#79 Holiday Greetings

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For over a century, the Nobel Prize committee has been giving an award for literature. The Pulitzer Prize committee has been recognizing outstanding journalistic writing for ninety years. The Christopher Award is a mere slip of a thing at half that age. Other writing awards include the Hugo, the Nebula, the Newbery, the Booker Prize, the Blooker Prize, and the National Book Award.

Yet not a one of those prize committees has ever recognized someone for writing an outstanding Holiday Letter.

This is probably because in the entire history of literature no one has ever written a Holiday Letter worthy of an award.

Summing up the last twelve months of your life in a few dozen words is no easy trick. You’ve got to hit the high points and give just enough detail to make your friends and relations insanely jealous of how well you’re doing. Except, your relations probably know enough of the truth to see through your tissue of lies and if your friends don’t, just how close are they really?
 

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NOTES:

• If you’d like to avoid some of the pitfalls I covered in this essay, check out the hints at http://www.christmaslettertips.com/
• http://tinyurl.com/2qcwne features a funny (and I suspect fake) Christmas Letter exchange between Martha Stewart and Erma Bombeck.
• I also turned up an interesting news story about obnoxious Christmas letters on MSNBC. You can find the whole report at http://tinyurl.com/2lhgsp

Tags: humor essay | humor column | holiday | christmas | christmas letter | comedy