Laughter's Language

Dear Santa,

It is only recently that I have come to realize that you are not, as is widely believed, a benevolent purveyor of seasonal cheer, but a vindictive, merciless despot, who keeps the neck of humanity crushed under your reindeer-excrement-encrusted boot in a bitter, wintry tyranny.

Like the meager provisions supplied by third-world governments to their starving populations, your toys serve only as a cruel reminder of our enormous material need by teasingly offering its momentary satisfaction but failing to alleviate it completely. Yet its complete alleviation is within your power! Your unlimited capacity for the generation of gifts and the tortured, malnourished elven hordes at your command grant you the capability of eradicating both need and want from El Paso to Ethiopia, yet instead you choose to feed the insatiable leviathan of Western consumerism and engorge yourself on its doughy, sugar-coated tributes, you fat, sick bastard.

No doubt you recline on a throne assembled from the bones of children who perished with their Christmas lists of “Food” and “Plumbing” clasped desperately in their skeletal hands while signing a work order for another 500,000 posters of Justin Beiber and the latest product tie-in from the Jersey Shore. No doubt Dasher and Dancer subsist on a diet of tree bark and snow while prodding at the motionless, prostrate forms of Prancer and Vixen. No doubt Ms. Claus is chained helplessly in some corner as grim portraits of Pol Pot and the Marquis de Sade loom ominously behind your mad, cackling countenance.

Enclosed please find my Christmas list. In spite of your abhorrent reign of terror, I am nevertheless an advantaged Westerner, the prime beneficiary of your maniacally misplaced largesse. Thus, much like discordant masses which decry their government’s intrusive reach while clamoring virulently for unemployment benefits, and pompous Parisians who preach diversity and tolerance while shipping Muslims, gypsies and foreigners off to the nearest Balkan hellhole, I am now at once lamenting your horror and demanding your immediate service of my desires. Considering your reliable history, I’m confident you will oblige.

Cordially,

Matt Coogan

List:

1) A larger pot for the growing bamboo plant that lives in my office

2) A more luminous chain for my golden, 1920’s-style pocket watch

3) A kitten identical to or closely resembling the one featured here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Bmhjf0rKe8

4) The affections of a man

5) The high score on the Snake application for Facebook