Christmas

Two Baltimore Department of Public Works employees stood ready in Cherry Hill yesterday morning to turn Christmas trees into wood chips. But perhaps it was too soon for Baltimoreans to take down decorations. Only five cars arrived with trees in the morning. Employees appeared a bit disappointed, shuffling around the machines but perking up whenever a car drove near. "People will just throw them in the alleys," Quentin McCready said. The Christmas tree program works like this: City machines chew up the Christmas trees, and residents can take the resulting mulch.

YELLOW SPRINGS, Ohio -- My best Christmas as an adult was one I spent in the hospital. That was where our first child was born, on Dec. 21. As his mother recuperated, our new little family observed the holidays in her room, cut off from the frenzied world outside, enjoying one another's company, and only occasionally being reminded of what we were missing by muted sounds of revelry down at the nurses' station. Being in the hospital gave us an impeccable excuse not to "celebrate." We had no parties to attend, no cards to mail, no last-minute gifts to buy, no crowds to brave.

BETHLEHEM, PA. / / You don't have to travel far to learn Bethlehem's Moravian history. The story of its founding by Christian missionaries in the 18th century echoes underfoot on cobbled streets and from austere limestone buildings scattered throughout the downtown. Bethlehem's Colonial roots are never more apparent than at Christmas, its name having been given to the community on Christmas Eve 1741 by its first Moravian settlers. This is high season in the Christmas City, as the town is informally named.

TODAY, WHILE many are out returning gifts or catching year-end bargains, let's muse on Robert Redford's words in his most recent Sundance catalog of merchandise: "Holidays again. Forgive me while I dodge the rumble of the million-footed throngs that have succumbed to the marketing ether for Christmas and its days. Can we, without disappointing the children and others who long for the surprise of gift giving, just look to a different value to digest?" One might say -- if in a jaundiced mood -- that this is a little holier-than-thou, appearing in a catalog of things to buy!

HOLIDAY HABITAT FOR HUMANITY GIVING TREE / / 10 a.m.-9:30 p.m. Monday-Thursday, 10 a.m.-10 p.m. Friday, 9 a.m.-10 p.m. Saturday, and 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Sunday. Through Dec. 31. Towson Town Center, 825 Dulaney Valley Road, Towson. 410-494-8800 or townsontowncenter.com. ....................... As long as you're in the mall and in a gift-giving mood, stop by the Giving Tree, a fund-raiser for Chesapeake Habitat for Humanity, an affiliate of Habitat for Humanity International, which helps underprivileged families get housing by building affordable houses.

It's time to get moving for the holidays with this week's deals: The Radio City Christmas Spectacular is part of the Roosevelt Hotel's Radio City Christmas Show Package, with a one-night stay and two show tickets, for $467-$898, depending on the date chosen. Offer is available through Dec. 30. Call 800-694- 1812 or go to theroosevelt hotel.com and click on "Packages/Special Offers." Cezanne and van Gogh headline the MoMA Package at the Shoreham Hotel, where one night's accommodations and two tickets to the Museum of Modern Art and the Central Park Zoo start at $339, valid through Dec. 31. Call 800-553-3347 or go to shorehamhotel.

Fred Claus Rating: -- PG What it's about: -- Santa's bitter, resentful older brother goes home for the holidays to help out at the North Pole, and work through some personal issues. The Kid Attractor Factor: -- A fanciful version of the North Pole, slapstick and a PG-rated Vince Vaughn. Good lessons/bad lessons: -- Holding a sibling responsible for being "mom's favorite" isn't really fair. Violence: Snowball fighting. Language: -- Astonishingly clean. Sex: -- Suggestions of co-habitation.

It was Christmas in the New York subways last week, musicians heading off to play Christmas gigs, and in the Times Square station, a wild-haired old man out of a George Price cartoon pounded out "Winter Wonderland" on an electric organ, a rhythm attachment going whompeta-whompeta-whompeta, and two crazed, battery-powered Santas dancing the boogaloo nearby a young trumpeter giving "O Holy Night" a good working over. Then the doors closed and we racketed uptown as an old codger came into the subway car and launched into "Chestnuts roasting on an open fire" as he limped up the aisle, jingling his Styrofoam cup. I am pretty much hardened to Christmas music, except at the end of the Christmas Eve service when the lights dim and the glories stream from heaven afar and the heavenly hosts sing Alleluia and then, from long habit, tears well up in my eyes and I weep for the dead who enjoyed Christmas so much and for humanity in general, and then we go sashaying out into the cold, starry night and walk home.

So many holiday books for children! Which ones to choose?Ask a librarian.Calls to Enoch Pratt Free Library branches in Baltimore and library branches in Baltimore and Howard counties produced an eclectic list to fill children's holiday reading times -- and stockings or gift boxes.Or, you could just borrow a few, with the possibility that a visit to the library may turn up holiday activities or story sessions.Recommended by more than one librarian were such Christmas classics as "Polar Express" by Chris Van Allsburg, various editions of " 'Twas the Night Before Christmas" by Clement C. Moore, "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" by Dr. Seuss, and "The Best Christmas Pageant Ever" by Barbara Robinson.

