I am reminded by Amanda Walker that today is DEC-20 Day — it’s the date, kids — causing me to recall times working at research labs that used DEC-20s as their shared workhorse machines. This DEC-20 brought me two cartoons, the first a Zippy glancingly related to Christmas, the second a Bizarro directly about Christmas in popular culture.
Two DEC-20 cartoons
December 20, 2025Ad-talk: your morning groom
December 19, 2025Caught on tv this morning, one version of a Titanium Edge tv spot ad “Any Hair Anywhere”, released 7/31/25 (details on the iSpot site here); from this ad:
Titanium Edge, the “2-in-one nose and ear groomer that goes wherever razors can’t … to finish my groom” — with a noun groom, a nouning of the verb groom, to denote a regular routine of grooming, here specifically for men and in fact specifically for shaving; this nouning would appear to be a commercial invention by Titanium Edge’s ad agency
Godzilla, enlightened and confused
December 17, 2025Aric Olnes’s Godzilla countdown to Christmas on Facebook, #5 (10 days to go) on 12/15:
Fighting to extract himself from the lights? Showing off his Christmas style? Swatting at the lights like those airplanes that sometimes bedevil him? Or just confounded, as so many of us have been, by the strings of lights? Enraged, delighted, or baffled? It’s the Christmas mystery of Godzilla.
AO’s series began on 12/12 (with 14 days to go); see my posting “Godzilla Santa #1”, showing a wonderfully benevolent Godzilla in a Santa cap, starring in a fable in which he rescues Santa’s workshop from Shimo the ice monster. Other items in the series show us a more traditional Godzilla, devouring trains and devastating city skylines, but for Christmas.
A Vermont portmanteau and a net-naive Santa
December 16, 2025Two cartoons from the New Yorker issue of 12/15/25: Michael Maslin with a phrasal overlap portmanteau tribute to the state of Vermont (land of covered casseroles, for covered-dish socials, and rustic covered bridges); and Roz Chast, showing us Santa’s alarmed helpers when he can’t resist falling — once again — for clickbait.
The fortuitous guest gift
December 15, 2025The sinus-infection background, from yesterday’s posting “Chair-ridden”:
The [long-running, like for weeks] sinus infection isn’t contagious, and I don’t run a fever, But it’s fiercely painful, produces prodigious amounts of disgusting junk I cough up constantly, and is, alas, not much affected by nasal saline sprays. Mostly, it’s unbelievably tiring. Hence, my being chair-ridden (the analogue of bed-ridden).
Now I’m going to amble discursively through the rest of this story. Walk with me.
Chair-ridden
December 14, 2025I’ve been sick for some time — a terrible sinus infection that makes sleeping lying down mostly impossible, so I’ve been sleeping, immense amounts of time, sitting up in the comfy chair in my living room — sleeping fitfully, with unpleasant waking moments, for long times (9 to 11 hours) at night and then with desperately needed hour-long naps during the day. (I also have attacks of the itchies — once mostly in my crotch, which was dreadful — and crippling arthritis clawing up my right hand, but those are side issues.)
The sinus infection isn’t contagious, and I don’t run a fever, But it’s fiercely painful, produces prodigious amounts of disgusting junk I cough up constantly, and is, alas, not much affected by nasal saline sprays. Mostly, it’s unbelievably tiring. Hence, my being chair-ridden (the analogue of bed-ridden). I still need to order in food and do some basic household work, and until today have been able to produce at least some small posting each day, to show that I’m not dead yet.
Today’s found poetry
December 13, 2025Today on Facebook, Hana Filip passed on a two-sentence poem in prose (an English translation from the German original):
Jan Antonin Baťa, or Bata, the genius entrepreneur who founded the Bata shoe emporium, had in his main headquarters in Zlín (Moravia, Czech Republic), an elevator in the size of a fully equipped office. While sitting in this office, he could move up and down his headquarters building and visit its different departments.
Godzilla Santa #1
December 12, 2025Yesterday on Facebook, Aric Olnes embarked on “14 days / Countdown [to Christmas] with Godzilla” with this especially arresting image:
Godzilla, defender of Santa’s workshop
A search on this image got me to a reference to: A Daikaiju Christmas: Godzilla vs The Ice Monster (1969). Which seems not to be a real movie, but some sort of fan invention (complete with a plot description, in which Godzilla is defending Santa’s workshop against Shimo the ice monster). But no mention of the creator of the image.
Today’s consumer quiz
December 11, 2025According to the label on the can, it
contains product from [in alphabetical order] Bolivia, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Mozambique, Nigeria, U.S.A, Vietnam
It’s high in iron, vitamin E, niacin, magnesium, zinc, copper, and manganese; also in dietary fiber and saturated fat, but with no cholesterol. It has no salt, very low sugars, and a fair amount of (plant-based) protein. It’s crunchy.
What is it?
Dancing Santas
December 10, 2025From Bob Eckstein’s The Bob substack on 1/7/23, this delightful troupe of dancing Santas, created for the monthly comedy newspaper the Funny Times to sell on t-shirts (this year’s offer came to me by e-mail yesterday:
(bob’s text) Funny Times is getting into the Holiday groove with my Dancing Santas. The perfect Secret Santa gift can be found here.
