can see anything they want to see in the world,
you know, with the satellites and everything. So the satellites

(26:30):
show all three of the ships that are still sitting
in the South Persian see, so they're not here. But
the one guy is just like they've got cloaking. He's
just losing his mind. But anyway, so what I thought
was just going to be like a want and done,
it actually isn't. It's like getting more and more and

(26:52):
more attention. It's showing up in my feet all the time.
It's on the nightly news now they're talking about it,
so yeah, so so something's going on there, So everybody
keep an eye on that if you're interested in the paranormal,
because I don't think this is like a group of
pranksters doing this. There's something more to what's happening here.

(27:12):
So that's not necessarily the paranormal. That's like the conspiracy theorists.
Well it's something, right, I mean, I don't know. We
can't put a tag on it til we find out
who the party is behind it, because if they never
find out who it is, I mean, with the technology
we have today, I can't believe that this is like
going on as long as it is and hasn't been
like squashed by our military or the CIA or FBI

(27:36):
or somebody. The one sheriff with that when in one county,
the sheriff they interviewed him, he is like, if you
see them things flying around, just shut it down. Shut
it up in the sky. Yeah, because that's always ends. Well,
but I digre's that's not very Christmas. No.

Speaker 2 (27:57):
But I do want to point out that our number
one friend of the show, mister Anthony, he wrote me
the other day saying that I guess at the same
time as these drones are happening or whatever, now they're
starting to see weird lights here in Minnesota.

Speaker 1 (28:20):
Oh well, I didn't see that. Now I gotta watch out.

Speaker 2 (28:23):
For it, I said, either he would keep me up there,
you would, But he sent me a link to an
article written by like Fox nine or whatever it was,
Carol Levin or something about weird lights being seen in Northfield.

Speaker 1 (28:42):
Okay, well, since we're going that direction, I gotta throw
this out there because in the Forest Lake community page
somebody was and more than one person, we're asking who
was doing the drone, the aeronautical drone thing at the
high school right here across from my house. They said
there were two hundred, two hundred drones, approximately two hundred

(29:04):
drones over the football field at like two in the morning.
There's pictures of them. Like people They're like, well, who
was doing the air Who was like practicing their drone
thing for Christmas or some holiday show. They just figured
somebody was doing it for the holiday show. But at
two o'clock in the morning on the on the football field,

(29:25):
you're gonna be out there with like a crew setting
up two hundred drones that are going to fly in sink.
I don't know. I didn't see it. I wish I had,
because that would be an interesting as hell. I've actually
gone over there, see what I mean. I mean, it doesn't.
It doesn't. The only thing that doesn't make sense in
that is the two am.

Speaker 2 (29:42):
I mean, yeah, if you're going to practice a two
hundred drone show, you're gonna want a big open field,
and a right football field be the proper place to
do it because it's gonna be wide open, right, But yeah,
two am, that.

Speaker 1 (29:54):
Makes sense to me? Is it?

Speaker 2 (29:56):
Just it went so long that they're like, we're not
leaving until we get a stout, until it's you know,
and there's two three in the morning, and then they're like,
all right, let's pack it up, right.

Speaker 1 (30:07):
So I mean I could see that, I honestly could.
I couldn't. I could too. I just uh, I just
thought it interesting since you were talking about like crazy
light sightings and stuff. But yeah, I.

Speaker 2 (30:17):
Don't know, but I think now everybody's getting paranoid.

Speaker 1 (30:20):
It was the same with the Chinese balloon.

Speaker 2 (30:23):
Anytime you saw any balloon after that, oh my, you know,
people went nuts and we're being spied on.

Speaker 1 (30:28):
Yeah, and now.

Speaker 2 (30:29):
Everybody now everybody sees a light or a drone and they're.

Speaker 1 (30:32):
Like, what's going on? Right? Right? But I digress. So
now that we got into the kissing spirit and then
went away from it, we're going right back. We're going
right back. So I would like, like I said, there was,

(30:54):
I didn't. I don't know why I didn't get demps,
I honestly don't. But Julie, who has been a longtime.

Speaker 2 (31:02):
Listener of the show and very appreciative of that, she
wrote in two two memories to us one good, one bad.
You know you did say you wanted positive and negative.

Speaker 1 (31:15):
I said it was open, open to whatever you wanted
to share with us, right exactly, And she did that.
So which would you like me to read first? Well,
let's get the bad one out.

Speaker 2 (31:27):
Of the way, So get a bad one. I thought so,
but just wanted to be sure. So and this kind
of falls into not so much like like favorite customer,
but memorable and and it's always interesting that, you know,
even as I think back, like it either has to

(31:47):
be so incredibly amazing that it just sticks with your life,
Like you know, the whole Nintendo thing when I was
like five or six or whatever it was, and then
you have like twenty years of nothing. You can't remember
anything about any Christmas because it was just the same
thing over and over and over again, you know. And
then you have you know, I have the memory which

(32:12):
makes me relate to Julie's very very intensely. And I'll
get to that later. But it's but yeah, So this
is what Judy writes. My most memorable Christmas was in
twenty twenty. Unfortunately it's not a great memory. On November

(32:32):
thirtieth of twenty twenty, my brother passed away unexpectedly. He
had already went Christmas shopping for the family, So on
Christmas morning, as we were opening our presence, there were
many presents there for my brother. Instead of being an
exciting time, every gift we opened from my brother, we cried.
Later in the day, my nephew and I were taking
down the Christmas tree and we were listening to Christmas music.

(32:56):
All of a sudden, the Christmas music stopped playing and
it started playing a really sad song that is usually
played at funerals. Of course, we started crying again. Sorry,
it's not a very exciting and uplifting story, but that
was my most memorable Christmas. Definitely no need to apologize,
and obviously our condolences for for your loss, especially especially

(33:20):
at that time, but.

Speaker 1 (33:23):
Anytime you well, anytime family members, you know, not the
best of times, but right, But I mean, to.

Speaker 2 (33:32):
Have to go through the whole trying to to accept
what happened and moving on with life, only to have
Christmas come around and it's.

Speaker 1 (33:40):
Just like him right back in your face again. Yeah, yeah, no,
So what's up with the funeral march happening right in
the middle of Christmas music? Though?

Speaker 2 (33:52):
Yeah, I was I'm wondering if it's like go rest
high in that mountain or something like that, because that's
something that people play a.

Speaker 1 (34:00):
Lot at at funerals. Okay, I don't know if that is.
She wasn't. She wasn't specific on what. I don't know
if it was like right in the middle of jingle
bell rock, it just stopped and then you got like
taps playing or something like that. You know.

Speaker 2 (34:15):
I hope that's not exactly what. I hope that the
song finished and then they just went to something else.

Speaker 1 (34:22):
Okay, I'm hoping. But I I.

Speaker 2 (34:28):
Sit here and I like try to ponder whether that
was a message from him.

Speaker 1 (34:33):
That's what I would say, right, is that? But why
would you play that?

Speaker 2 (34:37):
Why would you play a song that played at funerals
instead of like his favorite song or something.

Speaker 1 (34:41):
Right, That's what I would say too, Right, So if
he was watching all the emotional all pour and stuff,
that certainly could have drawn him back to that location. Absolutely,
I mean, and then I would think that he would
share something that was one of his favorites or something.
I agree with you, I don't know why you would
play it like a depressing funerals So so.

Speaker 2 (35:02):
I'm torn between Yeah, I'm torn between message and then coincidence.

Speaker 1 (35:06):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (35:08):
I guess only she would be able to answer that
question whether it was a song that meant something to
the both of them that were taking down the tree.

Speaker 1 (35:18):
Or not. Maybe there was.

Speaker 2 (35:20):
Something that happens on that that radio station all the time,
right or whatever they were listening to.

Speaker 1 (35:27):
Nobody listens to radio anymore.

Speaker 2 (35:33):
Well, I tried to listen to Cool One to Wait,
which is twenty four hours of Christmas music, but it
was literally like two songs, ten minutes of commercials, three
songs ten minutes of commercials, and.

Speaker 1 (35:50):
It's the same commercials, and it's the same issues and
something else. Oh fat Larry selling life insurance to fat
people and then tax issues. I mean, I'm like I
did too. So I switched over to Love one oh
five point three and it's all all basically almost all music.

(36:10):
It's like a half hour music, three commercials, half hour music. Yeah,
so it's pretty good.

Speaker 2 (36:18):
There's another what is it, It's like ninety seven point
one or something like that, Kate Is, which was supposed
to be twenty four hour commercial less Christmas music. So
I tried that, but then found out quite quickly that
all the songs were Jesus.

Speaker 1 (36:36):
Related and was like the Christian station pretty much.

Speaker 2 (36:42):
And so I'm like, well, like I don't mind christ
you know, Jesus Christmas songs, it's not that that has
their place too.

Speaker 1 (36:48):
I'm like, but only no, I want Santa Claus coming
to town, baby, like let's go here. Yeah. So yeah,
baby it's cold outside. I gotta have that every once.

Speaker 2 (36:59):
In a while of that song, especially now that I
know the lyrics. It's just it's just hilarious and I
relate to it far more because that that's like me.

Speaker 1 (37:09):
I'm the guy trying.

Speaker 2 (37:11):
Like you'll freeze out there, know, Yeah, come on back.

Speaker 1 (37:17):
I got some popcorn and then.

Speaker 2 (37:20):
Yeah, you know, but my favorite line of all of
that is like get over that hold out. It's like yeah,
so me yea yeah, but yeah, I love baby.

Speaker 1 (37:30):
It's cold outside. So uh.

Speaker 2 (37:35):
I do want to thank Julie again for sending that,
because I know that couldn't have been easy, right, So
I really a pre It gives me even greater joy
that I can contact her and be like, you won.

Speaker 1 (37:52):
Because you're the only one that bothered to do it.

Speaker 2 (37:55):
Yeah, but honestly though, I really appreciate it.

Speaker 1 (38:02):
So okay, let's get on to her her good memory.

Speaker 2 (38:09):
So she said this in like maybe an hour or
so after her other one, and like, Okay, my last
memory that I submitted it was not a happy one,
so I thought that I would send one that was
memorial and happy.

Speaker 1 (38:20):
I wanted a bike for.

Speaker 2 (38:21):
Christmas so bad because I wanted to ride my bike
to school with my brother.

Speaker 1 (38:25):
I knew that my parents didn't.

Speaker 2 (38:27):
Have a lot of money for Christmas that year, so
I wasn't expecting one at all. When Christmas morning came around,
all we all went around the tree, and although I
knew I wouldn't get a bike, I was still hoping
for a Christmas miracle. Maybe Santa would bring me on,
but there was no bike under the Christmas tree. I
was okay with that. We opened up all of our
presents and I was so happy for everything I got.

(38:48):
I noticed that my dad had left the room, but
didn't think anything about it until he walked back in,
rolling in on the new cream colored bike for me.
I was so excited because I didn't although I was
hoping for one. I rode that bike all day on
Christmas Day. A week later, when school started, I was
able to ride my brand new bike with my brother
to school, even though I'm sure he didn't want his

(39:11):
little sister to take along with him. So that is
my very happy and memorable Christmas memory that I have.
Even if my parents did not have much money some years,
they always made our Christmas so special. David Mike have
a wonderful Christmas and a very happy New Year, and
obviously very much same back to you. Like that goes

(39:32):
right along with the whole Nintendo thing where you know
the parent leaves the room and they're just they're just
kind of slinking along hoping they're not I actually did
that to Cameron when I had the team over about
a year and a half ago. For our Christmas would
be Christmas twenty twenty three, twenty two for twenty two

(39:55):
And I had a hidden in the room or whatever,
and I was like, okay, it's your and you know,
went and got it and rolled it out. And but
I love doing doing ship like that, And.

Speaker 1 (40:12):
Yes, exactly.

Speaker 2 (40:15):
So uh And and I think one of the things
that parents love to do is make even if they're
like parents are fighting or it's like a you know,
World War three, you know, in the house, once it
comes Christmas, they always try to make it special, right,
especially for the kids. And you know, did you ever

(40:38):
get to do any thing like that for your daughters?

Speaker 1 (40:45):
You know, it was always so one of the things
I always did is I never let them stop believing
in Santa Claus. So that's my claim defend right. So
I would always tell them, you know, because we went
to church, and you know, they believe even we grew up,
you know, Christian, and I brought them up kind of
Christian faith, and that there's something more, you know, better

(41:06):
than that, more powerful than them, that you know, created
everything around us. And what I used to do for
them for every year, we would leave out obviously cookies
and milk and stuff. But I said, we you know,
you can't forget about Santa's reindeer. And so I would

(41:27):
go to the extreme of we would leave out carrots,
and we would leave them on by the kitchen table, right,
and so where our fireplace was, I had a couple
of deer hoves from deer hunting that I had used
as coat you know, you could put your coat out
like a coat hook, And so I would take the
deer hose and I would get them with a little

(41:49):
bit of ash, and I would make footprints from the
fireplace across the carpeting to the kitchen. And then I
would get chocolate covered raisins, and i'd put a little
pile of chocolate covered raisins down right. And then I
would now on the carrots and I would shred them
and throw them all over the floor, right, and I

(42:09):
need the rest, so they'd be like scraps of carrots
all over the place. So and then obviously the cookies
would be you know, partially eating and stuff in the
melt partially dranking. And then we made sure that we
were never the first ones downstairs, so we would wait
until we'd hear them up and they were just they
grew up just like their dad. Because I was up
at about five am Christmas morning. Every other day I

(42:32):
got up at nine. On Christmas morning, I woke up
at five, you know, and they would I could hear
them run downstairs, you know, all three of them just then,
you know, and stuff like that. So you know, that's
what I did for them. Other than that, like we

(42:53):
never rolled in like a gift, you know. Anything that
we got them was like there in the room. There
was never like a Tadam moment like where we rolled
stuff out. But that was like, you know, and that
was great to list because when they were little, they
they were totally like, oh my god, there's I'm gonna

(43:16):
kill it. Shanna brought his deer with him down the chimney,
you know, you get his dare I'm talking. It was
just great.

Speaker 2 (43:24):
Uh did you ever just for effect pick up like
some of the chocolate.

Speaker 1 (43:30):
Covers every year? Every year? Yeah, I know, well we
can't have this, And then I kind of like feel
it and I'd be like, well I don't, and they'd
be like, oh yeah, that's boo boo, and I'd be like, really, oh,
isn't that bad. It's from Santa's Reindeer. It's magical viber. Yeah,

(43:50):
they were like, can I have some? And I'm like, no,
this is dad's, you know, And I would never let
him have any because I didn't want him to know
that it was chocolate covered raisins, right, so that would
ruin the whole thing. It would ruin the thing.

Speaker 2 (44:05):
Yeah, you could say that, you know, in the mythology
of like Dragon's you know, cry diamonds, right, you know,
maybe Santa's Reindeer poop.

Speaker 1 (44:17):
Raisins, but maybe Yeah, I didn't go that way, but
yeah I could have, but I got busted. I would
have probably gone that way would have worked for many,
many years.

Speaker 2 (44:27):
I'm surprised that after a few years or whatever, I've
seen you do it and them getting down there before you,
that they just did do it before you even got
down there.

Speaker 1 (44:36):
They were freaked out by it for a long time. Yeah.
Now they were like for years, They're like, it's just
they would tell everybody in the neighborhood that that my
dad eats boop eats render boop. You know. It took
then I'd have to wait until the kids were gone
to explain to the neighbors what was happening, and like
that's just classic, you know.

Speaker 4 (44:57):
But I'm like, yeah, but.

Speaker 2 (45:01):
In the meantime, you were the neighbor that ate.

Speaker 1 (45:03):
Poop in the meantime. Yeah, in the short term, I
was the neighbor that ate radio poop. I was totally
okay with it because it was delicious. Because I love
chocolate covered raisins. I would go and choc covered peanuts,
but that's just mere. They're a little bigger. Yeah. Yeah,
chocolate covered peanuts are good, but not as good as raisins.
Not as good as raisins. Wow, agree to disagree. Cell

(45:27):
covered strawberries have been better, but that's kind of deceptive
to leave chocolate covered strawberries and claiming to be poop.
That would have been a tough cell especially when you
build into it. Yeah right, eat it juicy.

Speaker 2 (45:41):
You'd either have to eat them whole, which is hard
to do.

Speaker 1 (45:44):
Which would be hard to do as I'm lying on
the ground choking to death on a strawberry stuck in
my throat on Christmas morning. Yeah, that would have been bad,
but memorable, but memorable. Yeah, they would have been able
to write in there's a Christmas memory my dad choke
to death on a strawberry. Why do they sound so

(46:07):
happy about that? I don't know, get this? We laugh
about it now? Yeah, yeah, he would have wanted us
to think it was funny.

Speaker 2 (46:17):
Well, I mean that's probably pretty accurate.

Speaker 1 (46:19):
Though, that's probably pretty accurate. So uh I I.

Speaker 2 (46:28):
Yeah, I'm not gonna because we're we're we're in a
high note. So you know, here, here's a question, and
they have ever asked you or we've and if I'm wrong,
correct me, because I don't want to go I don't
want to go over it again. We talked about like
our favorite Christmas memory, which we've talked about before.

Speaker 1 (46:50):
Yeah. Uh, but what about favorite gift ever gotten, ever received?
We talked about that before. I don't know that we
have or haven't. But honestly, I couldn't say that I've

(47:13):
ever gotten a favorite gift really. I mean, I I
appreciate anything that I get that if somebody took the
time to shop for me, I don't you know, like
one doesn't stand out more than the other. Like let's
say I got a bottle of you know, obsession for men,
which I really like that fragrance, and then I got
like a Ralph Lauren sweater that year. I mean, I

(47:36):
like that, just as you know, I can't determine whether
I like the cologne better or the sweater better, or
you know, so I don't know, I know that I could.
I don't know that I could pick like a favorite.
I mean there's memorable ones, like you know, when I
was little and I got the Atari twenty six hundred
and you know, nobody else like anywhere around my house

(47:57):
had one, and so my bedroom was packed with my buddies,
you know, my little thirteen inch black and white TV,
you know, playing Atari twenty six hundred, you know the
year kind of like Julie's, you know. I mean, I've
shared this before. When I was twelve, I asked for
a ten speed. When I was thirteen, I asked for
a ten speed and then and I didn't get it,

(48:19):
and then I thought, well, I'm never going to get one.
And in the same situation, you know, I grew up
in a poor area and parents didn't have a lot
of money. And that year, you know, we got downe
opening presence and my mom left the room and I
wasn't paying attention, and she walked back in the front door,
rolling in my brand New Schwin Continental and I was,

(48:40):
you know, like jumping for drug. I was out riding
it in like two feet of snow and slush up
and down the street. I didn't care, you know, I'm like, no,
I'm riding it, you know. I mean we had tons
of snow when I was growing up, you know, right
off chicag right on the lake offect Chicago snow. But yeah,
I mean that was a great memory. Yeah, the Atari

(49:04):
was a great memory too. I guess nothing recent, huh No, No,
I don't have. You know, I get a few gifts
every year for Christmas, and you know I appreciate him.
You know. I bought myself a Christmas gift this year.
I do every year anyway, but I bought myself. Usually

(49:26):
it's just something small. It's not another ring, is it. No.
I bought myself a nice Christmas gip this year that
I wanted for a while. So I got a I
bought a sixty five inch Mini Led, the new four
K Mini LEDs that have like twelve billion colors something

(49:49):
like that. Yeah. So I've been watching it, watching and
watching the price and watching the price, and finally I
jumped on it. So so it's gonna look like a drive
in movie theater in my bedroom. Nice. Yeah, I can't
wait to game on it. It's got that special one for

(50:11):
four gaming mode. Yeah, I don't know what that means. Oh,
and it's got a four eighty K refresh rate instead
of a sixty one to twenty two forty, there's a
four eighty K refresh rate. This is the one you
can like. It's got like a thousand or ten thoughts.
I forget. I think it's ten thousand, like famous paintings

(50:34):
and pieces of art and stuff. And if you're not me, yeah,
you can just click that button and it just scrolls
through and then it's it's an intelligent TV. So you
don't have to have anything. You don't have to talk
into your your remote. It just hears you. And so
it's like, Alexi, tell me more about this painting, and
it'll tell you all about the painting. Your pairs Bluetooth

(50:57):
headphones and I mean, it doesn't ever thing. It's a
beautiful TV. Nice. Well, Happy Merry Christmas to you. Well,
thank you very much.

Speaker 2 (51:08):
I I bought my team what is turning out to
be a very very very very very very expensive gift
for this year.

Speaker 1 (51:20):
Which which as soon as it's done, which it isn't
I was gonna say, and it probably is if I'm
thinking what it is. It isn't done yet. No, it's
not done yet.

Speaker 2 (51:30):
But when it is done, I'm going to not only
unbail it to my team who doesn't know.

Speaker 1 (51:36):
That this thing is is coming Christmas.

Speaker 2 (51:40):
I've noticed that, but I'm also going to be doing
like a live on on my team page to reveal
that since it is paranormally based, and I thought, since
it is good to be so amazing and it is
paranormally based, that during the first episode of the New Year,

(52:04):
that I would then show the video here on the show.

Speaker 1 (52:08):
But absolutely depends on how long it is, right, Yeah,
well you'll just have to dial it down or something. Yeah,
I can, I can, I can redo it, do that
once because it's going to be a live as opposed
to just a recorded video.

Speaker 2 (52:23):
But yeah, thank you guys. We'll really enjoy having to
see it. But yeah, otherwise, I guess, I mean, I
guess you could say the Lego set that I bought
is probably a gift for me.

Speaker 1 (52:40):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (52:41):
The Eiffel Tower, which stands six feet tall and ten
and one pieces I'm so looking forward to putting that together.

Speaker 1 (52:50):
It's just been.

Speaker 2 (52:50):
Sitting like the door to my lego room and that's
what I call it.

Speaker 1 (52:54):
It's a spare bedroom.

Speaker 2 (52:56):
It has been open and it's just been sitting on
the on the table like teasing me. Yeah, taunting me
as I walked past it.

Speaker 1 (53:04):
So we were this is how you're the menu of
he ca.

Speaker 2 (53:10):
Yeah, so we'll get to that, but as but yeah,
so why don't we unless we have something else that
we want to.

Speaker 1 (53:25):
Uh well, I'm gonna I was gonna say, I'm gonna
I found some like kind of interesting, obscure Christmas facts,
So I thought before we get into traveling around the world,
that throw these out as like a primer. Absolutely all right.
So the very first Christmas tree, the first Christmas tree ever,
was made of dyed goose feathers and came from Germany.

(53:48):
So nobody thought to go chopped down an evergreen tree.
They killed a bunch of geese, plucked them, and made
a tree out of it. I'm sure then they ate
the goose. They did too for Christmas dinner. Yeah. The
first decorated Christmas tree, the very first decorated Christmas tree
in history was in Riga, Latvia in fifteen ten. It's

(54:13):
a long time for Christmas. That is a long time ago. Yeah,
this is interesting too. The very first use of lights
on a Christmas tree. How Edward H. Johnson, a close
friend of Thomas Edison first put was the very first
person to put lights on a Christmas tree in eighteen
eighty two. Again, I would have never guessed that. I

(54:34):
would have been somewhere in the twenties tens, like nineteen ten.
The tradition of putting tangerines and stockings came from twelfth
century French nuns. You know why they put oranges and
tangerines and stockings. I didn't know they ever did that.
Oh god, yeah, every year we would have we'd have

(54:56):
oranges in our stockings. We did that for my kids
off growing up. It's a tradition. It's so back when
Saint Nick like they back back in the history of
Saint Nick like back in the twelfth, eleventh, twelfth, thirteenth century.
He would open up his stocking as he was walking by,
and he would give gold balls to the poor girls

(55:20):
for their dowry, and so they would have something so
they could get married, so they'd have a dowry chest,
and so for the nuns, since they didn't have gold balls,
they would put oranges in there instead to represent that.
And I don't know how that ended up in my

(55:41):
family as a tradition. Interesting, but we did. Eggnog was
originally a pirates drink because it was only for the
upper class and the only way the pirates got it
was to steal it. They were and they were the
only ones who had access to milk sherry and needed
to make it, which I thought that was great. Jingle

(56:03):
Bells was actually written for Thanksgiving. Jingle Bells, written by
James Pierpoint in Massachusetts, was written for a Thanksgiving festival,
not for Christmas. Way to ruin it for them. Spiders
as Christmas decorations, and this is interesting because this is
part of my background too. In Ukraine and Poland, families

(56:26):
decorate the Christmas trees with spiders, and we always had
a spider. We always had a big gold spider and
a silver spider on our tree every year. Part of
my Ukrainian background. And then where do we want to
leave it? Oh, I'm not even going to go there
with that one, because the historians are just absolutely wrong
on that so we'll leave it with the spiders.

Speaker 2 (56:49):
That was actually the spider one I did come across
in my tradition.

Speaker 1 (56:54):
Yeah too, addition is searched, and I kind of laughed
because I was like, well, you know, my whole life
growing up, we had this big gold spider and this
silver spider, and these weren't like just like some you know,
two dollars spider. Like. This spider had like jointed legs

(57:15):
that you can move, and it was metal. I mean
it was It had to have been expensive. I don't know.
If it was a hand me down, I don't know,
but I had it for a long time too, and
now I don't have it anymore.

Speaker 2 (57:28):
Yeah, yeah, let me let me see if I can
find because they had the background story as to why.

Speaker 1 (57:41):
Here we go.

Speaker 2 (57:44):
So the tradition has its origin and an old tail
of a poor woman who couldn't afford to decorate her
tree and woke up on Christmas morning to discover a
spider had covered it in its glorious sparkling web. Yeah,
and it goes it's for good luck. It's not about
poor housekeeping.

Speaker 1 (58:04):
Right right. Yeah, I saw that too. Yeah, No, it
was for good luck because my grandma had hers on
her tree too. She had her spider on her tree.
So we never did the pickle thing. You know, the
pickle thing we got big here some years back. Like
I hadn't even heard of it when I was a kid.
I had never heard of it, and I had never

(58:24):
heard of it. You never heard of the Christmas pickle. Well,
to be in Germany, to me, that means something completely
totally different. Yeah, so keeping in the spirit of Christmas
and Jesus. Uh, the Christmas pickle actually was a tradition
from Germany. So if the Christmas it was a glass

(58:46):
Christmas pickle ornament, and if the last, if the Christmas
pickle was the last ornament to be put on the tree,
the first child who found it got an extra present,
and that extra present was like something really special, which
that never made it into my house. We had too
many other traditions going on. I can't take on everybody's traditions.

Speaker 2 (59:07):
So well, if there's anything America is known for, it's
taking other people's traditions and me, well, absolutely everything.

Speaker 1 (59:14):
Yeah, we've stolen everything that we own for the most part,
but borrowed. We've borrowed brow everybody, a lot of people,
but but yeah, I you know, I've never I've never
done that tradition, but I always thought that was interesting too.
So but we got to get into uh we got
to get into our our sleigh here and start traveling

(59:37):
around the country because some of these uh, I'm just
chomping at the bit to get to them. I mean,
what are you going to do? Are you going to
do the number one first? Probably the most popular one
that you saw right away, and I saw right away.

Speaker 2 (59:56):
Uh I. I wasn't going to start there. I thought
about it, but that's that's too good. So I was
actually going.

Speaker 1 (01:00:06):
To start in Sweden. Okay. Uh So in Sweden they
have the.

Speaker 2 (01:00:15):
Unusual tradition of creating what they call a mule goat
out of like straw and hay, and then they decorate
it with like big ass red ribbons and stuff like that,
and they put lights on it and stuff, and they
call it the yule goat.

Speaker 1 (01:00:36):
And it stands at.

Speaker 2 (01:00:40):
Least forty feet tall, so it's not like it's you know,
it's man's sized.

Speaker 1 (01:00:45):
I mean it's four stories.

Speaker 2 (01:00:47):
Yeah it h I'll get that here in a minute.
So there's there's more. I actually had two thereouh. Forty
two feet high, twenty three feet wide in it weighs
three point six tons.

Speaker 1 (01:01:06):
That's a lot of hay. That's a lot of hay.

Speaker 2 (01:01:09):
So they constructed in the same spot every year, and
that now it has gotten so like popular and technology
has gotten to what it is that now they live
stream like you can click, you can watch it being built.

(01:01:33):
You can watch it just sitting there doing nothing.

Speaker 1 (01:01:38):
Yeah, that's what I'm gonna watch that one.

Speaker 2 (01:01:41):
Well, it's so different than the yule log, well.

Speaker 1 (01:01:46):
At least the ule log the guy throws a piece
of wooden nerve. Once in a while, I watch a
forty ft goat made out of straw just standing there.

Speaker 2 (01:01:55):
So here's here's what I would expect. I would expect
this from the people of America to do this, not
not not the yu'll goat itself, no, no, no, where
you're going. But sadly, thirty six times since nineteen sixty
six it's been turned into a bonfire. Yeah, but by people.

(01:02:22):
So people go and they look at it and like okay,
and then they throw a match on it and it
goes up in flames. So maybe that should be like
their new part of their new tradition. The annual like
burning down of the of the Yule Goat. But I
will say this, like the pictures they have of it,
they do an extremely good job.

Speaker 1 (01:02:43):
Oh yeah, no, I thought too.

Speaker 2 (01:02:47):
Well, I just want to say for the people out
there who want to go and look up maybe what
it's seen, they do a really good job of it.

Speaker 1 (01:02:54):
Oh no, it looks yeah. And I thought it was
interesting that the that they said that the whole reason
that that started was because of the story of the
goat man that would walk around with Saint Nick, and
that was a kind of honor to that, a reference
to that. So obviously to me the goat man would
be Crompus, you know type of thing. That's where I

(01:03:19):
That's where I thought. Anyway, Crompas is in is in
these traditions a lot. Yeah. Yeah, he's in the movie
Big Red One too. Yes, yes he is, and he
plays a great role. I just yeah, you love you
love Crompus, I know, I do. Like I said, you

(01:03:39):
that march going through Austria, Oh god, yeah, yeah, that
was pretty cool looking. And then if you were just
to happen to be traveling through you probably would have
stopped in your tracks and turn and went the other
way because those guys looked like they were real. Those
they looked real. I don't know. I was pretty impressed.
That was a lot of money that they did, because

(01:04:02):
those dudes look like they came. They looked like what
I would imagine like a cropus would look like. So okay,
so I am stealing Catalonia Spain. Ah, I know, I
let you start. So the locals in Catalonia create okay,
so it's called the pooping tradition. So the uh. The

(01:04:26):
locals in Catalonia create a character out of a log,
draw a face on it, and give it a hat.
Then they spend the fortnight feeding it nuts, fruits, sweets,
and berries. On Christmas Eve, the entire family beats the
log with sticks and sings a traditional song that translates
to if you don't crap, well, I'll beat you with

(01:04:49):
a stick until the log excretes all of its treats.
It's hard to comprehend why this tradition hasn't caught on elsewhere.
They also decorate their Nativity scenes with small pooping ceramic figurines,
usually well known characters, often drawn from that year's news.
The figurines always have their pants around their ankles. So

(01:05:11):
I'm gonna add to this means I got I gotta
flip to this one. So okay, so I found this
one with this guy. They actually have I'm gonna clip
this inside the stealer later. So they actually have uh Gandhi,
Mandela Picasso, Dolly, Napoleon and I'm not reading them all here, Gollum,

(01:05:38):
Mario Brothers, a couple of famous soccer players, Darth Vader, Dracula, Graucho, Marx, Humphrey, Bogart, uh.

Speaker 3 (01:05:48):
And Batman, all with their pants down and over crapping,
and you can the whole shelf is loaded with these things.

Speaker 1 (01:06:00):
And that's what they do is they buy these these
crapping uh the figurines and they put them out with
their Christmas display. I thought was absolutely beautiful. So I
don't know where. I don't know like where that came from,
and I don't know about the whole pooping song, but
but it's funny. That's pretty funny.

Speaker 2 (01:06:22):
Yeah, the description they had me a deficating log.

Speaker 1 (01:06:26):
Yeah, yeah, I just have It's like, okay that that
is a tradition that needs to catch on elsewhere. Stanner
around as a family beating a log with sticks, singing
if you don't defecate, uh, if you don't poop, well,
you know you're gonna have a bad year. Oh my god.

Speaker 2 (01:06:50):
So uh, since you stole that one from me, I'm
gonna make sure I get this, make sure I get
this next one in Okay, you can't steal it from me.

Speaker 1 (01:06:59):
We're moving to Japan. I knew you were going there.
Moving to Japan.

Speaker 2 (01:07:06):
So because only like an estimated one percent of the
Japanese people are Christian, they obviously really don't celebrate Christmas.

Speaker 1 (01:07:21):
And so.

Speaker 2 (01:07:24):
What they do now is that they don't go for
you know, the Turkey dinner. They go for Kentucky Fried Chicken.
And in nineteen seventy four, KFC did a like big
old marketing campaign in Japan. I'm not even going to

(01:07:46):
try to do the Japanese words.

Speaker 1 (01:07:49):
That's like, no, don't.

Speaker 2 (01:07:51):
Yeah, I just it translates to Kentucky for Christmas. And
ever since then, that's what the Japanese people do on
Christmas Day is they all go for KFC. So it
says it's male, it's maintained it's Yule Tide popularity, causing

(01:08:12):
some people to order their boxes months in advance, or
stand in two hour long lines to get their finger
licking good food.

Speaker 1 (01:08:23):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (01:08:24):
So if you ever want to know why, how you
know KFC is still around?

Speaker 1 (01:08:29):
Oh, it isn't from the United States, it's it it's
the international market. It's it is Christmas in Japan at
the at the KFC. I mean, I loved KFC. I
loved when KFC had their buffet and you could just
go munch down some chicken for like six ninety five
and get some of their coals laws phenomenal. Their biscuits

(01:08:52):
are phenomenal.

Speaker 2 (01:08:53):
Well, they they still have some, don't They have some
there they're it depends on whether they want to or
if they want to participate in that.

Speaker 1 (01:09:03):
Yeah, there are there are still some that have it.
I wonder if they're one done by Rosedale Mall still
has it, because that's the one I used to go
to a lot. Actually, uh, I know, like the other
ones that I know, like KFC's closed all over the place.

Speaker 2 (01:09:17):
I yeah, they sold a bunch of them to pop Eyes.
But from what I understand that one does have it
because I drive by there like every day now to
go to the Burlington Northern and I had a supervisor

(01:09:37):
with me, and he was talking about how he hadn't
had it in like twenty years or something like that.
But he said something about them having the buffet, and
I'm like, I wish you would have said something. I'm like,
because I was thinking if they had the buffet that
we would stop and.

Speaker 1 (01:09:51):
Have lunch there. Yeah. I have not gone in yet.
I probably will try and do so eventually, just to
see if they haven't changed it. It's probably the best
KFC you've ever walked into because it's like a fifties
retro diner and they got like fifties tunes playing and
it's decorated inside and then it's KFC buffet. So it's

(01:10:12):
pretty cool. If they haven't changed that. Now, it's been
about a decade since I've been there to that one. Anyway,
I don't know. They probably modernized it eventually, I'm sure
hopefully not. You know, leave some traditions alone. Okay, so
we are jumping in a plane or jumping in the
sleigh and we are going from Japan to Iceland. Icelandic

(01:10:33):
kids don't just get one Santa Claus, they get thirteen
mischievous trolls roaming the country. The night before Christmas. Like
snow White seven dwarves, each of these thirteen Yule Lads
has his own personality, including such popular popular names as

(01:10:54):
the doorway sniffer, the spoon, liquor, sausage swiper, candles steeler,
curd gobbler, and the ominously named window peeper. Each each
lad takes turns visiting children who leave their shoes in
their bedroom window at night, and the Yule Lads drop

(01:11:16):
off either candies for the good kids or rotting potatoes
for the bad ones. I love the names of the
kids of the Yule Lads in Iceland. Doorway sniffer, spoon, liquor,
sausage swiper, candlestealer, curd gobbler, and window peeper. Window peeper. Yeah,

(01:11:38):
those are just classic names that should be a traditional
swhere too.

Speaker 2 (01:11:44):
Really yeah, I'm gonna say no on that one, all right.
So you may find this hard to believe, but apparently
even uh the Vatican has uh in Italy has its own,

(01:12:10):
its own interesting tradition and it's Santa's Little Helper is
an old witch. So uh, here's what I say. Unable
to conclusively prove the existence of Santa, but apparently the
ability to uh.

Speaker 1 (01:12:33):
Existence of God. Well there's that too. I was just
say God.

Speaker 2 (01:12:37):
But the Vatican decided to throw its weight behind something
they'd had countless dealings with, an old witch called the Bafana,
who delivers presents to kids in Italy. And this is
what I absolutely love about this. The story goes that
the three wise men invited the witch to accompany them

(01:12:59):
to see the Baby Jesus. She said she was too busy,
and the legend was born.

Speaker 1 (01:13:07):
That's all that, dude. Hey, the New Savior was born.
I got stuff to do. I got stuff to do.
I'm washing my hair, I'm running low on eye of newt.
I've got to go out and get a couple of Newts.
Like we're gonna go see the New Savior of man Ah.
You know, I wish you would have told me sooner.

