A Christmas Story

One particular Christmas season, long ago, Santa was getting ready for his annual trip but everything seemed to be going wrong. Four of his elves got sick and had to be replaced with trainee elves, which slowed down the production line. So Santa was beginning to feel pressured and behind schedule early on. Then Mrs. Clause told Santa that her mother was coming to spend the holidays with them...again, and that stressed out Santa even more!

It only got worse when he began to plan for his trip. When he went to harness the reindeer, he found out that one of them was about to give birth and two had jumped the fence and were out heaven knows where, which meant that more elves had to be pulled off the toy line to go find them. More stress. Then when he began to load the sleigh, one of the boards came loose and the toy bag fell to the ground, scattering toys everywhere. He picked them up and then spent ten minutes looking around the shop for the right size nail for the darn board, and then he whacked himself on the thumb with the hammer.

Deeply frustrated at this point, Santa figured he'd better mellow out with a cup of coffee and a shot of whiskey before heading out. "Lord only knows what else is gonna happen", he thought. When he went to the cupboard, he discovered that the elves had drank all the liquor, which made Santa so mad he SLAMMED the coffee pot down on the counter and it broke into hundreds of tiny fragments all over the kitchen. He went to get the broom, only to discover that the mother-in-law had taken it....who knows where!

Just then the doorbell rang, cursing yet another interruption in a long string of goof ups, he stormed to the door and flung it open, his nostrils flaring. Standing on the stoop was a tiny angel with golden ringlets and a sparkly robe carrying a huge Christmas tree. The angel said in a very cheerful tiny angel voice, "Merry Christmas Santa! Isn't it a lovely day! I have a beautiful tree for you! Isn't it a lovely tree? Where would you like me to STICK it?....

Thus, began the tradition of the little angel on top of the Christmas tree.