Being Santa’s jolly good fun
It’s weeks before Christmas and all through the house — no gifts have arrived. Not even a blouse!
To get into the Christmas spirit, I spoke with R. David Robinson. The R is for Robert. A onetime waiter, he quick learned he could make lots more bread by being an entertainer, and so he became a Santa who does private events and even works Carnegie Hall. Here’s his Santa-izing:
“I speak with a lower register. I ask them to tell me in my ear what they want. Kids today want electronics, a guitar, cell phone. They’re into technology. They ask for some things I don’t even understand. I mean, what’s a 4-year-old know? They talk of things I don’t even understand.
“If I need the john I go before — then after — never during. The kids are good. So far none have peed on my lap. My wardrobe has belly padding. My suit and beard are custom made.
“I was also the Santa Claus after 9/11. I hugged them. I gave the children time. They needed it. I kept quiet about what they’ve just gone through. They’d waited all year to see Santa Claus. I have children myself. I know children. When I left waiting tables I knew I had to support my children and so bit by bit I turned into doing these private events.
“I learned to do other corporate work. Like at Easter and for the Red Cross. I worked once at the Friars for some special evening. And you and your husband were there. And I’ve learned that Santa doesn’t go Ho-ho-ho. It’s really oh-oh-oh.”
This Mr. Claus, in his off hours, does pilates. This way he can shimmy down that chimney.
One more question: Why Dec. 25? One answer: It’s one of the shortest days. Others say it might’ve been Jesus’ birth date. Another’s “because it’s the birth date of the pagan invisible sun” — and what all that means I don’t understand altogether.
The (cheap) good ol’ days
Here’s a recent Adams reverie — equal parts nostalgia and reactionary sneer — about old New York. Soap was 8 cents. Coffee, 21 cents. Bread, 12 cents. To scrub a shmatta cost the scrubee 11 cents. Our mayor then? Fernando Wood, whom nobody remembers except maybe Mrs. Wood. Also maybe still around could be — if their marital loins produced any — Wood splinters. 1860 — weeks before I came to be — price to rent a whole house was $60 a month. To dress for dinner, one plain Hermes blue tie today — $350 plus shipping.
Can’t it weight?
I stumbled upon this in an old London Sun: “Pudgy Prince Andrew is having colonic irrigation to slim down from 210 pounds. The treatment, favored by ex-wife Fergie, has helped him lose 14 pounds. He hopes to lose another 28. He stopped eating meat, fish, poultry and dairy. His new diet: rice, beans, lentils, raw veggies, warm water flavored with ginger” . . . In other weight-loss news, prune-growers want their wrinkled old image facelifted. California’s prune board may be eyeing a name change to “dried plums.” Like “dried apricots.” It’s a bid to make the laxative fruit more palatable to the young.
So, this non-Santa type went into a dress shop for his wife’s present. He said he wanted what would fit a 34B bra. The salesgirl asked him how he got the measurement — and he said: “I did it with my hat.”