Bah Humbug

[ducasi]

My brother used to work for Sainsburys and he always used to reckon that they would start to plan for the next Christmas on Boxing Day.

Nah, it's almost definitely earlier than that.

[Groovy Dancer]

Scientific proof of the non-existence of Santa Claus

No known species of reindeer can fly. BUT there are 300,000 species of living organisms yet to be classified, and while most of these are insects and germs, this does not COMPLETELY rule out flying reindeer which only Santa has ever seen.

There are two billion children (persons under 18 ) in the world. BUT since Santa doesn't appear to handle the Muslim, Hindu, Jewish and Buddhist children, that reduces the workload to 15% of the total ¯ 378 million. At an average rate of 3.5 children per household, that's 91.8 million homes. One presumes there's at least one good child in each.

Santa has 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming he travels east to west (which seems logical). This works out to 822.6 visits per second.

This is to say that for each Christian household with good children, Santa has 1/1000th of a second to park, hop out of the sleigh, jump down the chimney, fill the stockings, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks have been left, get back up the chimney, get back into the sleigh and move on to the next house. Assuming that each of these 91.8 million stops are evenly distributed around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false but for the purposes of our calculations we will accept), we are now talking about .78 miles per household, a total trip of 75½ million miles, not counting stops to do what most of us must do at least once every 31 hours, plus feeding and etc.

This means that Santa's sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second, 3,000 times the speed of sound. For purposes of comparison, the fastest man-made vehicle on earth, the Ulysses space probe, moves at a poky 27.4 miles per second - a conventional reindeer can run, tops, 15 miles per hour.

If every one of the 91.8 million homes with good children were to put out a single chocolate chip cookie and an 8 ounce glass of 2% milk, the total calories (needless to say other vitamins and minerals) would be approximately 225 calories (100 for the cookie, give or take, and 125 for the milk, give or take).

Multiplying the number of calories per house by the number of homes (225 x 91.8 x 1000000), we get the total number of calories Santa consumes that night, which is 20,655,000,000 calories. To break it down further, 1 pound is equal to 3500 calories. Dividing our total number of calories by the number of calories in a pound (20655000000/3500) and we get the number of pounds Santa gains, 5901428.6, which is 2950.7 tons.

The payload on the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium-sized lego set (two pounds), the sleigh is carrying 321,300 tons, not counting Santa, who is invariably described as overweight.

On land, conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that "flying reindeer" (see above) could pull TEN TIMES the normal amount, we cannot do the job with eight, or even nine. We need 214,200 reindeer.

This increases the payload (not even counting the weight of the sleigh) - to 353,430 tons. Again, for comparison - this is four times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth 2.

353,000 tons traveling at 650 miles per second creates enormous air resistance - this will heat the reindeer up in the same fashion as spacecraft re-entering the earth's atmosphere.

The lead pair of reindeer will absorb 14.3 QUINTILLION joules of energy. Per second. Each.

In short, they will burst into flame almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them, and create deafening sonic booms in their wake. The entire reindeer team will be vaporized within 4.26 thousandths of a second.

Santa, meanwhile, will be subjected to centrifugal forces 17,500.06 times greater than gravity. A 250-pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back of his sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force.

In conclusion: If Santa ever DID deliver presents on Christmas Eve, he's dead now.

[Birlmeister]

Glad other people feel the same. 138 shopping days to Christmas (apparently), Harrods opening their christmas hall. I've not even had my summer holidays yet. Of course it's far too bloody early!

What about the silly b****r who celebrates christmas every day, buying himself a present, watching the Queen's speech and eating turkey. (I just pity all those standing downwind when he farts after eating all those brussells).

[Beowulf]

Glad other people feel the same. 138 shopping days to Christmas (apparently), Harrods opening their christmas hall. I've not even had my summer holidays yet. Of course it's far too bloody early!

What about the silly b****r who celebrates christmas every day, buying himself a present, watching the Queen's speech and eating turkey. (I just pity all those standing downwind when he farts after eating all those brussells).

