Because Christmas is looming, this means that the television stations are beginning to bombard the air waves with all the classics of the season - along with whatever new versions of sap that some energetic young producer has come up with. I hear rumors, for example, that there is at least one cable station that shows A Christmas Story back to back, all day on Christmas. Surely I cannot be the only out there who thinks that being forced to endure something like that could easily be one of the lesser rings of hell?

Luckily, we are avoiding the stuff on television, choosing instead to load up the Netflix queue with Christmas movie ' some we've seen before and some we've only heard of, but which sound vaguely entertaining. On suggestions from some of the folks on TUS, our Christmas movie run began with Christmas in Connecticut - the original one that stars Barbara Stanwyck and was made in the 40's or 50's. I wasn't quite sure what to expect, seeing as how it's old enough that I knew we were going to have to make a concerted effort to ignore any of the overtly non-PC (by today's standards, of course) themes. But we actually both enjoyed it quite a bit.

Unfortunately for me, the next movie in the queue was the aforementioned A Christmas Story, which we watched tonight. I've seen bits and pieces of this one before, and perhaps it was because I was only exposed to short clips that I was under the delusion it was actually amusing. Watching the entire thing, however, has convinced me otherwise. It is really, really, mind-numbingly dull.

I realize this puts me in a distinct minority, to say that I have not fallen head over heels in love with this story about a little boy who wants an air rifle, and the father who gets a lamp shaped like a leg in fishnet stockings, but I just cannot not find it in me to care one way or the other about the plot at all. But then I also fail to see what is so marvelous about It's a Wonderful Life. If I take the story away from the movie it's warm and fuzzy, but unfortunately the movie features Jimmy Stewart, whose method of delivering his lines is more likely to make me grit my teeth than succumb to any sort of holiday spirit.

Next up on our queue is The Ref, and at some point we will also get to watch Santa Claus Defeats the Martians because nothing quite says holidays like watching a truly horrible horror flick. And I am not all that much a scrooge, despite my not grasping the joy of Wonderful Life or Christmas Story. I could cheerfully watch White Christmas and Miracle on 34th Street more than once this season (which reminds me that, while we own the first, the second one we do not, so I really ought to add it to the queue).

Happy Holidailies