Yesterday, as I caught the bus home from work, I saw two guys on stilts. They were dressed as giant kangaroos with santa hats on and were jumping along the street. Opposite me on the bus sat a man and (presumably) his young daughter. As bad as I am with guessing ages of kids, I think I'd be pretty safe in saying she was about 5 years olds. She sat by the window, while her father sat in the aisle seat closest to me, and as we passed the giant kangaroos (who looked more the sort of men who would fit right into a bikie gang), the father must have said something along the lines of "Look! Kangaroos!" because the little girl replied "They aren't real kangaroos!". Her father tried to convince her that they were real kangaroos, but, as young as she was (or looked) she stood her ground and said "They weren't real! I saw their faces!". Man, little kids are hilarious.
If only I was as logically minded as that little girl. I mean, I don't think, had I been in her situation 10 years ago, I would have realised they weren't real if my dad was convincing me they were real for a laugh. I say all this totally from experience, having been tricked numerous times. Once my cousins tricked me into thinking that the words open sesame and close sesame controlled the opening and closing of the garage, when they were actually pressing a button on the wall right next to me. I was between the age of 5 and 10 I believe, mind you, and if you saw a full demonstration of how it works and saw the garage door open and close at the commands of your lips, you'd be pretty conned as well.
When I was young, I had a relatively intense fear of Santa Clause, or a love-hate relationship, be it as you wish. It went a little like this - I would really want to go join the other kids in the mall (sorry, I mean "shopping centre". Christmas time turns you American and besides, mall is so much easier to say) and wait in the long queue to receive a small gift bag from Santa, however I was much too scared to sit on his lap and endure an entire photo being taken just for the gift bag (as enticing as it seemed). So everytime I went to the mall with my family (as you do when you are young and have no friends nor independence) they would all tease me as we approached Santa's throne 'cause they knew he freaked me out. My dad would tell me to go see Santa and get a present from him, and sometimes even take my hand and try to drag me in Santa's direction just to freak me out a little more. As much as I wanted that gift, I'd avoid Santa's eye contact (otherwise he'd give me a freaky wave, in which case I would most definately not return it and probably runaway), grab my mother's hand and drag her straight past him so I don't have to be tormented by the big fat man in the red suit, or by all the gleeful kids receiving their gifts from him. Not only was I scared of the real deal (or as close to the real deal as you can get - I'm sure Kris Kringle, if that's how you actually spell his name, wouldn't be very scary), but I was almost just as scared of the plastic santa that used to hang behind a door in our house during the festive season. I'm not quite sure why I was always so scared of Santa, but I think it must have something to do with my current fear of being abducted and so on. It must have been some sort of subconcious pre-setting to this fear, as if I have always (subconciously) been scared of unknown men that may hid me in a sack amongst all their goodies and take me away. Anyway, whatever it was, I'm glad I only sat on Santa's lap a couple of times before I developed my fear. If you ask me, he's always been a pretty shifty figure, and as confidently as I could approach, greet and sit on the arm of his chair today, I certainly wouldn't sit on his lap. Anyway (!), as much as you wouldn't think so, after all this rambling, this Santa story actually relates back to the topic of this blog. I was once also completely fooled (not to mention totally freaked out) by my sister and next door neighbour into believing that Santa was on our roof. I could have just said the point from the start, but I thought I'd fill you in from the start, since it is Christmas in two days. It's more fun this way :)
Anyway, to anyone and everyone who reads this blog, have a good one, 'cause I'm going away until new years, and probably won't blog until then, unless something interesting occurs during the next two days. I highly doubt that.
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