It's supposed to be the most wonderful time of year... but now the Christmas season lasts nearly as long as hockey season and election season! Not too many years ago, advertisers had the discretion to postpone their holiday marketing blitz until the day after Thanksgiving (at least in America, that is), even when their storefronts began decking the halls months in advance. Now, the Madison Avenue folks won't wait for Halloween zombies to return to their graves, much less wait until the carving of the turkey. Santa Claus is appearing at insanely early times even in TV commercials, and Best Buy's series of pre-Halloween spots was a new low this year.

Now, I don't mean to sound like a Grinch, ready to burglarize Whoville's premature Christmas decorations, but am I alone in finding this Christmas creep to be a bit much? I'll be the first to admit there are a number of other factors here - including being older and no longer quite as interested in Legos! - but the season felt more special back when it didn't seem to drag on forever.

Anybody feel the same way? Any dissenting voices?

someone's going to say it if i don't; it sucks to work in retail around this time, because they'll drive those christmas songs into the ground

they're such good songs, but not when they're used that liberally. my store fortunately hasn't started doing that yet, but i bet as soon as black friday's here they'll be doing so

Yeah, I know what you mean.
I enjoy Christmas as much as the next guy, but I prefer to wait until December before doing much related to it.

I guess I just want to prevent it from getting stale, y'know?
Keep it fresh and all that.