I don’t have all the Christmas lights up on the house yet. I know, I know, as a card-carrying Christmas nut, I should have had it finished before Thanksgiving, but I just couldn’t after I went on the Internet and saw this:

“For every Christmas light that burns before Thanksgiving, an elf kills a baby reindeer.”

Well, I know me, and I know that if I had my lights up before Thanksgiving, I’d have been throwing the switch on those suckers. Like I said, I’m a Christmas nut, and once they’re up, they’re burning. I put up a lot of lights. Or should I say, put up about half of a lot of lights. For the other half, the half that goes up all the way to the peak of my very tall roof, I have decided to hire a service. I’m not the ladder climber I used to be, and I decided it was worth the expense to avoid the embarrassment of a headline that reads: Homeowner croaks trying to save a couple of bucks hanging Christmas lights himself at his advanced age.

Actually, I did this last year, too, when my weight exceeded the load limit for the ladders on hand. I hired a service that came out and hung lights for a reasonable price and it worked out rather well (after I went out and corrected some of their mistakes).

See, I am a McKenzie on my mother’s side, and nobody ever does work quite as well as we can do it ourselves, or so we think. Therefore, when we do hire someone to work for us, we believe we owe it to all concerned to make sure things are done properly. Really, we McKenzies should all have tattoos that say “Born To Supervise.”

Anyway, I was thinking about hiring the same service this year when lo and behold, the guy who did the work called and asked for the job. I said yes and we agreed on a day and time … which came and went without any sign of him. When I telephoned to see what happened, I was told it was too cold to hang lights and besides, they really couldn’t afford to do small jobs like mine anyway. Which struck me funny after I remembered that they were the ones who called me asking for work.

Anyway, I eventually found what sounded like a nice bunch of people willing to do the work for a good price and more to the point, get up on the ladder and go to the top of the house where I do not belong. See above under “embarrassing headline.”

The important thing is that the lights go up. You see, I live in a neighborhood where about half the residents have those oh-so-tasteful minimalist Christmas displays, and the other half of us roll our eyes at them. Which is a big part of why I put up enough lights (according to my tasteful neighbors who commented online) to drag airplanes off course.

Well, fooey on them. I’m having Christmas, and that means lights. Lots of them, some of them (the low ones) put up by me, and the others personally supervised by my McKenzie self. Hey, I may be late but at least the baby reindeer are safe.

Mike Redmond is an author, journalist, humorist and speaker. Write him at [email protected]. For information on speaking fees and availability, visit www.spotlightwww.com.