Spent today putting up Christmas lights. Got them ready for the big light em up turkey night.
Ya I know, it’s my fault. I’m the guy that starts the season. But I never light up before the turkeys down.
I’m going all green. I got a modest 400-450 lights on the roof, not counting a few others.
That isn’t much there’s a guy here in Tulsa that must have 20,000 + I kid not.
We all got em. Any one else putting up lights?
Feel free to cus me out. But I do it for the kids and especially for the one in me.
Replies
Putting up the lights at my parents house used to be one of my favorite things to do with the old man, that is until I was "old enough" to do it by myself and the old man kept coming with more lights and new places to put them.
but hey, have fun, nothing better then driving down some street on a cold night and seeing all the houes lit up.
Cool!
Dragging the kids around was my big thing. There all grown, no grandkids yet, so I drive my self and the loml to enjoy them.
Not this year. Not last year. Not ever.
Who ever invented work didn't know how to fish....
Ya!..... but you live in that great christmas shaker, Colorado. Don't need lights, besides I bet it'd just hold more snow on the roof anyway.
Wasn't it IMERC or somebody, who said they were putting a big super tree out front with a homecrafted Santa standing there bent over facing away from the road. With a remote switch inside the house so everytime a car went by he could hit the switch and Santa would drop his drawers and shoot the moon at the passerbys.
Hey, I'd buy one of those.
The tree goes DOWN RANGE and Santa gets a auto sensor trip switch so he can be on the job 24/7.
Who ever invented work didn't know how to fish....
One of my fondest childhood memories is putting out candles in our neighborhood.
One of our neighbors had a big flatbed trailer and a jeep.
About this time they would go around and collect 1 or 2 $ from everyone and buy enough white paperbags , sand and candles to line all the streets.
Then one saturday in Dec. we would all gather at thier house and walk behind the trailer and put the candles out.
Big Mike would stomp a hole in the snow bank every 10' or so and the kids would put in a bag with sand in the bottom and a candle.
Every house would light the candles lining thier yard at dark every night.
I always wanted to fly over and see it from above!
Mr T
Do not try this at home!
I am an Experienced Professional!
Big Mike would stomp a hole in the snow
Never did the candle thing growing up but there was a lot of it done when I was a kid. I really liked it. Maybe it was because we didn't have any one like Big Mike.
Yeah Big mike was from one of those down to earth working class families that were just plain nice folks.
We had an empty lot at the end of our street where the whole neighborhood would gather every summer night and have a friendly game of soft ball.
Kids, parents, teens, boys and girls, evryone who wanted to could play.
Some times we would have two shortstops and six outfielders per team!
But when Big Mike got up, everyone went DEEP!
He lost more softballs.......
He had a bat called Big Bertha. More like a piling with a handle!
Those were the days!
Mr T
Do not try this at home!
I am an Experienced Professional!
Funny how life evolves. When young, my brother and I would string most of the lights (dad had polio). I looked forward to that from about September on. The older we got, the more we would throw up there. When I left home at 18, spent 10 years in the USN, all thoughts of Christmas preparations were lost, seems like forever. I haven't strung lights since, and that was over 30 years ago. DW does it once every couple of years, but the kids go off to college next year, so maybe this would be an excellent time to light 'em up.
Thanks for the inspiration.
I don't have to put up my lights- they're still up from last year! Sometimes I think I'm taking procrastination to an art form.<G> ( I still refuse to plug 'em in until December )
You might know you have a procrastination problem when your christmas lights quit working after ten years so you string up another set over top of the old ones.
ANDYSZ2I MAY DISAGREE WITH WHAT YOUR SAYING BUT I WILL DEFEND TO THE DEATH YOUR RIGHT TO SAY IT.
maybe I'll just break out the halogen work lights and just have a couple of REALLY bright Christmas lights. On the other hand , I don't want any airplanes flying lower than they already do.
I know of a few houses in my area that really get into decorating for the holidays. Its nice to look at, but I just don't have either the time or desire to to do more than a few lights outside.
I'm half tempted to really light up an outdoor Christmas tree outside the house for the viewing public.
