12 Days of Christmas Watching 2022 Day 1: It begins!

This is your friendly neighborhood podcaster Rick sending you all Season's Greetings and announcing that starting today and going up to December 24, I will be sharing the 12 Days of Christmas Watching with you. Each day I will post a few words about a bit of holiday television I watch this season, with the only rule being it will be something I have never seen before, or at least something I don't remember seeing before.

Maybe we can make this an annual tradition on par with screening A Charlie Brown's Christmas, with the lighting of the Christmas tree at Rockefeller Plaza, and with me stabbing myself with one of the cheap ornament hooks I insist on keeping each year as I pull them out of the box.

So how do I start the 12 Days for 2022? Uh, well, I don't want to write about a few things because what I saw first is from a series we are likely covering in Season 11. So...oops!

To save this new feature from instant terminal lameness, though, let me share a cool commercial. Take the world's biggest toy store and combine it with the world's biggest trend, and you get 1979's roller disco Toys R Us ad!

This has it all, except Ethel Merman! OK, some actual toys would be nice, but skates are toys!

Another thing is, this isn't an actual store. If it is, boy, I really regret growing up 40 minutes away from the nearest location. They knew they didn't need to show the products or the setting, but all they had to do in 1979 was show DISCO, and everyone would arrive ready to buy.

I don't think that is a Christmas commercial, so here is the classic one that I loved even though it irritated me because I didn't have a store in my town:

I'll be back tomorrow with more variety!