Guilty as charged M'lud ok.. so that's a lie. But 25th June 2005 We had a Christmas party. The neighbours must have thought we were mad. We had the tree and decorations up, Little LED christmas tree's in the garden. I even dressed up in a santa outfit and gave out christmas presents.. of course, Heavy santa outfit and big white beard are not normal wear for a hot summers night

[WittyBird]

But 25th June 2005 We had a Christmas party.

Theres nowt as queer as folk

[TiggsTours]

Guilty as charged M'lud ok.. so that's a lie. But 25th June 2005 We had a Christmas party. The neighbours must have thought we were mad. We had the tree and decorations up, Little LED christmas tree's in the garden. I even dressed up in a santa outfit and gave out christmas presents.. of course, Heavy santa outfit and big white beard are not normal wear for a hot summers night

I thought it was just me that did that sort of thing!

We celebrated Chritsmas day on 25th January this year, on our skiing holiday, we had Christmas cards, presents, traditional Christmas food from France (which according to an internet search was Beof Beurginon (or however you spell it)), homemade Christmas pudding, brandy butter, santa, the works!

I also went to a Christmas party in July a few years ago with work, we'd been moving office over the Christmas period, and so hadn't had a works do, so our boss decided to lay one on for us. The restaurant were great, playing Christmas music, traditional Christmas dinner, the put up Christmas decs, and we even had crackers.

I've also been to a Halloween party in August, in complete fancy dress, I did get an odd look from a policeman when I stopped to ask for directions, in my witches outfit, but when I explained (seemed obvious to me) that I was off to a Halloween party, he nodded slowly and said "Of course you are".

[Mostlysane]

:rantmodeon:



*** what happened to the magic?

It's here.

[Beowulf]

*wakes up in a cold sweat*

AAAArgh Paul Daniels is coming for me !! sorry that's a menacing photo.. think freddie kruger bladed gloves.. think baleful red glowing eyes! AAARGH it's giving me the heebie jeebies !!

[Piglet]

Jumping Jaks in Aberdeen had a Chrimbo tree up in their hallway last night

So before I forget...

Merry Chrimbo everyone

[stewart38]

Scientific proof of the non-existence of Santa Claus

No known species of reindeer can fly. BUT there are 300,000 species of living organisms yet to be classified, and while most of these are insects and germs, this does not COMPLETELY rule out flying reindeer which only Santa has ever seen.

There are two billion children (persons under 18 ) in the world. BUT since Santa doesn't appear to handle the Muslim, Hindu, Jewish and Buddhist children, that reduces the workload to 15% of the total ¯ 378 million. At an average rate of 3.5 children per household, that's 91.8 million homes. One presumes there's at least one good child in each.

Santa has 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming he travels east to west (which seems logical). This works out to 822.6 visits per second.

This is to say that for each Christian household with good children, Santa has 1/1000th of a second to park, hop out of the sleigh, jump down the chimney, fill the stockings, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks have been left, get back up the chimney, get back into the sleigh and move on to the next house. Assuming that each of these 91.8 million stops are evenly distributed around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false but for the purposes of our calculations we will accept), we are now talking about .78 miles per household, a total trip of 75½ million miles, not counting stops to do what most of us must do at least once every 31 hours, plus feeding and etc.

This means that Santa's sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second, 3,000 times the speed of sound. For purposes of comparison, the fastest man-made vehicle on earth, the Ulysses space probe, moves at a poky 27.4 miles per second - a conventional reindeer can run, tops, 15 miles per hour.

If every one of the 91.8 million homes with good children were to put out a single chocolate chip cookie and an 8 ounce glass of 2% milk, the total calories (needless to say other vitamins and minerals) would be approximately 225 calories (100 for the cookie, give or take, and 125 for the milk, give or take).

Multiplying the number of calories per house by the number of homes (225 x 91.8 x 1000000), we get the total number of calories Santa consumes that night, which is 20,655,000,000 calories. To break it down further, 1 pound is equal to 3500 calories. Dividing our total number of calories by the number of calories in a pound (20655000000/3500) and we get the number of pounds Santa gains, 5901428.6, which is 2950.7 tons.

