Santa Claus is Comin' to Town

Hi, readers.

Heading to the parade. . .

So I'm not sure if you're aware of this or not, but Santa Claus - who's kind of a big deal around this time of year - officially resides in Midland, MI throughout the month of December.  Just in case you were under the false assumption that Ol' Saint Nick was up in the North Pole, I'm here to tell all of you good people out there that, no, that is not the case.

Midland, Michigan, folks.  And I have photographic proof this afternoon to validate my claim.

You see, Santa Claus, as we all know, technically claims residency in the North Pole.  This is a widely-known as somewhat verifiable fact (hundreds of thousands of correspondence has been mailed to his aforementioned address, so clearly the census is aware of this.)  What might not be as widely known is that he claims Holiday Season residency in his locally-famous Santa House, conveniently located next to the courthouse on Main Street, downtown (and also directly across the street from Kris' church, First United Methodist.)

Thank God we had the kids bring gloves today. . .

Anyway, when homeboy rolls into town every year, around this time, they throw the Big Guy a parade.  A long, drawn out, freezing affair that starts in the Midland High School parking lot and ends. . . somewhere downtown, I don't know.  We decided to check it out this year, having not known about it last year, which the kids were excited about, but that Kris and I regretted almost immediately due to the FREEZING RAIN.

Behold our yuletide blunder. . .

Midland High's parking lot.  Filled with random crap.

Start of the Parade.  We stood on the corner of Eastlawn and Washington, right near the beginning of the parade, with a great view.  Not bad for showing up 5 minutes before the parade technically started. . .

What the hell is this?

It's nice to see floats in a parade again.  God knows that the one we catch in Clare basically consist of firetrucks from various township departments throughout the area. . .

They had delegations (or whatever) from every school in the city march in the parade as well.  The girls were pretty excited to see this one.

They passed out plastic bags to kids for candy collection, which was a nice touch - kept the kids busy while they waited for Santa to appear.

Rest assured, the kids totally lost their shit over this part.

Yes, you counted right.

Dickens characters on horseback.  'Cause Midland.

More scary clowns, trying to lure kids into the woods.

If anything screams 'Christmas,' it's this picture right here.

(I let her wear my hat after awhile - the weather was getting brutal.)

Two bigots that need to pick up a frickin' History book.

No idea what this guy's up to, or what purpose he serves in a city parade. I'm assuming he was just lost and that this is how he gets around town.

Definitely a lot of horses in this year's parade. . .

. . . and donkeys.

ALL BOW BEFORE THE MIGHTY SUBWAY SANDWICH

FINALLY.  Santa sure took his sweet-ass time making his appearance this year - he was in the far-back of the parade, bringing up the rear.  I mean, it makes sense, obviously:  if he were in the parade earlier on, people would be leaving in droves after seeing him. . . and then who would stick around to wave at the giant Subway Sandwich?

After seeing this dude we high-tailed it back to the van, drove home, and vowed to never again set foot outside until April.

- Brian