xtcian

That's easy -- The Chipmunks Song (Christmas Don't Be Late)...by The Chipmunks, along with Dave of course.

ALVIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Amen to the Chipmunks. Mine has always been "Do They Know It's Christmas?" by Band Aid.

My favorite non-guilty pleasure is "Christmas Wrapping" by the Waitresses.

Definitely the Waitresses, "Christmas Wrapping"--it makes me smile and tear up a little bit every year.

Wow, what an incredible sky!

'grandma got run over by a reindeer'

was that played nationally in the '80s, or was that sick little ditty dreamed up by a now-forgotten dc-area dj? it's a real hoot.

over here, all of the department stores and supermarkets seem to play the same holiday songs cd featuring an annoying, cloying, screeching little gang of schoolkids, over and over again, all december long. makes me wanna shriek 'bah, humbug!' and run THEM over with a reindeer, or a tuk-tuk rather.

Even Coldplay has recorded "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas."

I love "All I Want For Christmas is You," especially the version in "Love Actually."

JJE and LFMD, great pictures from earlier. I love Connor with the candy canes; and the beach picture with Helen is beautiful. We can't seem get "THE" picture of Nicolas for our Xmas cards yet, but my link has some recent holiday pictures.

I have never been a big Christmas music fan, but I always get weepy over the Drummer Boy song.

Scruggs -- your little family is so cute. I think that you can use any one of the photos on your link for a card! I am glad that you like our photos -- I make things easy on myself, and I just pick a photo that I like from the year, and I use it as the holiday card. So, our Christmas cards never have anything to do with Christmas! Hence, the beach photo.

Ian, that is a beautiful photo. I just made it into the background wallpaper for my computer. Thanks.

Definitely, without a doubt Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas is You." The "Love Actually" version is great. (Love that movie!)

"Do They Know it's Christmas" is a close second.

Thanks, Scruggs. The candy canes were a last minute bit of inspiration. It was supposed to just be the tangled string of white lights. But Patrick was so freaked out that I was going to electrocute the kid that I tried to keep the lights as far away from him as possible. Of course with the candy canes, I had to make sure he didn't poke his eyes out.

Scruggs - Great shots! I love any of the last three especially for a Christmas card.

Oh, and mankind agrees with me - Mariah's "AIWFC" has been running #1 out of ALL songs on iTunes for the past couple of days.

"Emmet Otter's Jugband Christmas" has some catchy songs, too. ;-)

Gotta go with ALVIN--but, silly me--didn't even KNOW I was supposed to feel guilty about it!!!! I think all the psuedo quarrelling amongst the 3 + Dave makes it seem much more like a REAL Christmas, although I am certain by now those 2 terms constitute an oxymoron if ever there was one.

JJE, LFMD,SCRUGGS, IAN--Beautiful pics! I'll share some of my beloved nephews as soon my sister unhands the digital camera! :)

Beautiful photo!!!

I like the Kinks' mean Christmas song, "Father Christmas," but I don't feel guilty. ;)

On a related note, I remember how I loved the Christmas assembly in elementary school in NJ every year, and how we used to sing really religious Xmas songs in addition to the token Hannukah songs, and nobody raised a fuss or even noticed. I bet schools can't do that today.

Deck the Halls. I'll always remember my then 3-year-old son, Charlie, dancing about singing, "Tis the season to be Charlie, fa la la la la..." Yes indeed, with a birthday on Dec. 12 followed by Christmas, topped off with some indulgent grandparents, it is a great time for the little guy (who turns 7 today!).

My college boyfriend found some obscure CD featuring a song called, "Here Comes Santa's Pussy," and played it over and over again. I don't even know what that means, but I know that it's wicked.

Uh, yeah. Mine is The Eagles "Please Come Home for Christmas". But not Jon Bon Jovi's "Please Come Home for Christmas", because he touched my guilty pleasure Christmas song, and then he screwed it up.
Hate that.

My favorite is also the "Love Actually" version of "All I want for Christmas".

Robert Earl Keen's "Merry Christams from the Family" is my guilty pleasure.

