#53: THE BEST CHRISTMAS SONG, EVER

MERRY CHRISTMAS!  A nice way to start the day is Feliz Navidad with Jose and his grandson:

As I neared #1 on my favorite songs list, I wondered why I had a couple of days to spare before the year ended.   Turns out I skipped #53.  How that happened is I just goofed.  But this gives me a slot for what I should have included anyway.  The Christmas season is when we've had the most songs that keep returning.  They never quite go away.

If you Google the Top 10 Pop Christmas Songs of All Time, you might not even recognize one.  Again, try the 50 Greatest Christmas Songs, and at least some are more conventional.  In both ratings, #1 is All I Want for Christmas is You by Mariah Carey.  She also wrote it and published this song more than a quarter century ago.  Wikipedia lists it as the best-selling Christmas single with 3.2 million digital downloads.  So I had to listen to it.  Amazingly, never heard it before.

I searched further, and found these more recent Christmas songs.  Good start, with #10 being Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas, by Judy Garland, from the 1944 film, Meet Me in St. Louis.  Rotten Tomatoes gave it 100/87 ratings.  As the only St. Louis World's Fair was the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in 1904, that was St. Louis at the turn of the century.  The Expo drew just about 20 million visitors.  The 2010 Shanghai Fair entertained 73 million, including me.

Elvis' Blue Christmas was #8, and we'll return to him later.  The Ronettes came in at #6 with Frosty the Snowman.  Again, first time I heard this.  And they released this song in 1997.  #1 was Bruce Springsteen singing San Claus is Coming to Town.  This was recorded in 1975, and, yes, first time for me.  Where have I been all these years?

Finally getting closer to my reality, a ranking from Reader's Digest of the best 20:

#1    White Christmas, Big Crosby
#2    AIWfCiY, Mariah Carey
#3    O Holy Night, Josh Groban

#4  The Christmas Song, Nat King Cole (read the story of how this became the first holiday hit song by an African American in 1946--here with Natalie)

#5    Sleigh Ride, The Ronettes

#6    HYaMLC Judy Garland
#7    Let it Snow, Dean Martin
#8    Winter Wonderland, Michael Buble'

#9    Santa Baby, Eartha Kitt

#10  It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year, Andy Williams
#11  Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer, Gene Autry

#12  Santa Claus is Coming to Town, Jackson 5
#13  Silent Night, Bing Crosby
#14  Rocking Around the Christmas Tree, Brenda Lee
#15  The Chipmunk Song, Alvin and the Chimunks
#16  Christmas Time is Here, Vince Guaraldi Trio
#17  Blue Christmas, Elvis Presley

#18  Run Rudolf Run, Chuck Berry
#19  Feliz Navidad, Jose Feliciano (he wrote and released this song in 1970)
#20  Jingle Bell Rock, Bobby Helms

You just got to watch Elvis' Blue Christmas, with Terry Fator:

70 minutes of popular Christmas hits.  Plus, Merry Christmas from Honolulu.

However, what about all those Christmas carols, and Handel's Hallelujah Chorus and O Tannenbaum, also known as O Christmas Tree and the Punahou School alma mater.  Where do these, and many others, fit into this holiday list?  Well, from Classic FM, the 30 greatest Christmas carols of all time.  #1 is O Holy Night and #2 is Silent Night.  But I don't think I've ever heard of half of them.  Click on that link to see/listen to all of them.

Finally, Classic Christmas songs more than 100 years old.  I must be really old.

• Carol of the Bells (1919)
• Jingle Bells (1885)
• Away in the Manger (1885)

• 
  O Little Town of Bethlehem (1868)
• We Three Kings (1863)
• Angels We Have Heard on High (1862)
• Hark! The Herald Angels Sing (1855)
• Good King Wenceslas (1853)
• Here We Come A-wassailing (1850)
• It Came Upon the Midnight Clear (1850)

• 
  O Holy Night (1847)
• O Tannenbaum (1824)
• Silent Night (1818)
• The Twelve Days of Christmas (1780)
• God Rest You Merry, Gentlemen (1760)
• Oh Come, All Ye Faithful (1751)
• Joy to the World (1719--wow...two centuries old)

So what is my favorite Christmas song to slip into the #53 slot?  I really don't have a special one.  So they all will qualify.

