Thou shalt NOT!!!!!!!

This is me drinking Julebrus (Christmas fizz/pop/soda) before December. Do you know what will happen to me if I do this? Do you realize the implications of this daring act!!!! Nah - neither do I. And yet, according to a small group of sad loosers, what I am indulging in is in fact breaking a sacred law. Thou shalt NOT drink Christmas fizz before December!!! Who made this rule, you ask. And more importantly, why? There are some people around here who think that this amber nectar should only be drunk in the month of December. Not before Christmas, and certainly not after Christmas. Between the dates of 1st December and the twenty forth, however, you may consume to your hearts content.

If you ask me, and I reckon you should, these sort of petty rules should be broken. Mostly to annoy the petty people that made them. The pharisees have been doing this for years. Wherever you go people want to make rules that make no sense. Take dancing for example. Where in the Bible does it say: thou shalt NOT dance??? I certainly can't find the place. And yet, only the other day when I was asked what I instruct at the local gym, apon answering; "Fitness belly dance," I received an unnerving response: "Oh, is that of God?" Sigh.

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Tell people that their rules/traditions are ludicrous and you WILL face exile, or at least a loooong explanation into why these rules exist. Allthough, when it comes to the Yulefizz tradition, the response is usually thus: "Det er bare sånn." (That's just the way it is.) A very feeble reply indeed. I remember I attempted to query the tradtion of HAVING to eat the same Christmas food every year over here in Norway, and wouldn't it be nice to change something. Change the activities or something??? The response was a very narrow minded one. (Something I encounter an awful lot of.) "You see, in Norway we have some important traditions. In England your traditions are not so important to you as they are to us." ARE YOU SANE!!!!!???

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Personally, I've only celebrated the English/British style Christmas twice in my life. For all the other Christmasses, we celebrated the traditional Norwegian way. Except we ate roast pork - because it's easier to actually find the meat on this instead of picking though the belly pork/ribbe fat stuff that they serve over here. We ate the same thing every year and did the same things every year - which was great. And here's the thing - I like traditions too. (And I think you'll find that there are plenty of ancient traditions in Britain.) I just don't like the idea of being told to have a tradition, or doing that same tradition over and over again with such obsession that I become some sort of pharisee that forces my ideas on everyone else. That's a sad life if you ask me.

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I am quite happy to change what I eat from one year to the next. I doesn't HAVE to (på død og liv/as a matter of life or death) be the same food, the same activities, the same chocolate etc. If everything is too samey it can become boring and stale and dogmatic. Again, I'm not saying that we shouldn't have traditions at all - I'm merely stating the flaw in obsessing over them.

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As for me - I'll be enjoying my Yulefizz whenever I please. It makes the run-up to Christmas so much more appealing. It's a lovely thing - to step outside the box and enjoy the diversity of the rest of the world.