I also love the Betty Boop sounding version of "Santa Baby, Hurry Down the Chimney" because that's how my mom sings it. That used to embarass me so much and now it's one of my favorite Chritmas memories.

I'll tell Bono you all said hello when I see him TONIGHT in Charlotte!!

OMG.

Hi Quinn. My name is Laurie. I just wanted to post a post under your post because I am a fan. At age 10, I was your biggest fan ever. You probably hear that a lot.

Have a good day.

Salem's Little Sister! Where have you been?? Are you watching the Gauntlet 2?

Send Bono my love.

LFMD, you're very kind. Frequently, what I hear is "Oh my God, you're HER! I hated you when I was a kid!". Always challenging to find something to say after that.

Q
www.qcreport.blogspot.com

Dominic, the Italian Christmas Donkey...

"When Santa visits his paisons,
With Dominick he'll be.
Because the reindeer cannot
Climb the hills of Italy."

LFMD- I've been here, just trying to catch up from my trip to Chapel Hill(checking grad schools for my husband) last week. I don't bounce back the way I used to.
You know I'm watching G2. They are crazier than ever! With "Lost" in reruns, I'm counting on MTV to pull me through.

And of course, Bono.

Hi Quinn. Are you kidding me?!?!?!?! I adored you. . . I wanted TO BE YOU when I was 10! How anyone could react differently is beyond me. Ninnies!

I have been reading and enjoying your QC Report ever since Ian made mention of his friendship with you. Damn, you are funny! I enjoy your writing, and I can relate to all of your stories about your daughter (who is quite the Cutie Cutiekins). Your HipHugger is ingenious. Wish I had one when my daughter was little.

Have a great week! Hope I don't seem like too much of a dork -- but this little exchange has MADE MY DAY. Just wait until I tell my childhood friends who I chatted with online today . . . they'll think I was hallucinating.

Happy Christmas (War is Over) by John Lennon has to win the prize this year.

In terms of overexposed old, umm, chestnuts, I like the Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting etc.) mostly because I enjoy playing it on the piano. It has some nice chord progressions. And it's fun to sing "tiny tots with their eyes all aglow".

But my real Christmas kitsch confession is that I love the Motown-glitz excess of Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas is You" from her 1994 Christmas album. Something about the melody's ascending and descending arpeggios is firmly stuck in my brain -- and in a good way. 8-)

Quinn,
I have to be honest...I don't know who you are, but I had to look at your blog after LFMD's post.

I do have to say that your blog is some of the most brilliant writing I have read in a long time (besides Ian's--and my husbands--of course). As a mother of a 9 1/2 month old and nearly 6 year old, I found myself relating to a number of things you wrote about...so in awe at how you are able to communicate your life with such honestly and humor.

Nicola

P.S. Guilty pleasure Christmas Song: I always get a little weepy when I hear Mannheim Steamroller's "The Holly and the Ivy." Reminds me of a lonely holiday season in the dorm at the University of Oregon.

weird i was just looking at the itunes top 100 and feeling shocked that people are actually paying for schlocky christmas songs.

apparently they are also buying a song called "honky tonk badonkadonk" - no lie.

anyway if my arm is twisted, ima go with eartha kitt "santa baby"...

I agree with Anne D. about the Christmas Song - I love the changes on that one.

CL. The schools down here can't/don't sing carols and haven't for awhile. Back in my h.s. days, one day each Xmas season all the foreign language classes would meet up every class period and sing holiday songs in various languages, even latin (tineat tineat tin tinabulum!). But that was squashed about 5 years ago.

Ian, speaking of guilty pleasures in general...a guilty pleasure of mine is reading the NYT wedding annoucements online during my Monday morning conference call. Today had your UNC/Pink House buddy, Gill.

Nicola! How old are you? If you are 37 or older, think QUINN CUMMINGS, as in

Annie Cooper from "Family"!
Lucy in "The Goodbye Girl"!
Lots of other stuff!

Quinn Cummings!

Let it Snow.
In a cabin, with a fire, with a boy.

Great picture. Nice to see snow on the ground up in Yankeeland.

