We are now just one week away from Christmas. Are you ready for it? I believe I am. At least, I hope I am. Anyway, here are five random facts about Christmas.

  1. The debate over saying "Merry Christmas" was happening even over 100 years ago. Of course the debate was whether to say "Merry Christmas" or "CHEERY Christmas." What was so bad about "Merry Christmas"? Well, being "merry" was associated with drunkenness, noise, and bad behavior.
  2. Christmas trees used to be lit up with actual candles. This was of course very dangerous, but hey, they lived dangerously back then.
  3. Nobody quite knows the real beginning of hanging stockings and drinking eggnog is.
  4. Oyster stew was a common Christmas dish. And I'm not sure this fact should be in the past tense. My family still eats that crap every Christmas Eve. It's disgusting. It's basically oysters in milk and butter. But the reason behind is being a tradition for most people is that oysters were cheap in the 19th and 20th centuries.
  5. The Santa that we all know now is probably thanks to the work of Cocoa Cola. Up until a man by the name of Thomas Nast put together a Coa Cola campaign, Santa's suit was tan, not red.

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