Scaredy Squirrel Gets Festive (Family Comic Friday)

Celebrate a classic yet highly structured Christmas with Scaredy Squirrel and his woodland friends in this 2023 graphic novel!

Scaredy Squirrel is a lot like me. He's very anxious. He has to plan things out days, even weeks in advance. Plus if things go wrong, it can trigger a real panic attack. Scaredy Squirrel is ready for Christmas. However, he's kinda terrified that things could go wrong. What if it doesn't snow? What if he gets sick? What if his decorations aren't just all that perfect? These are real fears everyone face every day. Only most people shrug those thoughts off and go on with their day. For those with anxiety disorder like Scaredy Squirrel and myself, these sorts of thoughts are really hard to shake off. Thankfully Scaredy has a trio of good friends who are willing to make it the best Christmas ever!

Scaredy Squirrel Gets Festive is based on the series of young reader picture books from Canada starring Scaredy Squirrel. This graphic novel is a step up for early readers, appropriate for those in grades 3-5. The book came out in Halloween. A little early for the holiday season, but available just in time for Christmas. 

I had so much fun reading this book. I enjoyed relating my anxieties and internal pressures with the main character. Despite how much I cannot stand having chronic anxiety, I didn't want this graphic novel to end. It not only contains a hilarious group of characters, but there are activities and craft ideas galore. Scaredy Squirrel Gets Festive is just one of those cozy little books set during Christmas that sucks you in and you just feel this peace while inside that tiny universe. I highly recommend reading this at night when it's frigid cold, wrapped in a blanket with the house lights down low and with the Christmas lights shining bright.

A must read for every family that loves reading during the holidays. It's a book that will become an annual Christmas tradition as I expect it to be with me from now on.

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 10 out of 10 stars.

A Hard Candy Christmas: Advent 2023, DAY 8

Today's candy is something my mother would make every year and they were delicious. When it came to cooking, my mom had 2 styles: burnt and more burnt. That's because as a nurse, she was terrified of food borne illnesses. So she overcooked everything. But when it came to baking, she was amazing. Now, technically, Chocolate Covered Pretzels are not baked goods. But it fits in with her excellent skills in making sweets. 

This type of treat might not be such a big deal these days as you can go to just about any pharmacy, gas station and grocer and big up a bag of chocolate covered pretzels. But until the 1990s, there were only 2 ways to get chocolate covered pretzels; you either got them at a gourmet shop or you made them. And every Christmas, my mom made them.

My mom made chocolate covered pretzels in several different varieties. Typically, she used pretzel rods. But she'd make a few out of the the typical bow shape pretzel as well. Milk chocolate wasn't the only covering she'd use. Some pretzels would be enrobed in white chocolate. But only the pretzel rods would get the treatment of both milk and white chocolate! 

Colored sugar sprinkles would only be used on the white and combination chocolate pretzels. However, she did something a little unique by adding a little salt to the sprinkles to increase the salty counter to the sweetness of the chocolates. I loved the sprinkles due to that extra touch of sodium. As for deciding between white and milk, I couldn't make a decision on which was the best. However, if I had a choice, I would go for a pretzel rod all the way! Not gonna lie. One of the reasons for that decision is because with the rod, I'd pretend I was smoking a real long cigar. Who says you can't play with your food???

Red Hood and the Outlaws Annual #2

An encounter with an impostor St. Nick at Wayne Manor sends 10-year old Jason Todd and his friends Starfire and Roy Harper on a trek to the North Pole to find out why the real Santa Claus didn't come to visit Red Hood and the Outlaws. 

The New 52 had a lot of memorable moments. However, the fun moments were few and far between as this incarnation of the DC Universe was much more dark and gritty. This holiday annual was lots of fun as it seems that fans of the Red Hood, Starfire and Arsenal got to explore an untold tale from their early days as youths. Only something just doesn't add up and it's not Dan DiDio and Jim Lee playing fast and loose with continuity. 

Scott Lobdell gifted fans with a festive story that was gritty, violent and absolutely bonkers. Yet, it was a wild ride that I will definitely visit again in future Christmas comics reading seasons. Jonboy Meyers' art was great and while the cover by RB Silva and Walden Wong is deceptively cute, it made for a great wrappage for this package full of New 52 twists and turns!

I've never read any of the Red Hood and the Outlaws books previously. Thanks to this 2015 annual, I may just start. I didn't really understand the concept of the series. I'm still not 100% understanding of why Starfire is with Jason Todd and not the Teen Titans; but I now have a better grasp of this series' concept enough to give it a go.

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 10 out of 10 stars.

A Hard Candy Christmas: Advent 2023 DAY 7

As I do every year with my Advent, I devote a day to Hanukkah. Tonight will mark the first night of the Jewish holiday and this year with what is happening in Israel, I hope that despite your political feelings, you'll understand that I celebrate the holiday due to my wife's heritage. Tonight's post isn't to infuriate but to celebrate. And to remember...

The school I went to for grades 1-5 had an annual Christmas pageant. The theme every year was 'Christmases Around the World'. First grade celebrated Mexico. I think third grade was England. One grade did Sweden, because I remember that every year one girl would dress as Saint Lucy and walk around the stage with lit candles in her hair. But the grade everybody wanted to be in for the program was fifth grade as that was the year you'd celebrate Hanukkah.

All of the girls in that class would sing the Dreidel Song while all the boys got to participate in the most holiday of activities- gambling! Let's face it. The dreidel game is a gateway drug to betting on sports and playing cards for money. Each boy would get a handful of chocolate coins covered in gold foil called gelts. Then in groups of 4, while the girls sang, we'd play dreidel for the coins. And we got to keep AND eat what we won!

The rules of the game are simple and not much is needed to play. But if you don't have a dreidel, then you're pretty much out of luck. 

There are 4 sides to the dreidel with a Hebrew symbol on each face. After each participant puts a gelt into the pot, a player spins the top. If it lands with nun facing up, the player gets nothing and the next turn starts. Everyone antes up before each spin. If player #2 spins a gimel, he wins all the candy in the pot. If they spin hei, they win half of the pot. If they spin shin, they have to add another gelt to the pot. You basically play until somebody wins all the gelts or in the case of our holiday show, until the song stops. I don't remember how much I won. But I know that for the rest of the program, I was snacking on chocolate.

Gelts are a requirement in our household during Hanukkah. Not that my wife plays dreidel. Heck, I don't even think we have a dreidel anywhere in our house. It's become a tradition because her grandmother would gift her a bag of the chocolates every year and though Jan didn't understand the meaning behind the confections back then, it's been a way for us to keep her few Hanukkah traditions alive. 

A Hard Candy Christmas: Advent 2023 DAY 6

For those of you who are complaining that there's not enough hard candy in an Advent titled 'A Hard Candy Christmas', I've thrown today's treat into the mix just for you.

Primrose Old Fashioned Cut Rock Candy is a confection that I don't really like to eat. But I am fascinated to look at it. Every tiny little piece has a microscopic image in the middle. The orange flavored pieces have an orange slice design in the middle. Watermelon has an image of a slice of melon. The spiced flavor is the one that carries the name of the candy, as a minuscule primrose flower is presented in the center of those pieces. (Although, I think some spice pieces are also of snowflakes. But that might just be in the Christmas variety.)

Primrose candy has only been around since the depression. I would have thought this stuff was being bought by Laura Ingles for pennies on the pound during her days on the prairie. I'm also surprised that this stuff isn't from England or some other part of Europe. Instead its manufacturing origins come from Chicago! Another thing I didn't know is that the original recipe calls for honey instead of sugar. Although that's not the case any more, as sugar and corn syrup are the two main ingredients of this deceptively timeless candy treat. 

From this image, it appears that butterflies, American flags and strawberries are other images made by Primrose in their cut rock candies.

Just like ribbon candy, Primrose is the stuff that you'd see filling grandma's candy dish each holiday season. In my belief, nobody actually buys the stuff. It just keeps getting recycled year after year. Though, if you have a grandchild like me, who would pick through the whole dish just to see all the pretty designs, please throw that stuff away to prevent food-borne illness from contact with unwashed hands. 

A Hard Candy Christmas: Advent 2023 DAY 5

Most of you might not equate today's candy with the holidays. But for me as a kid, I knew Christmas was coming when I got to buy Gummi Bears. (And no- it's not mispelling it. Americans are mispelling it by calling them Gummy Bears!)

In the Crabtree area of Raleigh, there used to be a gourmet shop called A Southern Season. Every year my parents would go to A Southern Season to buy fancy chocolates, snacks and wine for their holiday office parties and gifts for family and friends. With this annual trip, I always got a chance to buy a giant bag of Gummi Bears.

