With Thanksgiving only a week ago, and Christmas quickly on the horizon, many of us are doing our usual winter weight gain. For those of us concerned with watching whats going on at this time, there are numerous tools, such as pedometers that help inform you how many calories you have lost, or in cases how many steps you have taken.
This is also a great tool to have when you are walking through the mall, trying to search for last minute gifts that are sure to be forgotten by February.
Outdoing your neighbors.
I live in Pinecrest, a very prominent (obnoxious) “village” where a lot of very wealthy and spoiled people live. Pincrest is a place where there is a hummer in every neighborhood, an Escalade in every neighborhood, another luxury SUV in every neighborhood, and no trucks, because if you have a pickup, you have to keep it in your backyard, or more commonly, fenced and gated driveway. Also, every single one of those behemoths is driven by a soccer mom who never puts down her cellphone and never brakes at stop signs either. What I am getting at is Pinecrest, creates this sense of faux-importance from its residents that passes on to each other into competition of the minutia.
Thus I enjoy driving down the streets to and from my home and seeing each house every year get more and more festive when it comes to December and Christmas. And by festive, I mean the residents are trying to scream “look at me, my house has more lights than yours, and thus I am superior.” It all started in one house in Coral Gables that would put thousands of lights, and it eventually attracted Al Roker to do a news segment in front of the house. Since then, a few other wealthy people have started their own Blinding Light Christmas Castles, which ultimately leads to not being able to drive in those neighborhoods as people flock from around South Miami to see the grandeur that is this persons need to provide more light than the sun.
While those numbers are few and fortunately far between, the average Pinecrest household is now trying to be Lord of the Neighborhood Lights. When at one point in time there were just lights on the roof and in a few branches and the rare manger scene; now lights are high in palm trees, inflatable lawn decorations are every few feet in yards, giant snow globes block your view, artificial snow is pumped over pristine lawns, and interestingly enough, very few images or symbols of Jesus. Pinecrest also has a large Jewish population, and while Hanukkah has already past, many of them compete just as much. Partially because they all married non-Jewish women, but partially because they have to be just as superior to their neighbors. This leads to blue and white lights, giant dreidels, and Stars of David.
Quite frankly, during December between the heating, the water heater because I need my hot morning shower, and every other expense, the last thing I need to do is waste money on powering lights to upstage my neighbors. Also, don’t ignore the irony of these people trying to compete through decorations with one another, when you know not one of them actually set up a single light. No, they hired their lawn service guys, their yard workers, to get up in ladders and string thousands of dollars worth of lights all over their trees for probably $40. It has become not just a contest of who has what decoration, but who can put it in the most spectacular spot that their illegal worker could find. This also brings up the irony of these people voting Republican and focusing on the illegal immigration issue, meanwhile if it wasn’t for said illegal immigrants, they wouldn’t have their precious lights. I’m just waiting until they start showing off the workers themselves: “Brian, I want you to see this. This is Esteban. He’s bigger than any of your lawn workers. Hah hah.”
I don’t care if I have no lights up, or that I don’t participate in the petty rivalries. I also don’t have to worry about the neighborhood kids running off with anything, either.
Jason Orkin, Grinch
