It's beginning to look a lot like ... ugly Christmas.
And it ain't just ugly sweaters that Christmas now brings, especially in the sartorial world.
Now there's ugly suits. Ugly suits that cost a pretty penny. One chain-store promotional email recently advertised, in its "Ugly Christmas shop," a green men's Christmas suit -- jacket, pants and tie -- printed with Santa heads, stockings, bells and such, $99.99. Other sites posted other can't-unsee Christmas suits, priced the same, including a "winter woods party suit" with evergreens in a couple shades of blue on a darker-blue background ... and a "Happy Holidude" suit. A gift-retailer website advertises a "get lit" (as in Christmas lights) baseball cap. Here, try these ugly Christmas jammies. And those beard ornaments, though!
Meanwhile, the ugly Christmas sweaters continue to spread ... and get uglier. How about a reindeer hoodie, complete with ears. Or an ugly sweater dress? Or a garland-motif miniskirt. (I'll bite my tongue and hold my pen on the sequined mini dress splayed with "Ho Ho Ho" in large letters and the other predictable plays on Santa's famous laugh.) Ugly sweaters also bear other inevitable plays on hip-hop culture -- "Snowtorious," "Gangsta Wrapper" "Happy Holla Days" and "Straight Outta North Pole." A few sweaters are, well, not for public viewing. And in 2014 there was mention of a "world's ugliest Christmas sweater," one complete with not only blinking lights, but a working toy train circling the wearer's torso. And Pinterest is full of homemade ugly Christmas ideas, from gift wrap-bow slippers to the Marie Antoinette Christmas Tree hairdo. And you too can make your own snowglobe Christmas sweater ... complete with a raised globe.
With the Ugly Christmas theme gaining popularity, its scope will reach much, much further, after which we will realize we've created a monster, released the Kraken and fed the gremlins after midnight.
• Ugly Christmas Decor. Sure, it has been around but now it's destined to become cool. Saw there was a site where people submitted pictures of ugly home Christmas decor but the webmaster's interest waned, the account was suspended due to lack of renewal and the photos couldn't be recovered. The last houses posted were in 2013, around the time the ugly Christmas sweater concept really got going. Now there's no making fun of one's neighbor's overdecorated house and yard or the combining of the sacred and the secular. And hey, it'll even be OK to leave the lights on the house year-round!
• Ugly Christmas cooking/food. If we're gonna do ugly Christmas items, we can no longer "throw shade" on anyone's dinner offerings: Come fruitcakes! Come rum balls! Come underdone dressing! Come mystery casseroles, most unimpressing! Bring stale Christmas cookies and overcooked ham! Green eggs, lumpy gravy, turducken -- and bam!
• Ugly Christmas discussions. Avoid political talk when you're members of the Hatfield party and your visiting loved ones are members of the McCoy party? No need to stifle your glaring differences in opinion. Sit down at your table and hash it all out.
• Ugly Christmas toys. Sure, we've been there and done that. We had the kids from the cabbage patch, the bratty dolls and the self-balancing scooters. But soon somebody will be trying to invent those Whoville playthings the Grinch griped about in How the Grinch Stole Christmas. Our young 'uns will (spellings based on several online sources) blow their floo-floobers, they'll bang their tar-tinkas, they'll blow their Whoo-whoobahs, they'll bang their gar-ginkas. They'll beat their trum-tookas, they'll slam their sloo-slonkers; they'll beat their blum-blookers, they'll wham their Whoo-wonkers.
• Ugly Christmas movies. Nope, not talking about the Yuletide-theme horror movies, such as Black Christmas, Santa's Slay, All Through the House or, er, Jack Frost. Nah. Sure, they're foul enough. But we're talking about the really ugly Christmas movies that a certain cable channel sneaks in at all times of the year, then starts to bombard us with about two months out from Christmas Day... A Royal Christmas, A Very Merry Mix-Up, Snow Bride, Christmas Magic, The Christmas Cottage. Matter of fact, the working-train sweater isn't the ugliest Christmas sweater out there; it's the one that says, "I just want to watch Hallmark Christmas movies all day." That's real horror.
I vote we stop the insanity now and, to hijack a slogan, make Christmas Pretty Again: "Remember the reason for the season?" Sure. That, and don't try so hard. Keep ugly accidental.
What if email, perhaps, means a little bit more:
hwilliams@arkansasonline.com
Style on 12/03/2017