MONDO EXTRAS

This year, we found the Yule Log (or Hanukkah Stump, or Kwanzaa Chunk -- pick your holiday, we're not fancy) in its rightful place, which all New York area natives know is on Channel 11, WPIX. We sat around eating pumpkin muffins and staring very hard at the tiny TV in my parents' kitchen, trying to discern where they'd spliced the loop.

(...Well, my dad and Gen and I did. My mother could not have cared less and Mr. S fled the precincts of the kitchen the minute "Little Drummer Boy" started up.)

I thought it was a pretty tight loop, like 45 seconds; my dad said no, he was sure it was more like four minutes and I could tell by the shower of sparks on the left, "but not that one...or that one. Or that one. What's with all the sparks?"

But just when we thought we'd knocked it? ZOOM OUT! And THEN Dad goes, "Oh, so it's time for a commercial," BUT NO! PUSH IN!

Trickily played, Yule Log. You could have given in to holiday-faux-fireplace dramatic cliches, but no: you remained an enigma wrapped in a puzzle between two andirons.

Happy holidays, of any and all kinds, from everyone here at TWoP.

This year, we found the Yule Log (or Hanukkah Stump, or Kwanzaa Chunk -- pick your holiday, we're not fancy) in its rightful place, which all New York area natives know is on Channel 11, WPIX. We sat around eating pumpkin muffins and staring very hard at the tiny TV in my parents' kitchen, trying to discern where they'd spliced the loop.

(...Well, my dad and Gen and I did. My mother could not have cared less and Mr. S fled the precincts of the kitchen the minute "Little Drummer Boy" started up.)

I thought it was a pretty tight loop, like 45 seconds; my dad said no, he was sure it was more like four minutes and I could tell by the shower of sparks on the left, "but not that one...or that one. Or that one. What's with all the sparks?"

But just when we thought we'd knocked it? ZOOM OUT! And THEN Dad goes, "Oh, so it's time for a commercial," BUT NO! PUSH IN!

Trickily played, Yule Log. You could have given in to holiday-faux-fireplace dramatic cliches, but no: you remained an enigma wrapped in a puzzle between two andirons.

Happy holidays, of any and all kinds, from everyone here at TWoP.