I Beat Santa To a Bloody Pulp

Yes, the legend is true, I fought old St. Nick. And might I add that as a child I thought that he was Street Nick, but I digress.

I always knew that one day it would happen, that one day it would come to this. It was clear to me that the fat old man in the red suit would come looking for me. In kindergarten I was the boy who told the other children that Santa Claus was a fake, a phony and a charlatan. I can still see their confused faces.

Have you ever seen a kid who can't spell his own name try and say charlatan. It wasn't fair or funny what I did that day. I left the teacher with a real conundrum, but that is a separate tale for a different time and place.

Old St. Nick is not as jolly as some would like to portray him. You see when they speak of him making a list of who is naughty and nice they leave out part of the story. The nice children, well they get presents, cool toys to play with, bright and shiny.

But the naughty kids get something else and it is not a pleasant experience or so I had always been told.

The night it went down was no different from any other evening in Los Angeles. It was a little after 1 am and I was coming home from a night out with some friends. I was tired having fought six crips, eight bloods and a pack of girl scouts who were angry that I never paid for the pallet of Thin Mint cookies they had sold to me that spring.

On top of all that I had emptied three clips on the freeway and the worst part was that during the gunfight I had somehow managed to drop my best gun out of the window of my car. So by the time I rolled up to my driveway I was more than a little cranky.

He must have been planning this hit for a while because when I got out of the car he was waiting for me. I was walking up the driveway and towards the front door when I was knocked to the ground. I didn't see him jump off of the roof but I sure felt the weight of that fat bastard. The impact knocked the wind out of me. I was stunned and for a moment completely bewildered.

But the beauty of being a Taurus is that I am very much like the bull, minus the horns, hooves and ring through the nose. I pawed the ground, snorted and flung the old fat man off of me. I stood up and wiped the dirt off my face and prepared to unleash one angry Jew on that poor excuse of a man.

For a moment we stood and stared at each other. We circled right and circled left, it was the ugliest hora you have ever seen. And then finally from somewhere deep inside me came this guttural noise and I was on top of him. Punching, kicking, fish hooking and gouging we went at it. We rolled around in combat like Gandalf and the Balrog.

It was ugly and it was mean. I had never pegged Santa as a biter, but to this day my right shoulder bears the scars from his jaws. I had to tear out close to half of his beard but I finally got him to release. The pain was considerable.

After what seemed like an eternity I finally got the upper hand on him and I gradually made it clear that I was going to make him pay. The old fool must have had a contingency plan in place just in case something like this happened because he was rescued by a squad of commando elves and reindeers just when I was really beginning to press my advantage.

They swooped in and took him from me and instead of being able to claim victory I was forced to accept that I had won the battle but not the war. He is still out there and he remembers the pain and the shame. I am still on that list and someday he will come back and try to finish what he started.

And now each winter I watch the sky. I scan the horizon for signs of him. I pay close attention to the dark and I never forget that somewhere there is a fat man in a red suit looking for me. I never forget that the gift he brings will be bitter.

One day we will meet again, oh yes, one day we will find out the who really is the better man.