Blue Christmas

When I finally got around to stringing up the outdoor Christmas lights this year there was a big surprise waiting at local stores: the shelves were practically cleaned out of holiday lights.

It used to be that lights were so abundant that you could go out after Christmas and get great deals for next year; don’t count on it this season.

Laura Northrup, local journalist, hamster enthusiast, and weekend editor at The Consumerist wrote of the nationwide shortage, “Somewhere, Clark Griswold weeps.”

Every store I went to was nearly sold out —but I ended up with several strands of white LED lights. The package said “bright white” but the LED’s have a decidedly weird blue tint. So much so that my son Alex came home from college and said, “Happy Hanukkah, Dad. You want me to get the menorah out of the basement?”

Don’t get me wrong, I’m down with Hanukkah —but these LED people better figure out a way to make “bright white” lights that give off the same warm golden glow of their incandescent cousins. Until then, pass me the dreidel.

5 thoughts on “Blue Christmas

  1. Laughing with your son. My husband insisted on blue lights outside. Personally, for me, blue has always signified Hanukkah. My neighbors repeatedly wish us Merry Chrismakah.

  2. Rob, sorry, but in all my years of growing up with the cheesy electric menorah in the window at Chanukah, the lights were always orange. Never blue. When the bulbs burned out, my father would head over to Sears or Korvettes (remember them?), buy the pack of Christmas bulbs, take the orange ones out and give the rest of the colors to the neighbors across the street who would sugar us up on candy canes and make us seriously envious of their Christmas tree.

  3. #3: Yes, I’ve mostly seen orange, yellow, or white lights on menorahs —but somehow Christians have come to believe that blue or blue & white outside lights signify Chanukah. This is interesting because none of the Jewish families I know now or who lived in my old neighborhood ever had lights outside. As they say, go figure.

    I love that you mention Korvettes. We had one in Carle Place that we could walk or ride our bikes to. They had a pretty good record department back in the days of vinyl.

    And in an unexpected way this brings us around to a fascinating topic, the origins of the name E.J. Korvettes:

    http://www.snopes.com/business/names/ejkorvette.asp

  4. Rob and all Madeo’s;

    Warmest wishes for a Happy Holiday season and a Happy New Year.

    PS- Korvettes was where I bought my very first record album: Roxy Music Siren. I sat and played it over an over until I learned the bass line for ‘Love is The Drug.’

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