Happy Christmas!

Christmas, they say, is "the most wonderful time of the year". But that probably depends upon exactly where one is celebrating it. In Prussia, for example, or other areas in the civilised parts of Europe, there is no doubt some truth to this adage. Christmas in such places probably has more of the sorts of things usually associated with having a good time: mulled wine, potato dumplings, stollen, and red cabbage for those interested in some family feasting; or heavy battle, bayonet charges, and cruelty to captured Russian prisoners for those interested in a more active festive period.

'Foreigners: Coming Over Here at Christmas, Stealing Our Chairs' 

In Mittelheim, on the other hand, Christmas could truthfully only be described as "relatively speaking, the least violent time of the year". Overall, most times in Mittelheim for ordinary folk vary from the deeply unpleasant and usually quite painful, to the mediocre and probably quite damp. Christmas is thus "most wonderful" only because even the most venal and arbitrary of aristocrats tend to take the day off. In a Mittelheim Christmas, 'tis the season to be less miserable than usual. Surprisingly, this sentiment hasn't been turned into a jolly festive song. And so, if Christmas in Mittelheim is a time for good cheer, it is a good cheer from the locals when doing terrible things to any foreigners that they can find.

As this year winds slowly to an end, have a happy Christmas; and we hope that the coming year brings you more in the way of joy and less in the way of enemy siege parallels.