Christmas Flick

The other day, I asked Chip to name his favorite Christmas movies. In his top three was Die Hard.

What!!??? I couldn’t for the life of me recall Die Hard as being a movie that captured the Christmas spirit. Later I Googled it. Sure enough, it’s a regular on lists of most popular Christmas movies.

Today after school, our school staff and the staff of The Bridge Church had a little Christmas get-together, including OF COURSE some games. Yours truly along with the children’s pastor at The Bridge won some nifty Christmas cookie cutters complete with sprinkles and frosting for being the first to find our match by asking for clues about what word from a Christmas song title was stuck to our backs. He was the “Silent” to my “Night.”

Another game involved moving to the left or right side of the room to indicate which one in a pair of two holiday-themed items was your preference. Interestingly, in the battle between ham or turkey, it was a virtual tie. Disneyland beat out Knotts Berry Farm by a landslide for best place to go at Christmas time. And between opening gifts on Christmas eve or Christmas day, Christmas day appeared to be the winner. One of the questions paired Die Hard with Christmas Vacation. I’ll watch Christmas Vacation again in a pinch, but because I remembered Chip’s response to me a week ago and because I can tend, on occasion, to be a bit of a contrarian, I remained on the left side of the room — the one designated for the lovers of Die Hard. I still couldn’t remember how it had anything to do with Christmas.

So tonight I came home and asked Chip to watch Die Hard with me. I had to make an honest woman out of myself and at least know why I might choose Die Hard over Christmas Vacation if I were ever to play that game again.

Chip whipped up a homemade jalapeno and sausage pizza, and I made a pot of spicy kale sausage soup. We lit the fireplace and some candles, propped our feet up, and watched that classic Christmas flick Die Hard.

I get it now, sort of. The movie is set at Christmas time with all the accompanying lights and decorations, and there are lots of references to Christmas carols. But the edge-of-your-seat shoot-em-up suspense isn’t typically the first thing I think of when I think “Christmas movie.”

So now I can say that my choice to stay on the left side of the room with the Die Hard fans was an honest one. Maybe I should watch Christmas Vacation next just to confirm. It’s been a while.

For warm fuzzies and engendering Christmas cheer, I will always be on the side of the room with Elf. “I like smiling. Smiling’s my favorite.”

Today’s Chandler-ness:
3/5/97 - You stood on the front porch naked with a baseball cap on and a play guitar around your neck singing “Jesus is Just Alright With Me.”