Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Merry Christmas from The Signal Watch

This is pretty much my optimal tree lighting ceremony

Merry Christmas from all of us at The Signal Watch!

I am expecting limited posting for a few days to spend time doing Christmas-type-stuff (The Dug and K will be here in a few hours!), but I also wanted to get out ahead of the curve and wish everyone a very Merry Christmas as you head off to your respective destinations and settle in for a festive Yuletide Season.  (What is a Yule, anyway?)

I'll be honest, my idea of a good Christmas does not include being covered in mice.

Its been a fantastic year here at our house, and its been a great year getting back into the swing of things with this site.  We hope you've enjoyed our return to blogging (which, I hear, is now a dead use of technology.  I'm retro!).  

I like to think this is a season for giving, so I'll make two quick suggestions for a couple of international charities to give to this Christmas, as I know you're all good to your local charities, already (right?).



Ms. Brooks thinks giving to charity on the holidays is a great idea
As always, at the top of my Christmas wish list is Peace on Earth and Goodwill toward All.  May that goodwill spill over all the year-round to everyone we meet in hopes of better understanding between us.

In the past few years, the Christmas Story which comes back to me again and again is that of the 1914 Christmas Truce, when German and British soldiers put down their arms and their differences and took time to remember what it was that they had, instead, in common.  Soccer, carols, battlefields and the knowledge that under other circumstances, they'd be sharing tobacco and stories, and not hurling bullets at one another across an apocalyptic landscape.

Call it a miracle.  Call it an act of humanity at its finest.  Its what should be.

I hate to send you to Wikipedia, but they have a detailed synopsis of the event



How odd and strange, and yet... exactly what it should be that the better parts of our nature should know that we can live better with one another, no matter what we hear about those on the other side of the battlefield, or what those who have something to gain from division and anger have to tell us.  If only for one day.

Peace on Earth.  Goodwill. 

We wish you a very Merry Christmas.  Here's to you and your loved ones! 


now dash away, all!

We'll be back at blogging cruising speed after the Holiday.

3 comments:

Paul Toohey said...

I just got this email from UT President Bill Powers

"Dear Friends,

As we face these challenging times, I want to thank every member of the UT family for what you do to support our University. Have a safe and peaceful holiday season.

We have an important year ahead, and I'll keep you posted on our progress on my blog, Tower Talk.

Kim and I wish you all the best for the holidays!

Bill Powers
President
The University of Texas at Austin"

If he's still blogging, then I think it's OK for you to still be blogging...right?

The League said...

Me and Bill Powers are clearly sympatico. I think it mostly means blogging is now mostly associated with propagandistic one-way communication/ promotion. A side effect of every company deciding they needed IN on this blogging business.

I think its also been a common misconception that a lot of sites aren't blogging, when that this pretty much what they are. Sports sites, comics sites, etc... all of these sites that are columns are really aggregate blog sites.

cardboardbelts said...

There was a 2006 film made about the 1914 Christmas Truce (Joyeux Noël). Unfortunately, it sucked all the humanity right out of it and replaced it with something totally maudlin. Major bummer. Anyway, I'm glad to see you posted about it (history hats off to you!). Happy Holidays!