Deck the Halls

It's taken me a while to really get in a Christmas mood, mostly because I don't think people should act any more cheerful or generous or kind just because there's a holiday comin' around. It's not Santa's got short term memory loss, if you're an ass the rest of the year you're still getting coal. :-P

But there is something unique and special about this time of year, and I'm officially "in the spirit" now. My family, the mother of my mom's late friend, and I went to the Lasalette Shrine in Attleboro, MA tonight. This was my first year to see it, but every year they have a Festival of Lights. Literally, thousands of lights all over their massive park/shrine/whatever you want to call it. Thousands. It's incredible. It's the sort of thing that you should capture on camera.
...except none of us could think that far ahead. We also had to take it all in in a quick 15 minute tour before they shut the lights off for the night.

I've Googled it so that I could show some pictures from various places on the web. These pictures come from this site and the official Lasalette Shrine site. I don't think they're from this year, and they do not even come close to capturing the magic of the event, but I thought I'd give you a taste anyways.