The payload on the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium-sized lego set (two pounds), the sleigh is carrying 321,300 tons, not counting Santa, who is invariably described as overweight.

On land, conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that "flying reindeer" (see above) could pull TEN TIMES the normal amount, we cannot do the job with eight, or even nine. We need 214,200 reindeer.

This increases the payload (not even counting the weight of the sleigh) - to 353,430 tons. Again, for comparison - this is four times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth 2.

353,000 tons traveling at 650 miles per second creates enormous air resistance - this will heat the reindeer up in the same fashion as spacecraft re-entering the earth's atmosphere.

The lead pair of reindeer will absorb 14.3 QUINTILLION joules of energy. Per second. Each.

In short, they will burst into flame almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them, and create deafening sonic booms in their wake. The entire reindeer team will be vaporized within 4.26 thousandths of a second.

Santa, meanwhile, will be subjected to centrifugal forces 17,500.06 times greater than gravity. A 250-pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back of his sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force.

In conclusion: If Santa ever DID deliver presents on Christmas Eve, he's dead now.

This reminds me when I was 4 I raised exactly the same questions with my dad re the existing of Santa

He thought I was being too ‘simplistic’. He said you hardly think Santa is going to be using 20th Century technology (at that time it was) or crude assumptions re how the universe works

He said first thing why would Santa be only going at 650 miles a second. The time dilation effects won’t be near good enough

Santa doesnt need to speed him up close to the speed of light as that would make him appear ‘slow’ to us. He needs to speed the Earth up i.e.
-----------------------
Now, the first step in assessing the issue of the Twin Paradox is to ask is whether time dilation takes place in the real world. The answer is a resounding “Yes!” During the past 60 years, we have discovered families of elementary particles with short lifetimes in the range of a few microseconds (millionths of a second) all the way down to several picoseconds (millionths of a microsecond). Among these particles is the muon, a particle similar in many ways to the electron, but about 200 times heavier. At rest, or moving very slowly compared with the speed of light, the muon decays into an electron and two other particles, known as neutrinos, typically in 2.2 microseconds.
------------------------------

That of course make the Earth ‘Heavy’ but gives him time to interact
I don’t have time to find my old diary with all the answers but to this day I believe all the questions can be answered and Santa does exist

[stewart38]

This reminds me when I was 4 I raised exactly the same questions with my dad re the existing of Santa

Sadly he didnt teach me grammar ! Existance or existence

[whitetiger1518]

Of course Santa Exists - after all - as it has been pointed out above - He (aparently) only gives to Christian children... Death does EVERYBODY and we know he exists...(Well remember Susan plays the xylophone on his ribs when she visits )



Whitetiger

[Stuart]

Never mind Christmas, I've just seen Hot Cross Buns for sale in my local Tesco!

[Barry Shnikov]

This reminds me when I was 4 I raised exactly the same questions with my dad re the existing of Santa

He thought I was being too ‘simplistic’. He said you hardly think Santa is going to be using 20th Century technology (at that time it was) or crude assumptions re how the universe works

He said first thing why would Santa be only going at 650 miles a second. The time dilation effects won’t be near good enough

Your dad said this to you when you were four? Jeez, I was fully occupied deciding whether to play or sleep...

[Barry Shnikov]

Never mind Christmas, I've just seen Hot Cross Buns for sale in my local Tesco!

That raises an interesting point.

Hot cross buns, similarly creme eggs, are now pretty much an all year round item. I think the supermarkets can be seriously criticised for smearing everything out into a bland sameness. Doubtless things like christmas pudding etc. will also become 'all year round'.

I am firmly of the opinion that this is regrettable: I used to look forward to the appearance of hot cross buns in the shops, or strawberries, and Christmas puddings. The horrifying possibility arises of life in 50 years time - you'll walk into supermarket and it'll be the same things for sale, 24/7/52.