Mr. Leboykin has a most irritating problem which we’re sure many of our readers have experienced.

Every year I like to visit the nativity scene with friends and family at a Catholic church next to our old town plaza. Unfortunately, a small band of knotty-haired, ragamuffin THC storage units likes to set up in the gazebo in the public park next to the church and beat loudly on drums without any hint of an attempt at “music.” Ninety-nine percent of the people in old town seem angry at these crack heads. How can I rid these malodorous vermin from the innocent lives of my neighbors and from my Christmas without going to jail for the holidays?”

Bayard:

Thank you for such a colorful question. I think the key to this is to remember that holidays are about family. This is the perfect opportunity to make lifelong family memories.

Give your children large soft drinks and send them over to the drummers. Tell them that if they just happen to trip and pour their drinks all over the drum heads, they should run like hell to the back of the church, where you will pick them up and take them for ice cream. Reassure your kids that stoned people can’t run fast enough to catch them. In the end, your kids are happy with their ice cream, you’ve made some cherished family memories, and you’ve spread cheer to the 99% of the people in the plaza who prefer Silent Night to The Little Stoned Drummer Boy.

Holmes:

Organize people from 6 or more different addresses in the neighborhood to send a concerted letter of complaint to the mayor’s office politely insisting that the criminal drummers not be allowed to interfere with the holiday festivities. To an elected official, six addresses of voters complaining is an election crisis. Given the choice between making a phone call to the police or pissing off six or more households of voters, the mayor will act in his or her own self interest and make that call.

The alternative is to hire street people to urinate on the drummers, which is more fun and creates jobs for the unemployed. If that isn’t spreading holiday cheer in this crappy economy, I don’t know what is.

image by Daniel Schwen, wikimedia commons

Another reader, Ms. Rosenblum, asks, “How do I get my husband to put up Christmas lights?”

Bayard:

Ah! What an opportunity for marriage enrichment this is. There are only three sentences in the Happy Man Manual. 1) Feed me. 2) Feed my ego. 3) Feed my libido. A happy man is a pliable man so doing any two of these should result in a house so bright you’ll be wearing sunglasses at midnight.

Cook your husband his favorite dinner, then get out the ladder and the lights yourself. Struggle with them. Make a production of how awkward the lights are and climb the ladder slowly. It’s a nice touch if you can quiver a bit, but not so much that he’s suspicious. Then, with feeling, call him over and fall off of the second or third rung into his arms. Tell him how strong he is, and how safe you feel with him. This should feed his ego and ignite his primal, protective urges, making him want to climb that ladder and handle the job. He gets two requirements met from his manual, and you get enough Christmas lights to cause airline traffic confusion. (Note: If he doesn’t bother catching you, get a better husband.)

Holmes:

That one is too easy. I’m surprised you’re still married, and I don’t know how anything gets done around your house. Tell him you have a fantasy about being violated by a skilled Christmas decorator. We men are really easy. Feel free to use that against us.

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *

*Piper Bayard is a belly dancer from way back and a recovering attorney with a university degree or two. She currently pens post-apocalyptic sci-fi and spy novels with Holmes when she isn’t shooting, SCUBA diving, or chauffeuring her children.

 ‘Jay Holmes’, is an intelligence veteran of the Cold War and remains an anonymous member of the intelligence community. Piper is the public face of their partnership.

Bayard & Holmes blog at Bayard & Holmes. You may contact them in blog comments, on Twitter at, on Facebook at , or by email at . 

© 2012 Piper Bayard. All content on this page is protected by copyright. If you would like to use any part of this, please contact us at the above links to request permission.