(01:13:29):
I got plans. Oh, my sister said she's coming over later.
It's just not gonna work. She's not a traveler. She's
got the bad hip lumbago. Yeah, it's not gonna happen. Yeah,
I can just see. She's too busy, too busy to
go see the Baby Jesus. Well, why would three wise
men invent invent invite a witch to go see the

(01:13:53):
Baby Jesus.

Speaker 2 (01:13:53):
Anyway, Well, if she was a white witch, maybe it
was for like a you know, it could be a blessing,
you know, something like that.

Speaker 1 (01:14:05):
But I mean it just as an old witch. Obviously.

Speaker 2 (01:14:09):
They have a lady, like they have a picture of
this lady who's like suspended from a rope or whatever,
and she's got a she's waving to the crowd, and
she's got a brood between her legs.

Speaker 1 (01:14:19):
And as or Rudeberg or something partonate whatever.

Speaker 2 (01:14:24):
But but yeah, I mean she's wearing all black. But
I mean, obviously I think the connotation is the the
witch is, you know, like the wicked witch of the West,
you know.

Speaker 1 (01:14:37):
Right, otherwise she wouldn't be bringing kids presence, right, Well
there's that too. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:14:45):
So yeah, I love the fact that that was the
story that they came up with. And for some reason
because she was too busy to go see Jesus. It's like,
is this a curse?

Speaker 1 (01:14:54):
Like now she's forever? Yeah, yeah, I mean when to
go see the baby Jesus, guess what you get to
do for the eternity? See, that's just it, like it
doesn't get the story, doesn't mash the legend is what
I'm saying. There's some sort of generational gap going on

(01:15:17):
there between Yeah, between the wise men inviting the witch
to go see Baby Jesus and now you're destined to
hand out candy for eternity. Yeah, there's something lost in there. Yeah,
I agree with you. I saw that one too, all right,
So sleigh ride from Italy to Greenland. In Greenland, the

(01:15:38):
Christmas delicacies that are reserved for Christmas are mattoc and kivak.
Matac is whale skin with some of the blubber left
attached that is supposed to be chewed, but is often
just swallowed as it can be a little tough. Apparently
it tastes like coconuts. Kivoc is made from the raw

(01:15:59):
flesh of ox, a small Arctic bird. The ox are
buried in sheepskin a long time before Christmas and then
dug up to eat when they have reached an advanced
stage of decomposition. Not grabbing your appetite, don't worry. There's
usually barbecued caribou on the menu too. Oh well, I

(01:16:20):
guess that makes it okay. Then, Oh, I'm not going
to Greenland for the holidays. People, I can tell you that.

Speaker 2 (01:16:29):
Oh, I mean, I guess it's no different than than
having hagis in Scotland.

Speaker 1 (01:16:36):
I've had hagis. I would eat hagis before I would
eat whale blubber and rotten bird. What's good. Yeah, I'm
not eating rotten bird and whale blobber. It's like the
Greenland also is the place where they they get that.
I forget what breeders shark it is. If it's green
sharks maybe anyway, so they get these sharks and then

(01:16:58):
they they're really acidic. Are not a cidic? Oh, they've
got urine like they Oh, maybe that is a cidic, right,
You're Urine's a cidic. So anyway, so they're they take
this meat and they bury it and then they dig
it up. And it's Greenland again. It does this and

(01:17:19):
then they bury it and then they dig it up
and then they eat it. And I've seen it on
a couple like the food shows that I like to
watch and people that go there and you know, do
the traveling food shows, and like they can't even get
it near their nose because of the smell. They're just like,
this is just is not going to happen. And then uh,

(01:17:40):
Andrew Zimmern, who's one of the guys here, he's from
Minnesota that did Bizarre Foods. He was there and he
actually plugged his nose. I got a piece in his mouth,
and I've never ever in my life seen something project
die out of his mouth until I saw the shark
project dial out of his mouth. And he's like, I'm sorry,
I tried, I got it in my I just can't

(01:18:00):
do it. And the guy was standing there slicing it off,
just just eating it like it was hard salami. I'm
just like, I wouldn't mind going to Greenland. Be interesting
to go for. The women are beautiful, and the northern
vel they are, and the northern lights are like constantly showing,

(01:18:23):
which would be great, like every night you could just
go out and watch northern lights. But yeah, I don't
know about eating that. I would do barbecue caribou. I
would because it's just deer, so it'd be like barbecue deer.
I'd be good with that. Not eating a rotten bird though.
No rotten bird for Dave. No, No, you can give
my help into somebody else who really likes it.

Speaker 2 (01:18:48):
All right, Well, we're gonna go, like I don't know,
fifteen hundred miles southwest from Greenland to Caracas, Venezuela. At Caracas,
so in a week leading up to Christmas, Venezuelans attend
a daily church service called the Misa de Guinaldo Guinaldo,

(01:19:15):
which basically just means early morning mass. So Cracus, which
is the capital of Venezuela, it is customary to travel
to the church service on roller skates, so it says, indeed,
so widespread is the practice.

Speaker 1 (01:19:36):
Many roads in.

Speaker 2 (01:19:37):
The capitol are closed until eight am to provide Christmas worshipers.

Speaker 1 (01:19:42):
A safe passage. That's a healthy population rollerblade in the church.
I suppose that was just what if you don't know
how to roller skate? Like I don't know how to
roller skate? Does that mean I can't go to mass?
I probably wouldn't even try to put on a pair
of roller skates right now because I don't be back

(01:20:03):
in traction in the hospital.

Speaker 2 (01:20:05):
Again it so, do roller skates come in size thirteen?

Speaker 1 (01:20:09):
Why do? Yeah? Maybe I need you can get those?
Maybe I need five roller blades instead of four exactly,
ye extra extra stability? Yeah? Can I get the Can
I get the ones that have like the training wheels
on them. But those work. I would need Yeah, I

(01:20:29):
would need to. Yeah, I would too.

Speaker 2 (01:20:32):
I can't even ice skate unless I have the chair.
And even then it's like.

Speaker 1 (01:20:39):
You knows whether I'm gonna be able to go anywhere.
Oh my god.

Speaker 2 (01:20:49):
Yeah, So roller skates in Venezuela. So they are in
shape and have very good balance that I do not.

Speaker 1 (01:20:57):
Yeah, Well, that's good. Keeps them healthy, keeps them flexible.
Let them celebrate mass it's a good thing. And you
get the streets closed so you don't get hit by
a crazy driver first thing in the morning. All right.
So we're staying in South America. We're going to Guatemala, Gabaa, Guatebala.
In Guatemala, it's important for your house to be clean.

(01:21:19):
Cleanliness really is next to godliness there. Locals believe that
the devil and other evil spirits live in the dark,
dirty corners of your home. And they do, and we
talk about this on every show. It's always in the corner.
It's always in the corner. It's always in the corner.
Guatemala is on it. Therefore, they spend the week before

(01:21:43):
Christmas sweeping up, collecting rubbish and then piling everything in
a huge heap outside. Finally, an effigy of the devil
is placed on top, and the whole thing is set
on fire. It's a tradition called burning of the Devil.
The idea is that the Guatemalans burn all of the
bad energy from the previous year and start the new

(01:22:03):
year out fresh. So he actually happened. That could happen here.

Speaker 2 (01:22:09):
Yeah, But here's here's my issue with it. It made
me chuckle when I originally read that one. Yeah, and
that is uh, devils and demons and stuff are typically
from hell. You know, they're known for to be from hell,
which is fire and brimstone. So what would make you
think that setting them on fire.

Speaker 1 (01:22:31):
Would do anything. It's probably just a feel good moment
for the Guatemalans.

Speaker 2 (01:22:36):
Well it is, but I just it's the mindset right
behind it, like, oh, these are these are are born
of of you know, fire and brimstone. But you know what,
let's just set them on fire and see what happens.

Speaker 1 (01:22:50):
So what they should do is like trap them in
a magic snow globe and then just be able to
shake it whenever they want to send them bouncing around
but all over the place. I do I do like
this traditional. I think this is a good tradition because
you're trying to bring you're trying to take the darkness
out of your house and you're trying to get it

(01:23:11):
so that more light and that more that God and
the light and love can come in because it's now
clean and all of the crap that's been hiding in
the corners, including the devil and demons, evil spirits are out.
They're out for the year, and then the goal is

(01:23:31):
not to bring them back. I would imagine, right, you're
out for you, you're on the bench. You're on the bench, rookie.
So yeah, I don't know. I like that. I think
that's a good tradition. Well, the the the intent behind it,
I love. Yeah, the intent, absolutely, the the it's.

Speaker 2 (01:23:52):
The execution that I have somewhat of an issue with.
But yeah, anyway, all right, Well, if you live in Norway,
make sure during Christmas Eve you hide your broom.

Speaker 1 (01:24:09):
Now. I know that might not sound like it makes.

Speaker 2 (01:24:11):
Much sense, but hear me up. So, Norwegians believed that
Christmas Eve coincides with the arrival of evil spirits and witches.

Speaker 1 (01:24:21):
It is only.

Speaker 2 (01:24:22):
Logical then that Norwegian householders hide all their brooms before
they go asleep. After all, nothing spoils Christmas. Christmas quicker
than finding your broom and boat broken pieces at the
foot of a tree, trashed by some joy riding witch.

Speaker 1 (01:24:43):
I hate when I wake up and I find my
broom at the tree all splintered up like that.

Speaker 2 (01:24:48):
Yeah, I mean you prefer, you know, chocolate covered raisins
and not off carrots all over.

Speaker 4 (01:24:53):
The place, exactly, And Ash goos, yeah, exactly, and Wove's yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:25:02):
I don't even know, like I get it, And I don't, like,
do they really think that evil spirits and witches, like
the only reason that they're going to come into your
house is to steal your broom and then go.

Speaker 1 (01:25:14):
Like crash it into a tree, just leave it at
your tree. I don't know, I don't know. It's got
me scratching my head as I'm still I can't wrap
my head around the three wise men inviting the witch,
the witch having to wash her hair so she can't
make it that day, so now she has to hand
out candy for the So I'm still trying to get

(01:25:38):
that one to sink into.

Speaker 2 (01:25:41):
I wonder, I mean, I know that these are like
the obscured traditions.

Speaker 1 (01:25:45):
Yeah, but that's what the show is, right, obscure christ Well,
that's what I mean.

Speaker 2 (01:25:48):
But I just I would love to see if anybody
actually still does either of these or either of those,
you know, like I don't hey, the Labenta or whatever,
the Italy witch, you know. I wonder if they get
like this, Tay, this says, you know too, Johnny from
Labenta or whatever underneath the tree, and then I don't know,

(01:26:13):
And then underneath that it says, help me.

Speaker 1 (01:26:19):
If you get an invitation to go see the baby Jesus,
make sure you go, Otherwise you'll spend the rest of
eternity handing out presents to kids in some other country.
Exactly right, Let's go to Slovakia. Slovakia, I like this one.
In Slovakia, there is the extremely odd Christmas tradition of

(01:26:40):
throwing putting on the ceiling as a way of finding
out how much luck of family will have in the
coming year. The most senior member of the house has
to throw locks up pudding at the ceiling. The more
it sticks, oh, the more of it that sticks, the
more luck your family will have in the coming year.
The traditional recipe for this pudding includes milk, bread, poppy seeds,

(01:27:05):
something to make it a little sweet, and something to
make it sticky. I like that. I just don't know,
like dad standing up with a platter or putting slamming
it up into the ceiling. It'd be funny, you know,
I'd be laughing even to today, Like but the kid
would come out of me and I would think that

(01:27:26):
would be hilarious. But uh, I don't know who's climbing
up to the ceiling cleaning that stuff up. Poor mom
probably getting stuck with it.

Speaker 2 (01:27:34):
Do you just wait until it falls off by itself?

Speaker 1 (01:27:38):
I mean, what if you make it really good and
you get enough stickiness and they're just perfect amount of
stickiness and it never falls Well, then I guess you
have good luck all year round. Well, then I guess
you're gonna be like, yeah, right, exactly. It'd be like
a millionaire. I'd move them by a new house and
have a clean ceiling to throw the next year's up on. Yeah.

(01:27:58):
So I don't know where this is.

Speaker 2 (01:28:00):
I'm assuming it's over by Chechoslovakia. It's the check ya.

Speaker 1 (01:28:05):
Is that how it's pronounced check na?

Speaker 2 (01:28:09):
There's no n oh see, I thought it was Chetsnia.

Speaker 1 (01:28:14):
But there's no okay, there's no n okay. Well, then
I don't know and I have no idea how.

Speaker 2 (01:28:21):
This is another one of those where I have no
idea how one side of this matches the other beyond it,
like this is.

Speaker 1 (01:28:31):
The diehard of.

Speaker 2 (01:28:35):
Like Christmas traditions. So it's called a pair of matchmakers.
So on Christmas Eve it's for all your single ladies
out there, and Christmas Eve unmarried check women stand with
their back to the door and toss one of their
shoes over their shoulder. If it lands with the toe

(01:28:56):
facing the door, it means that they'll be merry within
the year. If it lands with the heel, yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:29:07):
The point of the shoe facing the door. Oh that's okay.
Never mind.

Speaker 2 (01:29:11):
If the lands with the toe facing the door, it
means to be there. If it lands with the heel
facing the door, then you're in for another year of
being signaled single. So here's my question. What if it
lands sideways, you have.

Speaker 1 (01:29:27):
To hand out candy its foreign country, I don't know.
You have to you have to get a broom sorry
present exactly. You got to put a parsnip on your nose, uh,
and then you got and you got to get a broom,
and you got to start handing out candy somewhere. So
that that is weird man, which which one the it?

(01:29:53):
And I've got some more weird ones coming. But so
there you go.

Speaker 2 (01:29:59):
Ladies, if you're worried about whether whether you're gonna.

Speaker 1 (01:30:03):
Be married, you just keep throwing it. Probably, you know
what I mean, do over if you if you know,
if it lands sideways like you said, then like perfectly sideways,
then you probably just have to do it over. If
it lands, you know, kind of like with the heel
kind of facing it. Uh, then as you approach it,

(01:30:24):
obviously you nudge it with your foot before you pick
it up, so the toe is facing I tried, Yeah, mulligan,
Yeah you didn't. Nobody saw that. Nobody saw that. I
wonder that part of the tradition.

Speaker 2 (01:30:37):
Do you if nobody's around to watch you do it,
you can you go and pick it up and toss
it over again?

Speaker 1 (01:30:43):
Yeah? Exactly like that. That's something that I would.

Speaker 2 (01:30:47):
Practice like all year round, like I would get the
flip of the wrist, like I would I would make
sure that when Christmas Eve came that I was all
all prepared it's.

Speaker 1 (01:30:58):
Like the water bottle thing that was so popular in
years ago. Oh up and then at the water bottle
and has to land perfect. Yeah, all right, So we
are going to another one of my homeland countries and
I like this one. So Finland's candlelit graveyards. At first glance,
this might feel a little morbid, but in fact it's

(01:31:20):
surprisingly uplifting and beautiful too. On Christmas Eve, families in
Finland visit the resting places of their lost to loved
ones and light a candle to place on the grave.
Not only does this tradition help people to remember those
they have lost, it turns cemeteries into tranquil, glittering havens
of light that most Finlanders choose to walk in just

(01:31:42):
to appreciate the beauty. To finish, take this tradition seriously too.
As many as seventy five percent of finished families take
part in this yearly. I think that's great. I could
see that absolutely yep. And I would be the guy
up in lights and candles. Maybe I know I've got
some relatives there somewhere, but but I would be the

(01:32:05):
guy just walking through the cemetery, just enjoying the stillness
and like the flickering lights and stuff. You know, it
would be cool. Yeah, I think paying respect to your
lost ones. I think that's an important thing to do
with the holidays for the ones that aren't with us anymore.
You know, that you can sit back and share a
memory with them, or memory about them, or whatever whatever

(01:32:27):
the case might be.

Speaker 2 (01:32:29):
Yeah, you know, and that that's a perfect seguay to
to our trip to Portugal. Yeah, so we call it
dining with the deceased relatives. So during Consoda, which I'm
assuming is the traditional Christmas feast in Portugal, families sometimes

(01:32:52):
set at extra places at the dining table for deceased relatives.
It's thought that the practice will ensure good fortunes for
the household. In some areas, crumbs are left on the
hearth as well. And it's you thought feeding all your
living relatives was hard enough. But what what I love

(01:33:14):
about this is the photo that they used in this
in this article or this page is of this big,
like Portugal type family. I'm sure you know what I'm
what I'm talking about. Yeah, it's probably like you know,
there's like a dozen people around the table, there's food, everybody's.

Speaker 1 (01:33:34):
Laughing and talking. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:33:36):
Look at there's one black guy. Everybody's white and there's
one black guy. I what why you could tell that
that was staged? Yeah, but it's just it's just one
of those things that it's like, what in this picture
doesn't belong?

Speaker 1 (01:33:58):
I will say this. I have been into invited to
people's houses for like different holidays and different celebrations and
stuff like that over the years, and I have seen
on more than one occasion plate place settings left out
for the dead. Huh. So I think that's a pretty
cool tradition too. I think that the lighting of the

(01:34:19):
candles thing in Finland, I think that's great. And I think,
you know, not just Portugal, because it wasn't. Well I'm
just thinking right, and so the things that I'm thinking
of reflecting back on they weren't Portuguese. So but but
they had they would leave a place setting out if
they had lost a loved one that year.

Speaker 2 (01:34:39):
So it was interesting and I completely support that, yeah too,
I don't I don't find anything wrong with that whatsoever.
In fact, you know, I always thought that were the
time ever to come where I would get married, you know,
I would I would leave a spot open for my mother,

(01:35:03):
grandmother and father you know, you know, you know, to
to join us. So, I mean their dinner is no
you know, Christmas dinner is no different, right, But I
like the candle uh the candle cemetery thing that you
were just talking about. I mean, it's just another way
to pay tribute to those.

Speaker 1 (01:35:22):
You know, that that we've lost, right, same thing with
Mexico and Day of the Dead, right, it's not a
Christmas tradition, but I mean it's the same thing. You know,
they celebrate their loved ones that have passed and invite
them to come back out and be with them for
the day kind of thing and celebrate all right. So, uh,

(01:35:43):
this is just a beauty right here. We are going
to Wales for what is called Mari Liede. So the
Welsh culture in ah is ancient and steeped in superstition,
so it's not surprising that the residents of South Wales
enjoy rating a dead horse skull around their villages to
celebrate the happiest time of the year. In a watling

(01:36:07):
display dating back to probably the Celtic times. The custom
involves draping a white sheet over a pole with a
horse skull attached and knocking on townsfolks doors, no doubt,
giving them the fright of their lives. The party carrying
the morbid effigy then sings to the residents, who are
supposed to sing back before relinquishing food and drink. There

(01:36:29):
is some debate over whether mari led translates as holy
Mary or gray mare. But either way, you look at it,
it's creepy as hell. And the picture I'm looking at
is a horse skull and they put green glass Christmas
balls in the eye sockets and then tied hair as

(01:36:51):
ribbons with bells on it. It's beauty. You imagine, You
imagine like you're sitting at home and somebody knocks on
Ry Christmas. You go to the door, and then a
horse skull with green glass ball eyes and they start

(01:37:13):
singing to you, and then you're supposed to sing and
return and then give them food and drink.

