It's that time again!

No, no, it’s not another list. Relax.

The election is over and the holidays approacheth. Which means three things that tickle my giggler: extra days off, lots of good, home cooked food and Christmas movies!!!

I LOVE Christmas movies! Especially the formulaic ones put out by the well-meaning but tasteless folks at Hallmark.

It probably sounds like I’m doing a back-handed slam at the Christmas movie industry but I swear that’s not the case. I truly believe these movies are the least creative, most predictable features ever filmed outside of porn (or so I hear) or perhaps military training films. And I love them, every one.

Mary and I watched one today. A mother of three who’s been deserted by her ne’er-do-well soon-to-be-ex husband finds herself stranded in a small but lovely town where the good people all pull together to help her arrange a great Christmas for her standard Hallmark kids – the elfish toddler, the wise beyond her years girl and the troubled little boy – and she starts to feel attraction to the young-cop-with-baggage until they have a misunderstanding and he gives the appearance of going back to the harridan who left him at the altar although of course he’ll eventually end up with the heroine, but we don’t know that yet (okay, so anyone who’s ever seen a Hallmark movie knows they’ll end up together at the end, duh!). BIG BREATH! And there’s an older widow who takes her under her wing and a sensitive but clueless minister and of course, the gruff-but-caring old geezer, usually played by Ed Asner but today by Edward Hermann. Asner must have been busy. But Hermann-Asner did a great job of pulling the mother out of her funk and on the side, giving the son just the advice he needed to deal with the playground bully at school.

You get the picture but if not, just watch any Hallmark Christmas movie. They’re pretty much all the same. No surprises. Minor but predictable heart tugs. Don’t know why I love these things but I do.

Except the one this afternoon with Jamie Gertz doing a really ba-a-a-a-ad Jersey accent. Why anyone would intentionally pretend to have a Jersey accent is beyond me but if you’re going to make the attempt, for goodness sake, do it well. That may be the only Hallmark Christmas movie I’ve ever turned off.

‘Tis the season to be hokey and I intend to wring every drop of Christmas spirit out of some of the dumbest made-for-TV movies ever to hit the airwaves. Or, the cable, as the case may be.

I can’t wait for the day after Thanksgiving, when the non-Hallmark Christmas movies start making the rounds of the re-run circuit and my Christmas cheer kicks into overdrive. The original Miracle on 34^th Street is my all-time fave, but I’ll gladly settle for The Santa Clause. And when there’s nothing good on the tube, it’s Anne Murray’s Christmas on the CD player.

For the time being, though, it’s Hallmark time and this holiday hopeful will watch every one I can.