Gifts Time! ✨🎁✨

Did this one while I was on my way to the United States! Decided to add the Cratchit kids because a grumpy old man is never complete without his reluctantly adopted kids XD

I’m very tempted to actually colour this one so I’ll try and do that soon!

Thoughts on the design for Bob Cratchit?

The last time I tried to answer this my app crashed so here's to that

Anyway I love his design.

He looks a bit gaunt and pointy and like he's cold constantly and that already gives him some story which I think they did very well, it immediately sets him differently from some of the other characters.

He's more colorful/vibrant generally than you'd expect which gives him the warmth he shows others visually, he constantly looks so caring (about his family), they do his expressions well.

Might help that I'm a sucker for a redhead and that I think heterochromia is stunning but idk I love it.

I swear the first time I wrote this I had more to say, but I think his design is good.

On Christmas

An Essay on Christmas by G.K. Chesterton On Christmas an essay by G. K. Chesterton from All Things Considered, London 1908, plus some links to other posts about Christmas Festival, markets and stories What life and death may be to a turkey is not my business; but the soul of Scrooge and the body of Cratchit are my business. G.K. Chesterton Any one thinking of the Holy Child as born in December would mean by it exactly what we mean by it; that Christ is not merely a summer sun of the prosperous but a winter fire for the unfortunate. G.K. Chesterton The great majority of people will go on observing forms that cannot be explained; they will keep Christmas Day with Christmas gifts and Christmas benedictions; they will continue to do it; and some day suddenly wake up and discover why. G.K. Chesterton Christmas is built upon a beautiful and intentional paradox; that the birth of the homeless should be celebrated in every home. G. K. Chesterton There is no more dangerous or disgusting habit than that of celebrating Christmas before it comes, as I am doing in this article. It is the very essence of a festival that it breaks upon one brilliantly and abruptly, that at one moment the great day is not and the next moment the great day is. Up to a certain specific instant you are feeling ordinary and sad; for it is only Wednesday. At the next moment your heart leaps up and your soul and body dance together like lovers; for in one burst and blaze it has become Thursday. I am assuming (of course) that you are a worshipper of Thor, and that you celebrate his day once a week, possibly with human sacrifice. If, on the other hand, you are a modern Christian Englishman, you hail (of course) with the same explosion of gaiety the appearance of the English Sunday. But I say that whatever the day is that is to you festive or symbolic, it is essential that there should be a quite clear black line between it and the time going before. And all the old wholesome customs in connection with Christmas were to the effect that one should not touch or see or know or speak of something before the actual coming of Christmas Day. Thus, for instance, children were never given their presents until the actual coming of the appointed hour. The presents were kept tied up in brown-paper parcels, out of which an arm of a doll or the leg of a donkey sometimes accidentally stuck. I wish this principle were adopted in respect of modern Christmas ceremonies and publications. Especially it ought to be observed in connection with what are called the Christmas numbers of magazines. The editors of the magazines bring out their Christmas numbers so long before the time that the reader is more likely to be still lamenting for the turkey of last year than to have seriously settled down to a solid anticipation of the turkey which is to come. Christmas numbers of magazines ought to be tied up in brown paper and kept for Christmas Day. On consideration, I should favour the editors being tied up in brown paper. Whether the leg or arm of an editor should ever be allowed to protrude I leave to individual choice. Of course, all this secrecy about Christmas is merely sentimental and ceremonial; if you do not like what is sentimental and ceremonial, do not celebrate Christmas at all. You will not be punished if you don't; also, since we are no longer ruled by those sturdy Puritans who won for us civil and religious liberty, you will not even be punished if you do. But I cannot understand why any one should bother about a ceremonial except ceremonially. If a thing only exists in order to be graceful, do it gracefully or do not do it. If a thing only exists as something professing to be solemn, do it solemnly or do not do it. There is no sense in doing it slouchingly; nor is there even any liberty. I can understand the man who takes off his hat to a lady because it is the customary symbol. I can understand him, I say; in fact, I know him quite intimately. I can also understand the man who refuses to take off his hat to a lady, like the old Quakers, because he thinks that a symbol is superstition. But what point would there be in so performing an arbitrary form of respect that it was not a form of respect? We respect the gentleman who takes off his hat to the lady; we respect the fanatic who will not take off his hat to the lady. But what should we think of the man who kept his hands in his pockets and asked the lady to take his hat off for him because he felt tired? This is combining insolence and superstition; and the modern world is full of the strange combination. There is no mark of the immense weak-mindedness of modernity that is more striking than this general disposition to keep up old forms, but to keep them up informally and feebly. Why take something which was only meant to be respectful and preserve it disrespectfully? Why take something which you could easily abolish as a superstition and carefully perpetuate it as a bore? There have been many instances of this half-witted compromise. Was it not true, for instance, that the other day some mad American was trying to buy Glastonbury Abbey and transfer it stone by stone to America? Such things are not only illogical, but idiotic. There is no particular reason why a pushing American financier should pay respect to Glastonbury Abbey at all. But if he is to pay respect to Glastonbury Abbey, he must pay respect to Glastonbury. If it is a matter of sentiment, why should he spoil the scene? If it is not a matter of sentiment, why should he ever have visited the scene? To call this kind of thing Vandalism is a very inadequate and unfair description. The Vandals were very sensible people. They did not believe in a religion, and so they insulted it; they did not see any use for certain buildings, and so they knocked them down. But they were not such fools as to encumber their march with the fragments of the edifice they had themselves spoilt. They were at least superior to the modern American mode of reasoning. They did not desecrate the stones because they held them sacred.

It is not uncommon nowadays for the insane extremes in reality to meet. G.K. Chesterton Another instance of the same illogicality I observed the other day at some kind of "At Home." I saw what appeared to be a human being dressed in a black evening-coat, black dress-waistcoat, and black dress-trousers, but with a shirt-front made of Jaegar wool. What can be the sense of this sort of thing? If a man thinks hygiene more important than convention (a selfish and heathen view, for the beasts that perish are more hygienic than man, and man is only above them because he is more conventional), if, I say, a man thinks that hygiene is more important than convention, what on earth is there to oblige him to wear a shirt-front at all? But to take a costume of which the only conceivable cause or advantage is that it is a sort of uniform, and then not wear it in the uniform way—this is to be neither a Bohemian nor a gentleman. It is a foolish affectation, I think, in an English officer of the Life Guards never to wear his uniform if he can help it. But it would be more foolish still if he showed himself about town in a scarlet coat and a Jaeger breast-plate. It is the custom nowadays to have Ritual Commissions and Ritual Reports to make rather unmeaning compromises in the ceremonial of the Church of England. So perhaps we shall have an ecclesiastical compromise by which all the Bishops shall wear Jaeger copes and Jaeger mitres. Similarly the King might insist on having a Jaeger crown. But I do not think he will, for he understands the logic of the matter better than that. The modern monarch, like a reasonable fellow, wears his crown as seldom as he can; but if he does it at all, then the only point of a crown is that it is a crown. So let me assure the unknown gentleman in the woollen vesture that the only point of a white shirt-front is that it is a white shirt-front. Stiffness may be its impossible defect; but it is certainly its only possible merit. Let us be consistent, therefore, about Christmas, and either keep customs or not keep them. If you do not like sentiment and symbolism, you do not like Christmas; go away and celebrate something else; I should suggest the birthday of Mr. M'Cabe. No doubt you could have a sort of scientific Christmas with a hygienic pudding and highly instructive presents stuffed into a Jaeger stocking; go and have it then. If you like those things, doubtless you are a good sort of fellow, and your intentions are excellent. I have no doubt that you are really interested in humanity; but I cannot think that humanity will ever be much interested in you. Humanity is unhygienic from its very nature and beginning. It is so much an exception in Nature that the laws of Nature really mean nothing to it. Now Christmas is attacked also on the humanitarian ground. Ouida called it a feast of slaughter and gluttony. Mr. Shaw suggested that it was invented by poulterers. That should be considered before it becomes more considerable. I do not know whether an animal killed at Christmas has had a better or a worse time than it would have had if there had been no Christmas or no Christmas dinners. But I do know that the fighting and suffering brotherhood to which I belong and owe everything, Mankind, would have a much worse time if there were no such thing as Christmas or Christmas dinners. Whether the turkey which Scrooge gave to Bob Cratchit had experienced a lovelier or more melancholy career than that of less attractive turkeys is a subject upon which I cannot even conjecture. But that Scrooge was better for giving the turkey and Cratchit happier for getting it I know as two facts, as I know that I have two feet. What life and death may be to a turkey is not my business; but the soul of Scrooge and the body of Cratchit are my business. Nothing shall induce me to darken human homes, to destroy human festivities, to insult human gifts and human benefactions for the sake of some hypothetical knowledge which Nature curtained from our eyes. We men and women are all in the same boat, upon a stormy sea. We owe to each other a terrible and tragic loyalty. If we catch sharks for food, let them be killed most mercifully; let any one who likes love the sharks, and pet the sharks, and tie ribbons round their necks and give them sugar and teach them to dance. But if once a man