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‘Holiday creep’ is getting worse

On Monday afternoon, I was at a local convenience store getting lunch when my eyes turned toward one of life’s true guilty pleasures — Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups.

But as I was contemplating whether to indulge, my eyes caught something else nearby that immediately activated my “rant mode” (Somewhere my wife is rolling her eyes, sighing loudly and wishing she had invested in a quality pair of noise-cancelling headphones.). Next to the regular Reese’s was a stack of candies labeled “Reese’s Peanut Butter Pumpkin.”

That’s right. On July 31, a full three months before Halloween, it was possible to buy Halloween-themed candy.

And, lest you think this phenomenon is limited to convenience stores, candy and/or Halloween, just wait until the lawn and garden section at every department store in the Western Hemisphere becomes “Santa’s Christmas Village” while you’re still cleaning up paper plates and plastic cups from your Labor Day cookout.

How did we get to this point where we barely notice the out-of-control “holiday creep”?

When I was a kid, like many kids, I loved Christmas. And once we were past Thanksgiving, it seemed like it took forever for Dec. 25 to arrive.

But back then if someone would have been setting up a giant inflatable Rudolph in September, I would have thought that to be strange.

For the record, I still do — both love Christmas and find it absurd that Kris Kringle gets dusted off while it’s still 80 degrees outside (Of course, it’s also ludicrous that you can buy a swimsuit but not a winter coat in February or that back-to-school sales begin seemingly 20 minutes after the previous school year ends, but I digress.).

Look, I get why the stores do it. They want to create a false sense of urgency to make you feel like you need to buy these things right now so they can get into your wallet more quickly. And Christmas is always the most important time of year for any retailer, so finding a way to make Christmas last longer than most celebrity marriages makes a lot of business sense.

But you can call me old-fashioned, I guess, because I still like thinking about Halloween in October, not July; Thanksgiving in November, not August; and Christmas in December, not September.

I want to celebrate a holiday, not merely feel relief that it’s finally over after a four-month build-up.

So, for me at least, I will do my part to fight the power and won’t buy the admittedly-delicious chocolate-and-peanut-butter pumpkins until the calendar turns to October.

Of course, by then, I might be ready to rant again when I find they’ve been replaced by “Reese’s Peanut Butter Trees.”

¯¯¯

Managing editor Brian Cox can be reached at bcox@lewistownsentinel.com.

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