There are more than 82 new films about the holidays.  Had to watch something last night, so, for the first time, saw The Bishop's Wife.  Rotten Tomatoes rated it 84/81.  Somewhat disappointing, but okay.  However, I had one of my better Christmas Eves, and all alone.

Began with the University of Hawaii, a double-digit underdog, beating the University of Houston by double-digits in the New Mexico Bowl held in Texas.  Better yet, I shared with two others winning the 15 Craigside pool, making me even for the year.

Nothing particularly monumental, but the small things make a day wonderful.  Thanks to Amazon, received two presents I bought myself.  One, particularly important, was something to more safely get in and out of my bathtub.  This is by far the most dangerous part of my day.  It slipped, so I had to glue rulers to keep it in place.  Note that I have more safety bars than anyone:

The other Amazon package was an Echo Dot with Clock and Alexa.  I'll soon report on how 15 Craigside is getting smart.  By coincidence I ordered this a month ago, and it just arrived.  It was a challenge, but with some effort, I actually began to speak to Alexa.  Now that was an accomplishment.

I also had a satisfying and healthy lunch of soba with soy beans and sashimi:

The hearty dinner was mostly supplied by 15 Craigside as our Christmas supper, which was served on the Eve.  By the time I got to it, the lamb had cooled, so I first fried it in butter.

Red cranberry and green mint sauces.  It's Christmas.  Assorted drinks, including one of the new red wines from Stanford:

To my left was the setting sun:

I was torn about having the supplied desert or a cookie, shortbread, given to me by Pearl's sister, who makes the best.

I settled on the cookie, but had the custard for breakfast.  I weighed yesterday at 153.6 pounds, the absolute lowest in a very long time.  To close, my hibiscus, the Hawaii State Flower, bloomed yesterday:

- 

CHRISTMAS LIGHTS

 For the next two days, nothing about Trump and COVID-19, except that yesterday was one of the worst for the USA, with 232,342 new cases and 3401 new deaths.  The ominous development might be South Africa, now into their mid-summer, but with cases and deaths suddenly increasing.  With the UK, they have the highly infectious coronavirus. If this mutation spreads across Africa...

I was sent the following Christmas lights display from Dyker Heights in New York.  Nice, but nothing compared to other exhibits the world over.  The thought of Christmas and something extra might have started in Germany with their evergreen trees brought inside the home in the 16th century.  Poinsettias?  This idea came from Mexico, and more specifically, U.S. minister to that country, Joel Poinsett.  The British in the 18th century changed the image of the mistletoe from a poisonous plant to a festive kissing trap.

But all those lights at Christmas?  An American tradition.  After all, Thomas Edison invented the light bulb, and his business partner, Edward Johnson, in 1882 put out a string of 80 red, white and blue lights on a Christmas tree.  We have at least 25 of these at 15 Craigside on display. 

Here are a few worthy destination sites, starting with the Las Vegas Motor Speedway:

Chicago Zoo:

Rockefeller Center, Manhattan:

Kobe, Japan:

Shiodome, Tokyo, Japan:

Cheonggyecheon Stream, Seoul, Korea:

Kurfurstendamm, Berlin, Germany:

Red Square, Moscow, Russia:

Malaga, Spain:

Paris, France:

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil:

Medellin River, Columbia:

Garden by the Bay, Singapore:

The best I've ever seen, by far, is Orchard Road, Singapore, about a mile long:

The Christian population of Singapore is only 20%.  However, commerce is everything here.

I'm now down to #3 of my favorite songs.  At 2101 Craigside, we had a view of Honolulu City Lights for nearly three decades.  The color was bluish in the early days, but shifted to orange when the sodium vapor bulbs replaced the mercury vapor lamps.  The scene was ethereally relaxing.

Honolulu City Lights was written by Keola Beamer around 1970, and opened their album of the same name with brother Kapono.  This is my anthem of living nearly four decades at two Craigside sites.

Richard and Karen Carpenter heard this song when they were vacationing in Hawaii in 1977.  While they recorded Honolulu City Lights soon thereafter, it was not released in 1986 three years after her passage.

Tomorrow, a surprise for my favorite songs.  After all, it will be Christmas.

-