December 20, 2007
In this issue:

A whole lot of fun!!!
New Policy on Twelve Days
Christmas Holiday Trivia
Top Ten Signs You're On Santa's Naughty List
Santa Claus: An Engineering Analysis

New Policy on Twelve Days

Effective immediately, the following economizing measures are being implemented in the "Twelve Days of Christmas" subsidiary:

1) The partridge will be retained, but the pear tree, which never produced the cash crop forecasted, will be replaced by a plastic hanging plant, providing considerable savings in maintenance

2) Two turtle doves represent a redundancy that is simply not cost effective. In addition, their romance during working hours could not be condoned. The positions are, therefore, eliminated

3) The three French hens will remain intact. After all, everyone loves the French

4) The four calling birds will be replaced by an automated voice mail system, with a call waiting option. An analysis is underway to determine who the birds have been calling, how often and how long they talked

5) The five golden rings have been put on hold by the Board of Directors. Maintaining a portfolio based on one commodity could have negative implications for institutional investors. Diversification into other precious metals, as well as a mix of T-Bills and high technology stocks, appear to be in order

6) The six geese-a-laying constitutes a luxury which can no longer be afforded. It has long been felt that the production rate of one egg per goose per day was an example of the general decline in productivity. Three geese will be let go, and an upgrading in the selection procedure by personnel will assure management that, from now on, every goose it gets will be a good one

7) The seven swans-a-swimming is obviously a number chosen in better times. The function is primarily decorative. Mechanical swans are on order. The current swans will be retrained to learn some new strokes, thereby enhancing their outplacement

8) As you know, the eight maids-a-milking concept has been under heavy scrutiny by the EEOC. A male/female balance in the workforce is being sought. The more militant maids consider this a dead-end job with no upward mobility. Automation of the process may permit the maids to try a-mending, a-mentoring or a-mulching

9) Nine ladies dancing has always been an odd number. This function will be phased out as these individuals grow older and can no longer do the steps

10) Ten Lords-a-leaping is overkill. The high cost of Lords, plus the expense of international air travel, prompted the Compensation Committee to suggest replacing this group with ten out-of-work congressmen. While leaping ability may be somewhat sacrificed, the savings are significant as we expect an oversupply of unemployed congressmen this year

11) Eleven pipers piping and twelve drummers drumming is a simple case of the band getting too big. A substitution with a string quartet, a cutback on new music, and no uniforms, will produce savings which will drop right to the bottom line

Overall we can expect a substantial reduction in assorted people, fowl, animals and related expenses. Though incomplete, studies indicate that stretching deliveries over twelve days is inefficient. If we can drop ship in one day, service levels will be improved.

Regarding the lawsuit filed by the attorney's association seeking expansion to include the legal profession ("thirteen lawyers-a-suing"), a decision is pending.

Deeper cuts may be necessary in the future to remain competitive. Should that happen, the Board will request management to scrutinize the Snow White Division to see if seven dwarfs is the right number.

Source: http://www.neloo.com/Christmas/more03.html

Christmas Holiday Trivia

1. The word Christmas is Old English, a contraction of Christ's Mass.
2. Electric lights for trees were first used in 1895.
3. "It's a Wonderful Life" appears on TV more often than any other holiday movie.
4. "Rudolph" was actually created by Montgomery Ward in the late 1930's for a holiday promotion. The rest is history.
5. "Jingle Bells" was first written for Thanksgiving and then became one of the most popular Christmas songs.
6. If you received all of the gifts in the song "The Twelve Days of Christmas", you would receive 364 presents.
7. The poinsettia plant was brought into the United States from Mexico by Joel Poinsett in the early 1800's.
8. Holly berries are poisonous.
9. Contrary to common belief, poinsettia plants are non-toxic.
10. In 1843, "A Christmas Carol" was written by Charles Dickens in just six weeks.
11. Coca Cola was the first beverage company to use Santa for a winter promotion.
12. Traditionally, Christmas trees are taken down after Epiphany.
13. More diamonds are sold around Christmas than any other time of the year.
14. In Mexico, wearing red underwear on New Year's Eve is said to bring new love in the upcoming year.

Source: http://www.christmas-celebrations.com/trivia.htm

Top Ten Signs You're On Santa's Naughty List

10. People refer to you as The Un-Nice One
9. Others get candy canes, you get a ball of rusty barbed wire
8. Santa sends his drunk brother Ronnie Kringle
7. You spend ten minutes telling him what you want -- he says, "Oh, I'm sorry, were you talking to me?"
6. You're being stalked by an elf hitman
5. Santa brings you a new car -- right through the living room wall.
4. He sees you when you're sleeping, he knows when you're awake, and he calls the police on you.
3. Santa doesn't seem to be "jolly" so much as "seething and vengeful"
2. Rudolph left your "gift" up on the roof
1. Your stocking is ticking

Source: http://www.neloo.com/Christmas/more07.html. Credit: this list is pieced together from ones on David Letterman's show. Thanks, Dave!

Santa Claus: An Engineering Analysis

1. No known species of reindeer can fly. But there are 300,000 species of living organisms yet to be classified, and while most of these are insects and germs, this does not completely rule out flying reindeer which only Santa has ever seen.

2. There are 2 billion children in the world (persons under 18). But since Santa doesn't appear to handle Muslim, Hindu, Jewish, or Buddhist children, that reduces the workload by 85% of the total -leaving 378 million according to the Population Reference Bureau. At an average census rate of 3.5 children per household, that's 91.8 million homes. One presumes there is at least one good child per house.

3. Santa has 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming he travels east to west (which seems logical). This works out to 822.6 visits per second. This is to say that for each Christian household with good children, Santa has 1/1000th of a second to park, hop out of the sleigh, jump down the chimney, fill the stocking, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks have been left, get back up the chimney, get back into the sleigh and move on to the next house. Assuming that each of these 91.8 million stops are evenly distributed around the earth which, of course, we know to be false but for the purposes of our calculations we will accept, we are now talking about .78 miles per household, a total trip of 75.5 million miles, not counting stops to do what most of us do at least once every 31 hours, plus feeding, etc. That means that Santa's sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second, 3000 times the speed of sound. For purposes of comparison, the fastest man-made vehicle on earth, the Ulysses space probe, move at a poky 27.4 miles per second - a conventional reindeer can run, at tops 15 miles per hour.

4. The payload on the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming each child gets nothing more then a medium sized lego set ( 2 pounds ), the sleigh is carrying 321,300 tons, not counting Santa, who is invariably described as overweight. On land, conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that 'flying reindeer' can pull TEN TIMES that normal amount, we cannot complete the job with eight, or even nine; we need 214,200 reindeer. This increased the payload- not even counting the weight of the sleigh to 353,430 tons.

5. 353,000 tons travelling at 650 miles per second creates enourmous air resistance. This will heat the reindeer up in the same fashion as spacecrafts re-entering the earth's atmosphere. The lead pair will absorb 14.3 quintillion joules of energy per second. Each. In short, they will burst into flames almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them, and creating a deafening sonic boom in their wake. The entire reindeer team will be vaporized with 4.26 thousandths of a second. Santa meanwhile, will be subject to centrifugal forces 17,500.06 times greater than gravity. A 250 pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back of the sleigh by a 4,315,015 pound force.

Source: http://www.neloo.com/Christmas/more11.html