What The Hell Am I Going to Do with 9 Pounds of Cranberry Sauce

So, the Holiday is almost over, and you have way too many pounds of tasty foodends, broken cookies, and holiday themed chocolate novelties. You probably have a spare day off or two as well...WHAT DO YOU DO NOW. You're in luck, cause just like Kwanzaa, Chrischanukkahwanzaamas is sill kicking post Dec 25th.

Chrischanukkahwanzaamas believes in recycling. The holiday season generates huge amounts of waste - dumpsters filled with crinkled shiny paper, sewers stuffed with garland and tinsel, plastic shopping bags strangling sea-birds. Well, Leftovermas is there for us.

In order to fully participate - take all of the leftover food from the first ten days of Chrischanukkahwanzaamas, roll it into a paste and smear it on bread. It makes great sandwiches. You can suck down the cookie crumbs with the last dregs of eggnog. If you finish off all the leftovers (and leave yourself poured onto the couch in a diabetic coma) Sammich Claus (the spirit of Leftovermas) will watch over you for the upcoming year.

Leftovermas Traditions

Most of the traditions of Leftovermas are based on the idea that you have way too much food leftover (thus the name) - so you should gather some peeps to eat said food, generally with the lure of a gathering - shiny new board games, college football, Trilogy Marathons*, poker game and the like usually work.

In practice, we have found that back to back watching of film trilogies are the perfect way to a) DO NOTHING and b) DEVOR LEFTOVERS. 8 hours of Star Wars, 10 Hours of Die HArd, 12 Hours of Leathal Weapon, adn 19 hours of Lord of the RIngs Extended Editions require that you have no desire to move from the couch and will can easily result in the demolishing of a half case of Pumpkin-Wheat beer, a quarter of a Honeybaked ham, 2 and half bags of various Doritos varieties, and a fruitcake. Well, maybe not the fruitcake.

The Legend of Sammitch Clause

You can mess with the kids again on Leftovermas. Before they go to bed, tell them this story.

"Every year, on the 29th of December, Sammich Claus jumps onto his magical hog, and throws a giant Tupperware container into the sidecar. Inside the Tupperware are thousands of Sandwiches for all of the Good Little Boys and Girls. He has a list, and he used to check it twice (but found out that computers are pretty good at keeping track of little details - naughty and nice is just a damn checkbox, and the listchecking is automated). Then, during the night - his massive hog rolls into town and fills little brown bags with these crazy sammiches - and you can tell if you were good or bad by the kind of sandwich. Mashed potatoes and peas on Rye. Bad. Turkey and Swiss, on Fluffy White with mayo. Good. Peanut Butter and Banana. Elvis."

When the kids ask, "And? What's the point." You just say, "Nothing. That's the story. And they all lived happily ever after. Now shut up and go to bed."

Leftover(mas) Spirits of Chrischanukkahwanzaamas