St. Nicholas Nicked

A small village in Turkey has taken down a statue of St. Nicholas and replaced him with a tacky plaster-of-Paris Santa Claus.

He made his list. Checked it twice. Googled the Web, and found out who’s been naughty ... who’s been nice.

Then it happened, last night: Santa Claus came to town.

All across America, excited children rushed out of their bedrooms to see what Santa had delivered in the darkness. The anticipation! Little hearts beat into near arrhythmia. Visions of iPods, X-boxes, cell phones and bling-bling danced across their mind-screens. For most of these digital dervishes and pre-adolescent mouse monkeys, Santa’s annual download of presents is one of the highlights of the year.

Well, okay. The highlight of the year.

But you have to wonder: Has Santa become too much a part of the present thing, the bag of goodies thing, the jolly old man in the red suit thing? Some people think that Santa has become too big ... literally. There is talk of leaving him a salad, instead of milk and cookies. Along with a note about the need to lose a few pounds.

And there’s an even bigger question for ...