The Miracle of Festivus

No sooner did I decide to announce that we would not be celebrating Festivus that my troubles began. The sink clogged before dinner, hopelessly, ending all thoughts of washing the dishes. Then a tooth cap fell off. An emergency trip to the grocery store for Liquid Plumber ended in failure and standing water filled up half the sink. I went to bed deep in the dumps.

Festivus dawned gloomy, but at Christmas there is always hope. A phone call and a quick trip to the substitute dentist assured me that I had broken my tooth in such a clever way that the cap could be glued on good enough to get me through Christmas. (I refuse to discuss those comments around the the house that, no problem, teeth could be Photoshopped in the Christmas pictures.) When I returned from the dentist, I opened the door and an old friend was one the phone.

"Happy Festivus!" I said, "I have my tooth for Christmas; half my problems are solved!" I then told her about my sink. She asked "Did you try a plunger?" "No," I said, "Can't do that, its a sink with a garbage disposer." "How could it be any different?" she asked. "Worth a try," I said.

A plunger was fetched. And we plunged: once, twice, three times. Suddenly, a great sucking noise was heard. Lo and behold, the sink was draining!" "You are a genius!" I shouted over the phone. "You have created the miracle of Festivus!"

Isn't it odd, a friend who I haven't talked to in years, calling out-of-the-blue, complete with a plan to fix my sink?

On my recent trip to the Christmas markets in Germany, I saw a number of interesting little nativity scenes which I found included, strangely, elephants, alpine hikers, German shepards, you name it, all off to visit the baby Jesus.

When I put up my little manger scene later today, I really, really want to commemorate the wonderful event of a phone call and a solution when most needed. So I ask, would it be really, really wrong to put near the wise men just a very small memorial in honor of a valued friend? Perhaps a memorial with a very high strength-to-weight ratio? Perhaps a very tiny Festivus Pole?