Repost: Go nuts this Christmas, Love Santa.

Back when I went to College, Christmas time was a pretty quiet time around the Fraternity. Pretty much everyone was gone, but since my family lived close by I stayed at the house and made sure that a bunch of fucking felons didn’t break in and steal everything in sight. Regularly joining me at the house over the break would typically be my good friend Chuck. (note to InDesign search folks, that’s Charles Lasseter)

We would usually pull a couch over to the fireplace, find an old wooden chair from the basement, break it up for wood, and make a nice fire. Then we’d sit down with a leftover Costco meat tray from my parent’s house, and drink whatever was on hand. One evening, after a particularly large bottle of Kahlua we liberated from some unsuspecting soul, we decided to play a few pranks with what we had on hand. We started by taking a bowl of pistachio shells that we had finished, and blowing them under one of our brother’s door. We could hear the shells scatter all over the hardwood floor of the room, making a real pain in the butt of a mess. We also left a note:

Dear Ed, Go Nuts this Christmas, Love Santa.

We staggered down the hall, giddy with the hilarity of our prank, and went to another door. We took a box of particularly stale chocolates, and using my new electric screwdriver, screwed each individual chocolate to the door in a nice grid pattern. We also left a note:

Dear Dave, Have a Chocolate, Love Santa.

We found this so hilarious, we could barely control ourselves. We proceeded to grab every loose thing we had, and glue, nail or toss it into someone’s door or room, each with a happy, merry note, personally written from Santa. We felt that this much holiday joy was not something that we could keep for ourselves, but we had to share it with everyone.

For years, every insane and stupid prank ended up getting signed, “Love Santa”. Even after graduation, gifts would get signed “Love Santa”, as would cards and letters. Especially if it contained something thoughtful and touching, like a rotting fish head.

In any case: