It’s that time of year. To take a tree cut down in the prime of it’s laugh and place it in our homes to dry out in a salute to a holiday.
When you think about it, I’m pretty sure there wasn’t an evergreen in sight of the manger scene, yet the Christmas tree has pretty much become one of the more dominant symbols of the holiday (outside of Santa, who was also not present that day)
The decision of choosing the right tree is a tricky one. You’ve got to figure out which breed of tree you want, how tall, how much you’re willing to pay, how fresh the tree is (or how fresh they claim).
We get two: one for our huge dining area, the other for the living room. Maybe because it doubles the odds we’ll get it right. Then again, it doubles the cash outlay.
And on that topic, how much should you pay for a good-looking tree? Again, in three weeks or so, we’ll be tossing it out in the yard to be picked up by scouts, or burned in the backyard barbecue pit when I don’t think anyone is looking.  Truth be told, I love a good Christmas tree bargain.  Last year, on December 23rd, I drove by a lot that had a sign that read, “Free Christmas Trees”.  I stopped, tied one to the car and took it home.  It just sat in our yard and I had to deal with getting rid of it, with the bottom line: I got a FREE Christmas tree!
But I digress, and quite well.
Of course, you can find the “Charlie Brown” trees for $9.99 if you look hard enough. I do like a sparse tree, so that your ornaments don’t look like they were plastered on the side of it. But this Noble Fir craze is insane. I don’t care if they take longer to grow. That’s not my fault.
I will confess that one year, in a previous life, I was party to spending over $80 for a tree. I can only imagine how fine that Single Malt Scotch would have been, had the money been used the way I would have liked.
Christmas trees are awesome: they make the house smell sweet, the add brightness and a festive feel to the room and heck, it’s only for a couple of weeks a year.
Then again, you need to water ’em, there are needles everywhere and they keep falling over if you’re not good at that tree stand thing.
Oh, well. ‘Tis the season. Besides the presents have to have something to go under.
Pick out a good one, would ya?

Tim Hunter