Speaker 2 (01:37:20):
Wait a minute, So if I dressed up this horse skull, yeah,
and knocked on somebody's door and you start singing to them,
and I started singing to them, they are then obligated
not only to sing back to me, but then give
me drinking in food.

Speaker 1 (01:37:37):
Yes, I like that. I was going to say you're
seeing the I can see the wheels are turning.

Speaker 2 (01:37:45):
I mean, I mean, one, it's just another reason for
me never to answer my door, right, and and two
it's it's like Christmas Halloween.

Speaker 1 (01:37:57):
Right, so like a blend. Yeah, it's like a Christmas
trick or treat. I gotta send you this picture. Yeah,
you do, because I I haven't seen it. Uh, I
gotta send you that. You're gonna love this picture. But
oh my god, I can't believe that. It's like, oh,
you guys are here. Oh that was a beautiful song.

(01:38:19):
Here's some wine, here's some some fruits. Yeah, here's some right,
some holiday bread, some cookies.

Speaker 2 (01:38:28):
I would go, Yeah, I would go over to Wisetta
or Lake Minnetonka, and I would just start knocking on
the cars, you.

Speaker 1 (01:38:42):
Know, a couple of pockets and still water. That's right.

Speaker 2 (01:38:46):
We're all the million dollar mansions and stuff that all right,
here's an entire artici.

Speaker 1 (01:38:53):
Oh, you'd be arrested in three minutes. I and even
get to the front door show they'd be like, what
are you doing. It's a tradition in my homeland.

Speaker 2 (01:39:11):
I get to the gate, I'd be like, they'd be
like hello, and I'd be like, hey, it's the Christmas tradition.

Speaker 1 (01:39:21):
Let me in, and then I have to sing to
you with my Then you have to provide me food
and drink and sing my sing me songs while I'm eating.

Speaker 2 (01:39:29):
My horror, my horror horse head exactly the horse head
of horror.

Speaker 4 (01:39:35):
There we go, Oh my god, it is it is
a horse head of horror. I just yeah, that would
not get very far here in the States.

Speaker 1 (01:39:45):
No, No, that would not make it very far in
the States.

Speaker 2 (01:39:50):
So on Christmas, even Poland, many families share tech.

Speaker 1 (01:39:58):
Did I say that right? I don't know opoltech. Uh.

Speaker 2 (01:40:01):
It's an unleaving religious wafer, so I'm assuming it's like
the stuff.

Speaker 1 (01:40:05):
Through the body of Christ.

Speaker 2 (01:40:08):
Oh, and it says, each person breaking off a piece
as they wish each other merry Christmas. Dinner may not
begin until the first star appears in the night sky,
and traditionally an extra settings left on the table should
somebody show up uninvited.

Speaker 1 (01:40:28):
So again, I'm just like, I'm here to share your dinner, right, Oh, well,
we have a place for you. Look at that. Yep.

Speaker 2 (01:40:39):
Some of these uh, some of these traditions are very
like you can just walk into people's homes and start
taking like you can take their brooms apparently if you're
a witch, right, and you can return and bust it
to bust it up if you want, you can go party.

Speaker 1 (01:40:57):
You can go party with somebody's broom and then just
destroy it and then and then just bring back the
broken pieces and okay, Yeah, it's okay because it's the
right time of year to do it. And it's their
fault because they didn't hide the broom from you. Correct
and right, exactly right, So my fault I took it.
It's your fault that you left it available for me
to take, yes, and that it was so easy for

(01:41:20):
me to get into your house to take it from you.
It's all perspective. Yeah, I didn't slap you. I gave
your face a high five. That's right. Oh my god.

Speaker 2 (01:41:36):
Here like even if you're not in Poland, even if
you're you're not invited, you can still go and eat
dinner with some random people.

Speaker 1 (01:41:44):
Oh that the food's good too. Maybe it is all right.
You're out, my friend. I don't have any more none. Nope,
I've got Christmas. I got some like obscure Christmas facts.
You want me to do some of those more you
already had some, Yeah, I know I got some more.
I'm really surprised you haven't done Austria. Oh for Cromis. Yeah,

(01:42:10):
we've already talked about crops. That's why I left it off, gotcha. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:42:16):
The only thing that I have left now is really
like food. It's like all all food type stuff. I
think we talked about this.

Speaker 1 (01:42:29):
Last year.

Speaker 2 (01:42:30):
No, not last year, well maybe because that was the
legend of Santa Claus, but the Netherlands has center class.
I think we talked about him one of these times.
Which is the Dutch name for Saint Nicholas.

Speaker 1 (01:42:44):
Yea, Oh, my spirit's moving around the room.

Speaker 2 (01:42:47):
Nice kids put a shoe by the chimney or back
door and wake up on Christmas morning to find treats
like gingerbread men, marzipan and in chocolate letters inside.

Speaker 1 (01:43:02):
So here's my question.

Speaker 2 (01:43:04):
Are we talking about like, dear Michael, you've been good
this year, here's a chocolate covered piece of paper letters,
or are we talking about.

Speaker 1 (01:43:16):
Like you're probably talking about like chocolate letters, like a
chocolate with the A on it or a D or whatever. Yeah,
weren't very very specific. So yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:43:29):
Other otherwise, like almost everything else is all food related,
like what they like, what they have on their tables,
and like New Zealand because it's like their summer months,
like all of their traditions like go around like a grill,
you know what do you grill on.

Speaker 1 (01:43:49):
On Christmas Day? And stuff like that.

Speaker 2 (01:43:53):
So nothing too weird, except there's on Christmas morning in Finland,
finished families traditionally eat a porridge made of rice and
milk topped with cinnamon, milk or butter.

Speaker 1 (01:44:08):
Whoever see this is what this is weird?

Speaker 2 (01:44:12):
Whoever finds the almond placed inside one of the puddings
quote unquote wins. But some families cheat and hide a
few almonds so the kids don't get upset. At the
end of the day, it is customary to warm up
in a sauna together.

Speaker 1 (01:44:30):
Absolutely, saunas are the best thing in the planet.

Speaker 2 (01:44:33):
So here here's my question, though, the person who finds
the almond, do they win the almond?

Speaker 1 (01:44:41):
Well, I don't know. It's a good question. It's kind
of like achanecake tradition for Marti Grass, right, where like
you find the ring and the king cake type of thing,
and then like you you're the the winner. That's it, Like, hey,
you find the almond, you're the winner, and then we
go on with life. I don't know, good question. I
mean you win something special. I mean maybe you get

(01:45:02):
to get in the sna ten minutes early. Then you
get it to yourself, you know for the first ten
minutes or something for the family sauna. Yeah, you can
do the family sauna. But you son, you found the almond,
you get a ten minute head start.

Speaker 2 (01:45:17):
Yeah, and if you want to be done before grandpa
gets in there, yeah, yeah, maybe that's it.

Speaker 1 (01:45:25):
Maybe maybe you get to exit. Yeah right, maybe you
get to get you get a fifteen minute head start,
so you get in there and get your sauna, get
washed up, and then you're out of there before grandma
and grandpa come in. That's what you get for the
winning of the almond, Thank you very much. I'll just
put my own almond in my bowl and slip it

(01:45:45):
in there when nobody's looking. So I went every year.

Speaker 2 (01:45:47):
If that's what I want, I would slam my face
into the porridge and try to find that almond.

Speaker 1 (01:45:54):
Everybody's porridge. So all right, So I got a couple
of quick fun facts. I'm gonna throw it here. Rudolph
the Red Nose reindeer got his start as an advertising
gimmick for Montgomery Wards in eighteen thirty nine. Very interesting,
and I don't believe this at all, but one in

(01:46:14):
three men wait until Christmas Eve to do their shopping.
That's not really you don't believe that. No men are
better than that. Paul McCartney earns four hundred thousand dollars
a year from his song Wonderful Christmas Time, one of
my favorites. Yeah, yeah, that's a good song. Yeah. More
than four hundred thousand illnesses are caused by bad Christmas leftovers.

(01:46:39):
Americans purchase one point six billion Christmas cards a year.
That's crazy. And this one. I totally believe. Visa cards
are swiped six thousand times a minute during the Christmas season.
I believe that too. Oh, I believe that. I believe
that now they taken swiped as the same as used. Yeah, yeah,

(01:47:07):
that's what it says they're used. I just use it
the word swiped.

Speaker 2 (01:47:10):
Oh, because with people using Amazon now, they don't swipe
the visa.

Speaker 1 (01:47:13):
They just use the visa right right, Yeah, well.

Speaker 2 (01:47:17):
Then yes, I want to if swipe it also means
they just use their visa card to use their visa card.

Speaker 1 (01:47:24):
Then I I think that might be even be low
six minute.

Speaker 2 (01:47:30):
Yeah, I think I think during my project that I
think I use my visa six thousand times a minute.

Speaker 1 (01:47:40):
So I would agree with that that I that I
used it or.

Speaker 2 (01:47:48):
Oh but yeah, I absolutely agree with that one.

