Well, the Advent Calendar has kept me too busy to really write much else, so to the more than half of you who don't read it: Haha, you're fucked.

We got a lot of snow today, which is nice, because this has been one whirlwind of a holiday season that I've barely had a chance to smell, eat, digest or otherwise own.

Christmas is less than a week away, which seems both impossible and absolutely insane. I'm not done shopping. I'm not even done decorating. Thank Leviathan for that "Christmas Lite" week between the 25th and New Year's. (Seriously, let's all plan to make that week the most festive, relaxing post-season in history -- it's a mandatory rule for all of you.)

Back to the snow: The photo above (actually a screengrab from a low-rent Quicktime) gives almost no impression of the vast sea of white seen from our front window, but trust me, it's killer. We must be up to six inches (not that bullshit "six inches where snow collects at its highest" thing, either -- a legit six inches), and if the reports are to be believed, there will be over a foot of God's dandruff waiting for me to shovel by tomorrow morning.

It's gotta be the biggest snowstorm we've had in years. It's completely white out there, but also dead silent. No cars, no stupid kids, no pissing strays...just totally empty and silent, and I love it like that. It totally removes any sense that I should be doing more with my weekend than taking pictures of crab taxidermy and homosexual rabbit figures, or conversely, blabbing about Zhu Zhu Pets.

I'm sure you've heard about these Zhu Zhu Pets. They're this year's biggest "fad toy," reminiscent both in popularity and gimmick to the Furby of old. Kids are absolutely wild for these, and thus, they're impossible to find. I purchased mine from a third party seller on Amazon for $35, not even realizing that they actually retail for just eight bucks.

And if that 400% markup (the cheapest I could find) doesn't mess with your head, consider this: The random Zhu Zhu Pets vehicles and accessories (which are all but essential to have any real fun with the things) are even harder to find, with stuff that costs $10 in stores selling for up to and over $100 online.

As the story gets told from one person to another person to another person to a cat and back to another person, Zhu Zhu Pets have garnered a reputation that they might not deserve. They're cute, fun and interesting, but they're not loaded with insane levels of artificial intelligence. At root, they're just battery-powered hamster dolls that roll around the floor and chirp. (Which isn't to say that they aren't capable of wonders beyond that, but don't be fooled into thinking that your Zhu Zhu Pet will fetch the newspaper and help out with the crossword puzzle afterwards.)

I made a tiny movie of the miracle rodent, though after uploading it, I noticed that YouTube has no less than 700,000 other Zhu Zhu Pets videos available, which all tell the tale more thoroughly than mine. While I haven't really engrossed myself in all that this wondrous little rat can do, I've seen enough to say this much with confidence: If I was a kid, I would go absolutely apeshit until somebody gave me one.

It isn't so much what Zhu Zhu Pets do that make them so appealing. It's the idea that you're getting a "real" pet. Think of all the similar fads that existed for the same reason, from Tamagotchis to Furbys and beyond. Sure, they were interesting toys with some progressive ideas and technologies at play, but at heart, it was the "pet concept" that really sold 'em. Same thing here. What kid wouldn't want to spend Christmas morning convincing themselves that they got a new hamster to take care of, even if that hamster was filled with wires and plastic instead of bones and blood?

Thumbs up. Factor in all of the weird vehicles and "hamster habitats" that you can buy for your robot rats, and the Zhu Zhu line seems well worth the hype. Mainly, I just find the idea of electronic hamsters sold in perfectly rectangular window boxes too adorable not to commend.

Finally, there's a new line of "Chocolate Edition" spins on your favorite board games, including the one I chose to spend ten bucks on during my last lapse of judgement at Target: Chocolate Scrabble.

Many popular board games have been remodeled like this, and while I can't honestly claim that they're intended to be "Christmas editions," the fact that Target put them in their stocking stuffer section makes it hard to deny, because Target is never wrong. Besides, I don't know how your family does their Christmas party, but we always have random, wacky shit like this at ours. A chocolate Scrabble set would fit right in.

Instead of literally translating the original games into chocolate form, they've scaled down the rules and decreased the number of usual pieces. On the bright side, the pieces you do get are much larger, and they're filled with chocolate!

Though you can't really tell from my photo, the game board is actually a poster-sized sheet of paper. The wrapped chocolate letters are about as large as After Eight mints, and the winner of this delicious game gets to take home that gold medallion shown on the upper left. (Which, of course, is also filled with chocolate.)

I could totally see breaking this baby out after my family's Christmas Eve dinner, when we're all too loaded to really care if we're playing properly, or even if certain players cheat by eating undesirable letters. Somehow, the thought of that just injected a much needed dose of Christmas spirit right up my spinal cord. Chocolate Scrabble, you're an alien Santa Claus.

It's way too late at night to classify this as an SNT, so, uh, Merry Sunday?