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Post by pim on Dec 24, 2016 23:07:58 GMT 10
Whether you think it's all "bah, humbug!" or it's all about santa claus or father christmas or whether you take a more traditional religious view of this festival the fact is that we all mark the day. Even those people who dismiss it as "bah humbug" commercialism (and they have a point!) or those like Matt-E who affect a religious scorn and pretend to reject it as a pagan relic (which it is but so what) or the Jehovah's Witnesses who are utterly boring on the question of Christmas and Easter: they refuse to acknowledge either festival because ... you know I haven't the faintest idea! And what's more I couldn't give a rodent's posterior! ... still end up acknowledging the day even if they do so negatively. Negative acknowledgement is still acknowledgement. So the day is a special one, and I hope you get to spend it with people you're close to. Merry Christmas. May Santa be good to you.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 25, 2016 6:45:53 GMT 10
And to you also, Pim
As a FIFO worker in far western Queensland, working Christmas is common for me but like doctors, nurses, emergency personnel and hospitality folk, we do get our turn to spend with family Mine starts tomorrow when I fly out of here for a late family Christmas on Magnetic Island
Vrolijk Kerstfees! (That's straight out of Google, so forgive any inaccuracies)
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Post by pim on Dec 25, 2016 8:29:09 GMT 10
And to you also, Pim As a FIFO worker in far western Queensland, working Christmas is common for me but like doctors, nurses, emergency personnel and hospitality folk, we do get our turn to spend with family Mine starts tomorrow when I fly out of here for a late family Christmas on Magnetic Island Vrolijk Kerstfees! (That's straight out of Google, so forgive any inaccuracies) Prettige kerstfagen aan jouw en ook aan je familie.
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Post by pim on Dec 25, 2016 21:56:36 GMT 10
Two points, the first one is linguistic and the second one cultural:
1. Next to West Frisian, Dutch is the closest European language to English. It roughly gives you an idea how the English language might have evolved if William the Conqueror had stayed in Normandy and English had continued to evolve as a north west Germanic language without all the French bits. The reason English sounds so different to nearby closely related European languages is because of several sound shifts that occurred between Old English and Middle English. In other words between the English spoken at the time of Alfred the Great and Chaucer. What happened was that the consonant "r" travelled from one side of the vowel to the other. Consequently in modern English we say "Christmas" but in Dutch we say "Kerstmis". There are other examples such as "press" (media) in English and "pers" in Dutch. So Dutch retains features of pre-sound shift English. . 2. The cultural point is that Dutch doesn't have Boxing Day. So they refer to the first Christmas Day and the second Christmas Day. For them Christmas is a season, not a "day". In old English it used to be the same with the 12 days of Christmas.
However you mark it - and even atheists mark Christmas! To dismiss it as bah humbug is to mark it - May this Christmas be a Merry one. God knows - because we certainly don't - that we need as much merriment as we can get in these dark times
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Post by KTJ on Dec 26, 2016 8:53:54 GMT 10
Christmas is about as relevant today as the Queen's Birthday public holiday.
One is an ancient pagan festival subverted by religionists pandering to the god delusion inside their heads and the delusion that their imaginary god sent a son via a virgin to grow up as a human, then be slaughtered to appease some weird law created by that god delusion.
The second isn't even the Queen's birthday at all. In fact, it isn't celebrated on the same day on opposite sides of The Ditch.
Both days are merely an excuse to skive off work for a day (two days in the case of Christmas) and get pissed, indulge in domestic violence (ask my sister about that....she is a police dispatcher and she was just telling me yesterday afternoon about how everything went nuts on the domestic violence front, as usual), and pretend to be nice to people we couldn't really care about.
There....BAH, HUMBUG!!
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Post by pim on Dec 26, 2016 11:09:34 GMT 10
Christmas is about as relevant today as the Queen's Birthday public holiday. One is an ancient pagan festival subverted by religionists pandering to the god delusion inside their heads and the delusion that their imaginary god sent a son via a virgin to grow up as a human, then be slaughtered to appease some weird law created by that god delusion. The second isn't even the Queen's birthday at all. In fact, it isn't celebrated on the same day on opposite sides of The Ditch. Both days are merely an excuse to skive off work for a day (two days in the case of Christmas) and get pissed, indulge in domestic violence (ask my sister about that....she is a police dispatcher and she was just telling me yesterday afternoon about how everything went nuts on the domestic violence front, as usual), and pretend to be nice to people we couldn't really care about. There....BAH, HUMBUG!! Predictably boring post, and boringly predictable as well. Next?
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Post by pim on Dec 26, 2016 11:12:13 GMT 10
For the benefit of one person obsessed with my "likes" ... the one above applies to only part of the post. (Guess which part I like?) Hubris Man calls an observation an "obsession". You live in a hyper bowl, Hubris Man
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Post by pim on Dec 26, 2016 11:17:28 GMT 10
Oh and I trust your Christmas Day was spent in agreable company. For you did have a Christmas Day! I'm a charitable bloke and I wouldn't like to think of you spending the day in floods of tears of outrage over this religious feast day which was being forced on you whether you wanted it or not. The Dutch are still into "Kerstmis". Today is the "Tweede Kerstdag" or second Christmas Day.
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Post by KTJ on Dec 26, 2016 11:19:18 GMT 10
Take a “chill pill” and listen to some nice, melodic Roman Catholic music to amuse yourself....
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Post by pim on Dec 26, 2016 11:27:30 GMT 10
"Obsessed"? Moi? I'm not "obsessed" by anything about you and you don’t own the word. Oh and keep posting those pics!
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