That is my Christmas tree. It's still up.
We're not militant about insisting that the decorations stay in bloom through the 12 days of Christmas (Dec. 25-Jan. 5), it's more like there just hasn't been time to take them down.
But I do like that they're still there and the lights still on outside. I don't feel delinquent at all. It's always depressing to see Christmas trees dumped on the curb on Dec. 26. (I know I have some nerve, as my tree is fake and has been for years).
Seeing the Christmas season last into January helps take away the bleakness of the month. If we didn't have the final few days of the season and football, January would be a lost cause.
So I like celebrating the last day of Christmas on this day (I used to get a bit jealous of the Orthodox who celebrate Christmas around Jan. 6-7, but then I found out they often celebrate with beet soup and that's almost as sad as ditching your tree).
Today I'm celebrating with my just-arrived Dodgers team set of this year's Topps Holiday set. It's fashionably late, to help me keep the Christmas spirit alive.
That is all but two of the cards. You've seen these poses before, either in flagship or Update. This year's Holiday set gets the usual fun red-and-green treatment, my favorite aspect of the set, plus some candy cane borders. And, just to make it extra busy, there is a snowflake-and-ornament design over the photo, as if the Dodgers are playing in front of wrapping paper.
It's a terribly busy design. I remember when 2019 Holiday came out -- my favorite of the Holiday designs -- and people thought THAT was busy. But 2021 is a little too much Christmas cheer, even for me.
The thing that sold me on buying the cards -- yes, I was thinking of skipping this round -- is that there are new photos of the two newer Dodgers (well, one is now a former Dodger) as they were included in Holiday after not making it into Update.
The Scherzer card is standard fare -- except for him appearing to be pooping an ornament -- but I like the Turner card a lot.
Since Holiday is one of those prohibitive sets in which lots of guys get left out, it's always interesting to see who wasn't included. This year, notables such as Kenley Jansen, Julio Urias, Max Muncy, Will Smith and A.J. Pollock are missing among others.
Even with my attempt to prolong Christmas, I am hoping that this is my last tour of the 2021 design, which didn't deserve the coverage I gave it at all. One of these days you'll see an update of my ranking of all of the Topps flagship designs that I did back in 2015 and we'll see if 2021 makes it above bottom-feeders like 1996 and 2016.
However, I am not done dealing with cards issued in 2021. Another 2021 set is on the way tomorrow -- when the tree will still be up.
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