Picket Fence Post

Item #1: Get Your Christmas Specials & Movies Schedule Here

The web site TV Tango has helpfully compiled a comprehensive list of the Christmas movies and specials slated to air on TV. So get your DVRs ready and/or mark your calendars and prepare to settle in for a family Christmas extravaganza or two.

Item #2: What’s Your Favorite Christmas Movie/Special?

Speaking of favorite holiday movies and specials . . . my December GateHouse News Service column challenges readers to think about your favorite Christmas movie and/or special and what your selection says about you. My favorite flick — aside from the awesome, four-hanky It’s a Wonderful Life — is now Elf. Want to know why? Read the column here.

Item #3: ‘Rudolph’ Doll Had ‘Psychological’ Issues

Ever wonder why the rag doll in the 1964 Christmas classic Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer was an inhabitant of the Island of Misfit Toys when nothing was visibly wrong with her, other than her lack of a nose?

Well the local CBS affiliate in the Boston area was on the case and asked one of the show’s original producers who told the TV station that the doll has “psychological issues.”

I kid you not.

Item #4: Are You a Twimom?

My editor at Mommy Tracked assigned me the task of going to see the latest Twilight movie, New Moon, and to write a column about why moms my age are so into this vampire series. Seeing as though I was a Twi-newbie (and a major Twilight skeptic, even though my daughter’s addicted), I Netflixed the first film, then went to see New Moon.

But after seeing both films based on the first two of the four-book series, I didn’t feel as though I had enough information to answer the question, so I read the hundreds of pages of New Moon . . . which prompted me to re-read Romeo and Juliet because there were a ton of references to it in the book.

The end result? My column on why I think I now understand why thirty- and fortysomething moms are obsessed with the Twilight series. An excerpt:

“. . . [T]he Twimoms can recall with fondness those days of being adored by an infatuated boy who sees nothing in his world but you. Their days now filled with ferrying children around, work, all things domestic, and something as quaint as a love life that seems as though it’s been put on the backburner, moms can recall the days when romantic love was everything by pouring through the thousands of pages of Twilight books and hours of feature films, like they’re taking a little vacation, albeit with those pesky, bloodsucking vampires and irritating werewolves.”

TWO QUESTIONS FOR READERS: What’s your favorite Christmas movie/special? And, do you get the whole Twilight infatuation thing? I’d love to read your answers.

Image credit: Summit Entertainment via GateHouse News Service.