Holy bird, Thanksgiving is tomorrow. Insane. Quickest year ever. We’ve been enlisted to contribute both stuffed mushrooms and baby artichokes to the family spread, which is a tall order for someone who would much rather do nothing at all.

The bad news: No new Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade review this year. Sorry…time just wasn’t on my side, and really, the parades I have left in my archive of dusty cassettes are nowhere near as interesting as the ones I’ve already covered. The bright side is, if you’ve never read those, I’ve got about six thousand pages worth of Shamu balloons, He-Man floats and old Christmas commercials for you to spend the next two days pilfering through:

I’ll see if I can round up some new ancient parades for next year. As penance, I’ve already begun working on a fairly gigantic “real” article that I hope to have published sometime between now and the year 8000.

Finding the aforementioned baby artichokes was no easy task. The mission took me from one side of town to the other, spanning no less than four supermarkets and, on a real hope shot, a corner deli. I didn’t mind the endless search, as it seemed like each supermarket carried an entirely different line of holiday-themed goods. Certainly, none of the places I’d usually buy baby artichokes at had one pound Sugar Daddy pops in stock.

Read again: ONE POUND Sugar Daddy pops. Honestly, they feel even heavier. And they’re huge. Sold as edible stocking stuffers with random holly graphics on the wrappers, these may be the weirdest “Christmas edition” foodstuffs I’ve ever encountered. You needn’t be a fan of Sugar Daddies (I’ve never eaten one in my entire life) to appreciate a candy that feels like a Honey, I Blah Blah Blah prop. I feel dwarfed and empowered, and perhaps a little unworthy.

The paddle-shaped wad of milk caramel is a serious weapon. It’s denser than commercial lumber, and I’m pretty sure that if I whacked you across the head with it, you’d die. A one pound Sugar Daddy is an impressive sight, but make no mistake, no good can come of this candy. Nevermind the ravages done to one’s intestinal tract upon eating the equivalent of 9.5 regular-sized Sugar Daddies; I speak more to the nearly-irresistible temptation to misuse this thing. From unlikely instruments of murder to the focal point of some bizarre manner of foreplay, one pound Sugar Daddies are the most innocuous of all evil things.

Despite their natural fit for criminal activity, these giant-sized Sugar Daddies would admittedly look great under the tree or in a stocking. If nothing else, no gift-getter, young or old, would ever predict such a gift.

Ehhh. This is bittersweet. I’m kind of over Star Wars-themed Christmas decorations, because I feel like there’s only so many times you can see Darth Vader in a Santa cap before the visual loses its punch. At the same time, these are probably the best Star Wars-themed Christmas decorations I’ve ever purchased.

Made by Kurt’s Adler, it’s a collection of six large statues ranging from the above-pictured Yoda to R2-D2 to Boba Fett and beyond. The packaging says that they’re “hand-crafted fabriche,” and I’m left wondering what the fuck “fabriche” is. Must be Italian. I guess I could look it up, but then “fabriche” would lose all of its awesome mysteriousness and become just another one of those words I avoid typing because I never learned how to make that little accent symbol appear above the letter “e.” Let’s pretend that “fabriche” is street slang for “neat shit.”

I picked up two of the statues, which range from 15 to 25 bucks. First up is Yoda Claus, who is desperately trying to look casual about his sudden casting as Christmas’s marquee star. More impressive is the Darth Vader statue, where the Sith lord temporarily lets go of his anger to build the Death Star out of snow. Cute, but I already got the snowglobe-version of this joke last year. Surely they could’ve portrayed Vader in the midst of some other, never-before-seen Christmas activity. Like you wouldn’t pay 25 bucks for a statue showing Darth Vader scraping morning ice from the front window of his uniquely-winged TIE Fighter.

See a larger photo of Yoda Claus and Darth Vader here. See a small photo of a happy orange here.

And oh! Ho ho! Those stupid Fizz ‘n Find toys have managed to eke out their own Christmas edition. The toys are exactly the same as the ones I reviewed for Halloween, save for the fact that the hidden monster figures have been replaced with hidden Christmassy tree ornaments.

You can refer back to the Halloween review to see how Fizz ‘n Find toys work, but the short version is this: After unwrapping the toy, you’re left with a rough, white hockey puck, which dissolves in warm water to reveal a prize inside. Nobody could claim that this isn’t an interesting concept.

After repurposing a cereal bowl as a dunk tank and letting my Fizz ‘n Find brick melt away, I was left with a cheerful Santa Claus figurine, complete with looped string for easy tree branch hanging. I can’t say that I was too amazed with it all, but then, I am sixty-seven years old.

PS: If you were having trouble running X-E’s Christmas Jukebox, I made some tweaks and believe that it’s now completely operational. If it isn’t, then you’ll just have to be satisfied with the five radio stations currently playing nothing but Christmas music from now until New Year’s.

Gah. I don’t want to make baby artichokes. I hate babies.

Posted by Matt. E-mail me!