I mean really light one up with neon, strobes, blinking floods, spotlights, blacklights etc. for starters.
I mean make the thing so gawdy it'd be cool.
'course the eye of the beholder...
---"I'm half tempted to really light up an outdoor Christmas tree outside the house for the viewing public"---
Glad that you explained yourself. After that introduction, I was thinking you were going to use gasoline and a match for that "lighting"!:-)
Maybe he should....
Who ever invented work didn't know how to fish....
Of course instead of the traditional Christmas star on the top of the tree I'd have to have something else with the spotlight showing it for all the world to see.
Just for the one soul purpose of getting Imerc into the Christmas spirit.
Might even take a pic of it and put it here on Breaktime.
guaranteed to get a rise out of Imerc.
Instead of the Christmas star what I'd do is take a tube of Vulcum caulk and put it up there.
Edited 11/22/2003 10:13:38 PM ET by rez
No, it was a big deal when I was a kid - everybody put them up; but, not very many houses with lights around this neighbourhood. I put up an artificial tree in the sunroom and we put maybe 600 mini-lights on it and call that Christmas.
Phill Giles
The Unionville Woodwright
Unionville, Ontario
" I put up an artificial tree in the sunroom and we put maybe 600 mini-lights on it and call that Christmas"
Thats enough.
My house is turned upside down for a whole month!
Tim Mooney
you and me both (or is it neither?) the loml and i don't do xmas. fine for those that do, but it is just sooooo not our thing. my little sister got all of my xmas spirit and then some, which is a good thing because she has three wee ones and i don't. come to think of it, i wasn't into xmas even when i was a kid.
m
Know what you mean.
Who ever invented work didn't know how to fish....
I got to thinking about what I used to do as a kid around Christmas time. This memory was sparked by seeing an old aluminum tree with a color wheel going .
Remember those. My mom would decorate the aluminum tree or white plastic with all red or blue or green ornaments and sometimes little bows.
Ok I'm not going girly, here's the point. I would ,when everyone's gone to bed, lie under the tree with my head under the branches and look up with my glasses off. My own kaleidoscope, or trip.
Anyway I'm surprised it wasn't a sign I was messed up, well maybe I was but those old trees were cool.
I wouldn't have one in my house now but at the time as a kid they were great. And as my dad said then we'll save money by not having to buy a new tree every year.
I buy from a tree farm every year wouldn't have a fake one but I do like the memories.
Any one still got an old tree or that color wheel?
my parents still have the aluminum tree and it's on about its third color wheel! they still set it up every year in the living room- right by the big picture window in the front of the house. i love that thing- as i just said up above, i don't do xmas, but i still like some of the stuff that goes with it. my brother and i used to lie under it all the time- the low branches would tickle our faces as they went by. it really was silly but strangely relaxing!
i had no idea how many different varieties of aluminum trees were once made, but a funky little shop near here had a collection of them on display last year. everything from mini 1'-2' models to one that was a good 12' tall- maybe 25 in all. and quite a lot of variation in the "boughs" and "needles", too.
m
Edited 11/23/2003 12:13:19 PM ET by mitch
So the truth is now out.
Mitch does have a bit of the Christmas cheer running around in there.
Ought to, myself, it's a nice enough day, 79°; other than the 30+ gusts as the front gets closer. (We're going from 79/65 to 65/35 on Sunday.)
Just can't get motivated to "do" christmas before having thanksgiving. So, I resist until it is actually December. But, I often manage to be the first on the block with outside lights up.
Been known to invite my apartment-dwelling amigos over, throw on some music & libations, and decorate away. Made some nice decoartions, that way too. (There are times when store-bought just ain't right.)
Have had a wild idea, involving a motion sensor, but it may take some experimenting first.
My lights will go up next weekend.
I have two animated systems (a Santa and a lighted tree), plus a color-changing system for the main house lights. Each of those systems is based on a microcontroller with custom hardware and software.
Add in the other non-animated strings, and I'm up to about 7,000 lights
Ill be going through the light-a-thon next week after T day
Darkworksite4:
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