My constant complaint this year has been that time has simply gone by too quickly! After Thanksgiving, someone might have just as well hit an accelerator pedal under the calendar and sent it streaking away. I didn't even watch some of my usual favorites during the holiday season and made up for some of them today: The Waltons "Best Christmas" for one. I love this episode, but there's a scene I've always found curious: this takes place a couple of episodes after Ike and Corabeth have adopted Aimee, and Corabeth and her new daughter have put up a beautiful homemade Christmas display at the back of the store, with a tabletop tree and a Sicilian cart filled with fruit. Elizabeth says to Aimee, "I bet you're getting everything you asked for," and Aimee responds in a very unsure voice, "I guess so." Never understood the tone of her voice or the wistful look in her eyes. I suspect it's because Aimee is still unsure of her new parents' love, but it somehow leaves you up in the air, with the feeling there was something missed.
Also watched the 1968 animated The Night Before Christmas. This isn't the Rankin-Bass story with the mice, but a fictionalized tale of how Clement C. Moore wrote "A Visit from St. Nicholas." The music and songs are by Norman Luboff and the story uses the musical arrangement of "The Night Before Christmas" originally written by Ken Darby for the Fibber McGee and Molly radio series. Radio veteran Olan Soulé is Moore.
If you've never seen this cartoon, here it is on YouTube:
The Night Before Christmas, part 1
The Night Before Christmas, part 2
The Night Before Christmas, part 3
It used to be a syndication classic before Christmas, along with Lutheran Television's Christmas Is and The City That Forgot About Christmas.
As a chaser, Rankin-Bass' The Little Drummer Boy (my old tape since the DVD is not complete) and a videotape I found in Dollar Tree, Animaniacs "Hellooooooo, Holidays!" It was pretty cute, but nothing special.
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