What's your problem with Christmas?

Truth be told. I LOVE CHRISTMAS.

However - I strongly believe in "too much of a good thing" when it comes to Christmas.

Here's how it started. One day, I was driving to school along I-4, and I noticed that Dolly Parton's Dixie Stampede had started to put their Christmas decorations up. That day was October 4, 2006.

Giant wreaths, garland, and what was likely the largest Christmas tree I'd ever seen (as tall as the 3 story building that housed the facility).

"Wow" I thought, "they must be going all out for Christmas this year! I'll be excited to see the decorations go up over the coming weeks."

9 hours later, I passed by the same location, and discovered they had completely finished the install. This absolutely boggled my mind. It was barely time to put up the Halloween decorations, and they'd finished their Christmas install. It blew my mind - if you can do this in one day, then why did you do it now? I feel no anger towards Disney's Hollywood Studios, which starts their Christmas light install for the "Osborne Family Spectacle of Lights" in August every year - after all, it's 5 million plus Christmas lights! That's not something you can do in an afternoon.

I went home and decided to do something about it. I laid out what would become the Wilcox Rules of Festive Holiday Displays and posted it on my MySpace (hey, remember MySpace everyone?). They continually change and grow, as the future dictates it must. Provisions are put in place, dates are reconsidered, and policies are made.

This blog, and the corresponding Twitter account (@JWWholidayrules) will be places to post offending homes and businesses on the "naughty list" - meaning they violate the rules and should be publically shamed.

Please keep me informed of any violators. Maybe we can all hope that stores follow Nordstrom's policy, which I'll detail in a later post.