Christmas offers a marvelous opportunity to encounter the great and grand master works of the choral canon.Performances of Handel's "Messiah" abound, and you won't have far to look should you fancy Bach's "Christmas Oratorio," Hector Berlioz's "L'enfance du Christ," or Mary's Magnificat Prayer set to music by the likes of Monteverdi, Bach, Schubert and others.But such large-scale choral works tell only part of the musical story of Christmas. For dotting the repertoire of the medieval, Renaissance and modern periods are smaller, more intimate carols, chorales, motets and songs that convey the rich spirituality of the holiday with gentleness and quiet joy.It is that end of the repertoire that will be the focus Sunday afternoon when the Chamber Singers, a choir of 22 voices culled from conductor Frances Motyca Dawson's Columbia Pro Cantare, presents "A Christmas Noel" at Christ Episcopal Church on Oakland Mills and Dobbin roads in Columbia.

Retailers looking to draw consumers to their stores during the slow economy are trying to get shoppers to think like it is the Christmas season, when stores offer some of the best deals of the year. They're looking to woo people with "Christmas in July" sales that they say are as good as the bargains in November and December. The summer Christmas sale concept isn't a new one, but it has evolved to include more than just holiday merchandise as retailers look for ways to bring in customers during the slow period right before the back-to-school season, retail experts said.

Two Baltimore Department of Public Works employees stood ready in Cherry Hill yesterday morning to turn Christmas trees into wood chips. But perhaps it was too soon for Baltimoreans to take down decorations. Only five cars arrived with trees in the morning. Employees appeared a bit disappointed, shuffling around the machines but perking up whenever a car drove near. "People will just throw them in the alleys," Quentin McCready said. The Christmas tree program works like this: City machines chew up the Christmas trees, and residents can take the resulting mulch.

BAGHDAD - Three years ago, a note appeared at Lita Kaseer's door. It contained a bullet and a one-word message: "Leave." Kaseer did flee, along with hundreds of other Christian families from the Dora neighborhood in southern Baghdad, once a vibrant Christian community. This year, she returned home from Syria, and yesterday she attended Christmas Mass with her husband and 7-month-old son. "It's always better to come home," said her husband, Khalid Kamil, 34. "In any other place, you are a stranger.

Running out of money to buy food, David P. Anderson was among the first to file into the dining room yesterday at Our Daily Bread. Behind him, dozens waited in line on Christmas morning as Anderson sat down to a turkey dinner and reached first for the cranberry relish. But it wasn't until he was walking out of the downtown Baltimore soup kitchen that Anderson learned who had prepared the meal and served it to him. For the 15th year, members of the Baltimore Hebrew Congregation stepped in so the usual volunteers, several of them Christians, could celebrate Christmas Day at home with their families.

On Christmas, the NBA gives the gift of basketball - five games broadcast nationally on ESPN, ABC and TNT, the first of which is a yuletide plum, pitting Dwight Howard and the Orlando Magic against the Chris Paul-led New Orleans Hornets. The Magic battled an injury bug in the early going, but that hasn't stopped them from winning 13 of their first 17 games. After a breakthrough 2007-2008 season, a relatively slow 9-6 start has everyone in New Orleans asking why. (Noon, ESPN) The second game of ABC's doubleheader is a clash of two teams who met in last season's NBA Finals and whom many pick to lock horns in June when Kevin Garnett and the Boston Celtics take on Pau Gasol and the Los Angeles Lakers.

If the predictions were on target, at this very moment you are suffering through a Christmas that is almost 29 percent less merry than last year. In fact, it will be the least merry Christmas since 1999, so you might as well go back to bed and sleep through it. I base my calculations on a recent Gallup poll that found that Americans on the average planned to spend about 29 percent less on Christmas presents this year - $616 rather than last year's $866,...

(An exchange of holiday greetings between The Baltimore Sun and the city's Police Department.) The cop shop reporters were snug at their desks, While visions of prizes danced in their heads. But the scanner was quiet; no crime to report; Nothing, nada; the blotter, quite short. The editors moaned; this can't be, they mused; Christmas cheer doesn't sell! We need bad news! Away to the windows, reporters ran like a flash Notebooks in hands, they threw open the sash. And there to behold, under a bright shining star, The flashing blue lights of a city police car!

It is the blessed Christmas season. But of course you know that. Unless you live 10 miles up a box canyon deep in the Wasatch Range with only your dog Boomer and are demented from drinking bad water, you have been inhaling Christmas night and day and "Adeste Fideles" is stuck in your head like a five-inch nail. This Christmas, I am in New York for the general dazzlement and variety. On Sunday, St. Patrick's was packed to the rafters for 4 p.m. Mass in Spanish, the name "Jesucristo" drifting around the battlements, and a few blocks south the Jane Austen Society was meeting to discuss Christmas in Olde England, and in between, I stopped in a men's store and bought six pairs of red socks.

Kenny Rogers is having throat problems - not a good thing for a man renowned for his soft, leathery croon. "My body's falling apart, but I'm never sick," says the 70-year-old country-pop legend, his voice noticeably frayed. "I tell you: These throat problems started two days ago. I'm so full of steroids, I feel like a racehorse - or a professional athlete." Rogers is calling from his luxury tour bus en route to a vocal cords specialist in New York, the same one Mick Jagger goes to. "I'll be fine by the time I get to your city," he says reassuringly.

Always at Christmas, Ledisi's house was abuzz with loud friends and family members. A funky good time was in full swing for hours. "It was from church to the house, people eating by the stove. It was none of that sit-down thing," the R&B singer says. "People playing dominoes, drinking, cussing and singing. At the end of the night, I would sit by the tree, looking at the lights when I was supposed to be 'sleep." For It's Christmas, her latest album and second release for the venerable Verve label, Ledisi encapsulates the soulful mood of those holidays in New Orleans and Oakland, Calif.