My English teacher once told us that Dickens got paid by the word, and in , it shows: Dickens spends a ridiculous amount of time telling us Jacob Marley is dead. "You will therefore permit me to repeat, emphatically, that Marley was as dead as a door-nail," writes Dickens. Two paragraphs later: "There is no doubt that Marley was dead.
" A page later: "Mr. Marley has been dead these seven years." We get it, Chuck!
Dickens may have rambled on and on, but he also blessed us with the character whose name conjures up images of rebellion against the syrupy sentimentality of Christmas. Wait! I mean Ebenezer Scrooge!
In all his appearances (Alastair Sim, Albert Finney, Michael Caine, Scrooge McDuck, and my personal favorite, Mr. Magoo), Scrooge had nothing but humbugs for those who tried to impose their cheery holiday will. Today's Five for the Day honors Mr.
Scrooge's tradition; it is the antidote to all that Christmas cheer: the gloppy Hallmark Channel specials, the radio stations that play 24 hours of Christmas music, and the store ads that sweet talk you into thinking that, if you buy that diamond, your woman might give your candy cane a licking worth $2,500. Here are five items that use icons of the Christmas season to satisfy the Grinch in all of us.
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