You might not believe it but until probably the early 90s, it wasn't easy finding these chewy treats. The only way I could get Gummies was to go to a gourmet shop and purchase them by the pound. You'd have to take a flimsy plastic bag and a pewter scoop and portion out your gummies. This meant being able to get only the flavors I loved; which were the pineapple and lemon ones. Occasionally a red one or an orange Gummi would sneak in. That was okay. It just meant that I'd eat those first.

Jump ahead to the 90s. My trips to A Southern Season had stopped. But I was covered as Gummi Bears started to be available in vac-sealed packages and sold in convenience stores and big box stores like K-Mart. With the prevalence of Gummies came a revolution in the confection genre. Gummies were now in the shape of worms, sharks and my favorite, cola bottles. 

The cola bottle gummies came in 2 forms. There's the traditional dark brown with clear topped Gummi called Happy Cola, that tasted like jellied Coca-Cola. But if you got lucky, you come across version 2.0, known as Fizzy Colas. These bottles were dusted with sugar and powdered CO2 popping candy. That way when you ate these cola bottles, they fizzed in your mouth like a an iced cold Coke. Far superior than the original but much harder to find, these cola gummies are so worth searching for.

Ender's Game: War of Gifts One-Shot

An interesting story about fanaticism vs. totalitarianism. 

I'm not a fan of the Ender's Game universe. In fact, I've never read any of the books. I happened across this book from a grab bag and if I wasn't intrigued by the title 'War of Gifts', I would have overlooked this Christmas time set comic book.

A young boy named Zeck Morgan is taken from the home of a pair of religious fanatics who are staunch pacifists, by representatives of the Battle School. The lad does everything he can to refuse to participate in the war games of the school due to those beliefs. But for some stubborn reason, the headmaster of the Battle School refuses to let the child wash-out.

On what would be the Christmas season on Earth, Zeck observes a Dutch lad providing a gift from Saint Nicolas to a fellow cadet. As any sort of celebration of faith, including holiday observances is strictly forbidden by the Battle School, Zeck rats the kid out. But the headmaster refuses to do anything.  In protest to this, Zeck starts a miniature holy war at the academy. For if he can't be allowed to practice his religious beliefs then nobody should be allowed to either. Hopefully, child prodigy Ender Wiggin can put this young man in his place...

I enjoyed this book. It's not turned me into a devotee of Ender's Game or Orson Scott Card or anything like that. It was a good single issue read and that's all I need unless there ever is another holiday themed issue set in the Ender's Game universe. 

I personally feel terrible for Zeck Morgan. His parents just seem awful. The boy is raised to be a pacifist and yet he and his whole family are angry, bitter people. Everyone isn't good enough to be a Christian in their opinion and something like Santa Claus is considered a gateway drug to Hell instead of an opening door to Heaven. These kind of Christians give believers like myself a bad name and I very much wish atheists and those who hate religion understood that the body of Christ isn't all like the Morgan family. 

Oddly enough, the Battle School seems the more reasonable institution. Well, at least the headmaster does. He overlooks these small acts of faith of his students as long as it doesn't interfere with the mission. Zeck thinks the practice of religion should be all or nothing. He doesn't realize that the headmaster of the Battle School is giving Zeck as much grace as that Dutch boy in allowing them both to express their beliefs. 

As for how this story aligns with the views of Orson Scott Card, I understand that there are some critics who believe the author to be homophobic. Maybe he is. But I've never met the man personally and other than this adaptation, I've never read anything else he's written before. I collect holiday themed comics. It's one of my favorite genres to collect and this book will stay as a part of my collection. If this causes me to lose readers of my blog, I won't apologize as I refuse to participate in censorship and to me, cancel culture IS censorship. I give my opinions on the books I read based on personal taste and quality of both the storytelling and art. The story by Jake Black was very well crafted. The art by Timothy Green II, was a little rough as I sometimes had trouble discerning who was who. But then again, I think that sort of homogeneity is part of the point behind the Battle School; like when a soldier is in basic training and the drill instructors try to strip away individuality for the good of the outfit. 

I liked it. It might not be your traditional holiday story. In fact, those holidays are verboten and basically all but ignored. But it was set during the holidays of the future and had holiday themes. So despite looking like a generic sci-fi comic, this issue is really a Christmas miracle if you dig deeper to examine the content of the story.

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars.