Ooooh Blogzzz

Wow, haven't done one of THESE in a while! I suppose it's only when you deliberately find a minute to yourself that you remember about blogs etc. It helps when someone links you to one though.

So now I'm lying in my bed, thoughts running through my head, and I feel like... no... wait... that's Angel. I'm just lying in bed with a labrador. HA! That sounds weird. He just acts as a hot water bottle though. You know what heating's like, you can never find the right setting.

Oh the fun... I'm going to stop moaning now and say that the

SKEPTICS GUIDE TO THE UNIVERSE PODCAST

is quite possibly THE best thing you can download right now :) lovely science-ness. I miss science. I do love being an arts student and all, somehow gives you the right to say weird thoughts out loud and not be judged past the " *sigh* typical arts student" point, but still, SCIENCE!!! Like alpha- or beta-glucose molecules, or the synthesis of insulin. Awesome stuffff.

Now that I've finished my hot chocolate (complete with marshmellows) and am looking oh so *now* in my cow print pyjamas (don't you love christmas presents from parents?!) I just started to reflect on what christmas actually means to people. (yeah, the mug was a present too. And the marshmellows).

Why do we all celebrate Christmas? I know I'll get the usual responses of 'birth of JC/son of God/ultimate gift' nonsense, but hardly any of us really celebrate it for that reason now, do we? UK-population-wise, I'm thinking most of us do it for the selfish reasons of giving and recieving. Yep, giving is selfish too, don't you just do it because you love the expressions of surprise and pleasure on their faces? So is it entirely a selfish thing? I'd love to be all sanctimonious and say: "I celebrate Christmas because it allows me an entire day completely dedicated to spending time with my family." But I spent it at my uncle's house, technically family, and hated it. The wrong family? Maybe... Sure, it was nice to see my nuclear family, but the people I really missed were my friends, and my boyfriend, the people I've chosen to be close to.

So maybe we've got it all wrong, maybe Christmas shouldnt be the stereotypical day we've created over the ages. Maybe we should all chill out and take it less seriously. No 'family only! it's Christmas!' rules. Maybe that would work better. But then should it be a special day at all? Should we really, and this is the cheesy part, have 'Christmas' every day?! There's a guy that does that, isn't there? http://www.museumofhoaxes.com/hoax/weblog/comments/3831/ although that site says it's a promotional hoax. Mmm... Christmas spirit!

I could take a completely different angle, and say that we should celebrate the pagan festival of the birth of Mithras, which preceded Christmas as the key event on the 25th of December, but hey, that was strictly patriarchal too.

I'm out of ideas for now, and I've rambled for a l-o-n-g time... So I may actually sleep now! Nighty night world! Not that anyone will ever actually read this!!! First sign of madness, talking to myself! O:)

Martha.