My guilty Christmas song is the Hanukkah song by Adam Sandler.

I love the line the rhymes Carnegie Deli with "Bowser from Sha Na Na and Arthur Fonzarelli"

My guilty pleasure is "Baby It's Cold Outside" sung originally by Dean Martin (not sure who the woman was). But it was redone in "Elf" with Will Ferrell and is so cute it makes me want to hug everyone!

All time best Christmas songs -- James Taylor's version of Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas - released in November 2001 and still resonates of 9/11 for me. On a cheerier note - Sarah MacLachlan & Bare Naked Ladies version of God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen & We Three Kings medley. Haunting and yet peppy.

Clearly, the correct answer is "Do They Know It's Christmas". None of the other nominations should induce as much guilt - we're talking Band Aid, people! And yet, none of the others provides as much pleasure, either. Oh, those clanging chimes of doom.

Happy Christmas ( War is Over ) by John Lennon really affects me. I think it has grown to be my favorite over the years.

Also I love Christmas Time is Here from A Charlie Brown Christmas.

Sad and beautiful at the same time.

My guilty pleasure is thinking I am three tenuous degrees of separation from someone who is that happy from sharing an exchange with Quinn Cummings.

And, Lyle, "Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer" was recorded by the Canadian-Irish bar band and erly 1970's TV stars the Irish Rovers. Every Canadian must know all the words under law and we do as it is played incessantly. My favorite Rover, the big guy, sings it. He us better than the little guy with the hat. Seek out "Wasn't That A Party" for their other big hit.

i can't say i have a favorite. as a very bad jew, though, any christmas song kind of puts me in the mood of the season...

thanks for such a gorgeous photo!! and good luck on the deadlines.

I adore hearing Karen Carpenter sing Merry Christmas Darling. You can just feel the hot cocoa filling your belly with warmness. Again, a sad holiday song of longing to be with the one you love...but she's still in the spirit. Something uplifting to me.

Guilty pleasure:
The Prayer
Celine Dion & Andrea Bocelli.
Not necessarily a Christmas song although it was on her holiday CD.

Aloha,
Lisa in Maui
85 degrees and sunny

hard to get in the christmas spirit here...

>>CL. The schools down here can't/don't sing carols and haven't for awhile.

Yeah, I guess that went out of style. Oh well. I had no idea I was singing about Jesus until years later.

run-DMC

christmas in hollis

alan! i should've known that only some wily, witty canucks could have created that zany tune. i'll check out 'wasn't that a party' straightaway. up with irish rovers!

My vote is Dan Folgelburg's "Auld Lang Syne" - totally cheesy song about running into his old girlfriend in the grocery store. I found I couldn't turn the car engine off until I heard the end of it today. Reminds me of those other "story" songs like The Pina Colada song or Copacabana. Total cheese but a guilty pleasure!
Neva

Gosh, Neva, had completely forgotten about THAT one. Dan Fogelburg. YES. And remeber his song about his dad? Leader of the BAnd---a TOTAL tearjerker and guilty pleasure all in one!!!

I don't know if you are a reader of Fluid Pudding, but she linked this little gem that is my New Favorite Guilty Pleasure Christmas Song Ever.

http://www.doubtfulpalace.com/artists/PledgeDrive/XmasRhap.mp3

Its long, but well worth the entire listen...

And I will always love the spooky classic "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen". Spooky christmas carols are the best!

I'm so late to the discussion--but wanted to include Xmas faves, some guilty, some not:

The Carpenters' "Little Altar Boy" --INCREDIBLE bathos, but so beautiful--that voice--pure magic

Glenn Campbell's "I'll Be Home for Christmas"--can't believe it hasn't been mentioned.

"The Holly and the Ivy"--my favorite carol! By the Clare College Singers. Simply unreal as far as the human voice goes.

"Snowfall" by our only Tony Bennett.

"Every Day Will be like a Holiday" by soul legend William Bell.

Oddly, even though I consider myself a helpless victim to Christmas-song nostalgia, I cannot STAND "Drummer Boy." No offense LFMD!!