Speaker 1 (01:47:53):
The real came out in nineteen eighty. It was a
dollar ninety nine. It still is a dollar night ten
dollars retails for ten bucks. Who the hell would buy
a Rub's cuban. They were popular as hell. They were
popular as hell when I was growing up, like in

(01:48:15):
high school, because that was my freshman year in high school.
I everybody had a Rubics cube in high school. Yeah,
that was the year I was yeah, well it's yeah.
I actually saw a video two weeks ago something like that.

Speaker 2 (01:48:30):
It was a guy who was going for the world
world record and he was juggling three rubs.

Speaker 1 (01:48:38):
Cubes while doing them. It's just a show off, And he.

Speaker 2 (01:48:44):
Did all three of them while juggling, juggling all three
of them all the same time.

Speaker 1 (01:48:51):
It was like four and a half minutes something like that.

Speaker 2 (01:48:56):
It was I was like, wow, like I can't even
imagine how much folk that would take.

Speaker 1 (01:49:01):
I've never gotten one done well, cheated. I've never cheated
and like watched how to Do It online? So I
mean I have never on my own been able to
do one.

Speaker 2 (01:49:13):
I cheated by taking off the stickers and moving the
stickers around.

Speaker 1 (01:49:19):
But yeah, that is cheating. Yes, that is clearly against
the rules of Rubic's cube, is it. I haven't seen
any rules of Rube's cube. So well, technically you're probably right.
But for a pentance ten years of handing out candy
in some foreign country writing a room, that's going to

(01:49:41):
be That is going to carry on into twenty twenty
five somewhere. It's going to be interjected as we move forward.

Speaker 2 (01:49:48):
Anybody that tells me they're too busy to do something,
We're like, well, I have fun delivered presents.

Speaker 1 (01:49:53):
Yeah, exactly, because apparently that's the penance that you're busy. Wow,
well I don't we can we can end early. It's Christmas.
It's Christmas. I gotta go have a cup of eggnog.
And I never I yeah, I I honestly have never

(01:50:19):
had eggnog. Oh my god, wait a minute, I got
a great ending for us. Oh so you've never had eggnog.
I've never had an eggog. Oh I don't. I don't
drink I don't drink alcohol. So there was just no,
it's not there's no alcohol and iggnog you had it yourself.
Oh so just eggnog itself and you just sprinkle a
little cinnamon or a little nutmeg on top. It is

(01:50:39):
like it is like a cold ah, extremely satisfying, like
a good cup of hot cocoa would be so hot
cocoa is the hot counterpart of that. Eggnog is the
cold counterpart of that. Like there their brother and sister
in there. Their eggnog is delicious, So you should try

(01:51:01):
some this year if you haven't had any. Quick Trip
actually sells a good brand and not a bony qrick Trip,
but their their brand. It's it's delicious. Huh. Well, I
might just stick the hot chocolate, but well, and you
can stick the hot chocolate too, because hot chocolate's great
this time of year. Sprinkle a little peppermint on top.
I bought a like a forty ounce thermos. It's supposed

(01:51:23):
to like keep stuff hot for like two days.

Speaker 2 (01:51:27):
Like yeah, for twenty four hours or whatever. So I've
I've gotten it down to a science on how to
make a full thing of hot chocolate. And so I
tell you that I take that to work on the
hot days or on the cold days.

Speaker 1 (01:51:40):
It's hot days, those days when I'm sweating my you
know what off, and I grabs nice hot cocoa and
bring it out. Okay, So I got a great story
here that I want to share. So I was probably
twelvesh or so at the time, and I would get

(01:52:01):
up early on Christmas Day, probably around two AM. I'd
go downstairs to check on the loot that Santa left.
I used my pocket knife to slit the tape on
all my presents to see what they were, then retape
the packages. While doing this, I came up with the
idea to take a bunch of stuff from my room
and wrap it up also and put it under the
tree with my name on the label. In the morning,

(01:52:23):
when everyone was up, the rest of the family discovered
a huge pile for me and maybe half of it
for my sister. My sister was pretty upset that I
got so much more. Later on, my parents were equally
but silent, were equally but silently confused as to why
there were clearly more presents there from what they put

(01:52:44):
out for me. It did become pretty obvious as I
started opening presents that they were clearly my own stuff
as well. I started playing psychic and guessing exactly what
was in each package. The whole family got a pretty
good laugh about it, and to this day, forty years later,
my parents still talk about it every Christmas. I think

(01:53:06):
that is hilarious. That is psychic, that's so, it's so amazing.
It's a pair. I think it's a basketball. Let me see,
Oh it's basketball. I think it's a pair of red Sox.
I'm feeling red sox of red Sox.

Speaker 4 (01:53:25):
The fact that he would take the time, yes wrap
his own stuff, yeah, that is absolutely classic.

Speaker 1 (01:53:34):
I would get up at two in the morning and
go look at all my stuff and then wrap, and
then wrap my own presence from my room and bring
it downstairs and play psychic. Yep I didn't. And then
the beauty part here too, that has totally eluded It
is pissing off your sister at Christmas by having twice

(01:53:54):
as many presents as she has. Well, she's like, you know, residents,
Well you were naughty, You're naughty. Yep, props is coming
to get you next year. Oh well, on that note,
I say, we say our goodbyes to twenty twenty.

Speaker 2 (01:54:18):
Four, yes, yes, indeed, uh and the year sure wise
show choice, yes.

Speaker 1 (01:54:29):
Yes indeed. Uh.

Speaker 2 (01:54:31):
And just in general, I mean everybody has their ups
and downs throughout the year, about throughout every year. Uh,
you know, everybody gives up right around January fifteenth, yeah
to you know, I'm having a good year and they're
waiting for twenty twenty six yep. But but you know,

(01:54:51):
for for everybody out there, uh, you know, one of
the great things about the paranormal is that it's it's
pretty much upsetting of everybody. And you're you're never you're
never alone here uh here.

Speaker 1 (01:55:09):
In the paranormal world.

Speaker 2 (01:55:11):
And so for Christmas, uh, you know, be with your families,
Love your families, Cherish the time that you have with them,
your friends as well, especially the friends who have become
your family.

Speaker 1 (01:55:24):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (01:55:24):
You know, if you're if you're part of a paranormal
team like myself, uh, you know, cherish the people that
have been around.

Speaker 1 (01:55:33):
For years and that have stuck around to do all
the menial and thankless work.

Speaker 2 (01:55:41):
That goes into then that happens behind the scenes, and
you know, uh and if you can uh not everybody
has the ability. Not everybody has the opportunity to do
something nice for somebody else, but uh, you know, if
you do, do it, do something nice for somebody else.

(01:56:05):
As good friend of the show Dustin Perry would always say,
it doesn't cost you anything to be kind, right, And uh,
you know, Christmas is a great place too if you're
just starting off.

Speaker 1 (01:56:19):
Christmas is a great way of kicking off the new year.

Speaker 2 (01:56:24):
Bye bye, changing what you want to change. So I
hope everybody has a very safe and merry Christmas and
a happy New Year.

Speaker 1 (01:56:36):
Was that your stomach was my stomach. It's like saying,
come on, the show's over, let's go get some French tos.
I was gonna say that pal belly, paranormal belly to
the max. Holy crap. That was a loud grumble right there.
Let's go every month, Dave and I will see you

(01:57:05):
in the new year, Yes we will. So do you
have anything you would like to No? No, I was
just gonna say here. You know, we had a lot
of fun on this on today's show, so and we
talked about a lot of like really obscure things, but
there's some cool things in there. So if one of them,
if you're listening to this and kind of one of
them caught your ear. Maybe make it a new holiday

(01:57:28):
tradition for your family. You don't have to be from
Germany to have the pickle ornament thing, or from Finland
to light a candle and pay respect to the debt,
or you know, to put a spider on your tree
from the Ukraine's I mean, if you saw something here.
Me personally, if I had known this years ago, I
would do the Catalonia pooplog, just because I'm a child

(01:57:52):
still at times, and I would get the biggest kick
out of being with my family grabbing sticks beating the
shit out of a log till it pooped out everything
we've packed in it while we're singing the good Poop Song.
I think that would be absolutely hilarious. So but if
you saw something seriously that get caught your ear, you know,

(01:58:13):
maybe maybe making a tradition with your family, because traditions
are what the holidays really are all about, That's what
carries all the memories forward.

Speaker 2 (01:58:20):
So yes, indeed, so yeah, uh, I guess what Dad said.
Over the next couple of weeks before we come back
in the new year, obviously, take a look at honestly
files Radio dot com.

Speaker 1 (01:58:37):
Uh. You know, we're always looking for uh reviews. Maybe
if you want to, you know, critiques, something you like,
some of the stories ideas. If we haven't touched on
something that you'd like us to talk about, submit it.
I mean, there's so much in the paranormal that Mike
and I you know, we spread our minds far and
wide to come up with new ideas. But if there's

(01:58:57):
something we haven't talked about or maybe haven't talked about
a long time, and you'd like us to hit the subject,
send it in. Be more than happy to absolutely. And yeah,
with that said, we'll see everybody in the new year.
Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, happy Hanukah, happy Chris.

Speaker 2 (01:59:17):
Wanzaka, whatever you want to call it, whatever you celebrate,
I hope that it is a joyful and happy time
for everybody and that everyone has a very happy and
safe new Year.

Speaker 1 (01:59:30):
So we'll see you all in the new year. Everyone
have a great day.

All Episodes

Episode 323 - Obscure Christmas Traditions

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

Stuff You Should Know

Dateline NBC

The Breakfast Club

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Episode 323 - Obscure Christmas Traditions