First, and perhaps foremost, from me and everyone at TTBTGH/SBFRR/Sunset Saloon, a very merry Christmas to you and yours! Now, I know that the politically correct nutjobs don’t want us to say that anymore, but screw them! We celebrate Christmas, so I wish you the joys that we’re hoping to feel and spread around this season. If Christmas ain’t your thang, well, feel free to wish me a whateveryoucelebratewheneveryoucelebrateit and I will understand the sentiment. In fact, I’ll appreciate knowing more about you and your celebrations. I know it’s hard to ignore this juggernaut mass marketing scheme this time of year, but that doesn’t mean that we look down on anyone who chooses not to take part in the whole shebang. Please don’t look down on any of us who get caught up in the ridiculous madness either. Let’s just all like each other. Or try. Sometimes it ain’t easy.

A public service announcement: STAY AWAY FROM THE STORES this weekend! Wait until Monday/Tuesday like me! Most of the other over-anxious mass consumers will be hurrying around trying to get it all done at the last minute this weekend. I’m here to tell you that it’s NOT the last minute yet! Wait! It’s the spiritual thing to do. See you out there on Tuesday afternoon! Stores are a little quieter then. Trust me.

In the meantime, whether you’re being run over by shopping carts or sleeping one off at home, sit back and enjoy some great music. I’ve got a lot of it coming.

You can listen at your leisure with some new, gettingclosertobeingcaughtup podcasts on the downloads page. Tonya guilted me in to it. It’s about time someone did! I’ve got more to come. iTunes will be restocked soon too.

And then of course there are the new episodes that surely won’t be podcasted for a few months! We’ve got super-sized episodes of TTBTGH and SBFRR coming at you this week!

Sunday, December 22 at 11 am, a TTBTGH Christmas miracle, featuring a chat with one of my all-time favourite guests and people, Mike Plume! He’s got a stellar new Christmas album for you, as well as a heaping helping of classic shows and albums from the vault. Remember that classic Mike Plume Band Holiday Bash at the WECC years ago? I sure do! Now you can download it as well as other shows and classic albums online. We’ll chat with Mike about that, his new TV show, his adorable daughter Ruby (check her out on the Christmas album!) and much more. We’ve been known to ramble on for looooooonnng periods of time on the phone. We’ll try to keep it reasonable so you don’t get bored. I know you do sometimes. But this time, I’ve got a LOT of time to kill! Everybody else at the station has the good sense to stay home during the holidays when the University is locked down and campus turns into a ghost town. Me, I love it. I get to play old stuff, weird stuff, long songs, vinyl, whatever I want. And I’ll do it, too. 11 am to 4pm central time. Study up on the great Mike Plume first:  http://mikeplume.bandcamp.com/

Thursday, December 26, 6:30-11pm, it’s a Steel Belted Boxing Day Blowout. Most of the madness will be over and done, so we’ll celebrate the good stuff and commiserate about the bad. It’ll be awesome. Join in! 6:35ish (those hockey boys do need watches for Christmas) to 11 ish!

Sunday, December 29, it’s this year/next year in music. 11-4 once again. It’ll be grand.

Tune in and enjoy. Or tune in and make fun of me. I don’t care, just tune in. If you don’t, it seems really stupid giving up 14.5 hours of my precious holiday time sitting around talking to myself. I’ll do it anyway, but it’ll seem stupid. (It is stupid, I do realize.)