suggests that a shark is to be valued against a sailor, or that the poor shark might be permitted to bite off a nigger's leg occasionally; then I would court-martial the man—he is a traitor to the ship. And while I take this view of humanitarianism of the anti-Christmas kind, it is cogent to say that I am a strong anti-vivisectionist. That is, if there is any vivisection, I am against it. I am against the cutting-up of conscious dogs for the same reason that I am in favour of the eating of dead turkeys. The connection may not be obvious; but that is because of the strangely unhealthy condition of modern thought. I am against cruel vivisection as I am against a cruel anti-Christmas asceticism, because they both involve the upsetting of existing fellowships and the shocking of normal good feelings for the sake of something that is intellectual, fanciful, and remote. It is not a human thing, it is not a humane thing, when you see a poor woman staring hungrily at a bloater, to think, not of the obvious feelings of the woman, but of the unimaginable feelings of the deceased bloater. Similarly, it is not human, it is not humane, when you look at a dog to think about what theoretic discoveries you might possibly make if you were allowed to bore a hole in his head. Both the humanitarians' fancy about the feelings concealed inside the bloater, and the vivisectionists' fancy about the knowledge concealed inside the dog, are unhealthy fancies, because they upset a human sanity that is certain for the sake of something that is of necessity uncertain. The vivisectionist, for the sake of doing something that may or may not be useful, does something that certainly is horrible. The anti-Christmas humanitarian, in seeking to have a sympathy with a turkey which no man can have with a turkey, loses the sympathy he has already with the happiness of millions of the poor. It is not uncommon nowadays for the insane extremes in reality to meet. Thus I have always felt that brutal Imperialism and Tolstoian non-resistance were not only not opposite, but were the same thing. They are the same contemptible thought that conquest cannot be resisted, looked at from the two standpoints of the conqueror and the conquered. Thus again teetotalism and the really degraded gin-selling and dram-drinking have exactly the same moral philosophy. They are both based on the idea that fermented liquor is not a drink, but a drug. But I am specially certain that the extreme of vegetarian humanity is, as I have said, akin to the extreme of scientific cruelty—they both permit a dubious speculation to interfere with their ordinary charity. The sound moral rule in such matters as vivisection always presents itself to me in this way. There is no ethical necessity more essential and vital than this: that casuistical exceptions, though admitted, should be admitted as exceptions. And it follows from this, I think, that, though we may do a horrid thing in a horrid situation, we must be quite certain that we actually and already are in that situation. Thus, all sane moralists admit that one may sometimes tell a lie; but no sane moralist would approve of telling a little boy to practise telling lies, in case he might one day have to tell a justifiable one. Thus, morality has often justified shooting a robber or a burglar. But it would not justify going into the village Sunday school and shooting all the little boys who looked as if they might grow up into burglars. The need may arise; but the need must have arisen. It seems to me quite clear that if you step across this limit you step off a precipice.

Christmas decorations Now, whether torturing an animal is or is not an immoral thing, it is, at least, a dreadful thing. It belongs to the order of exceptional and even desperate acts. Except for some extraordinary reason I would not grievously hurt an animal; with an extraordinary reason I would grievously hurt him. If (for example) a mad elephant were pursuing me and my family, and I could only shoot him so that he would die in agony, he would have to die in agony. But the elephant would be there. I would not do it to a hypothetical elephant. Now, it always seems to me that this is the weak point in the ordinary vivisectionist argument, "Suppose your wife were dying." Vivisection is not done by a man whose wife is dying. If it were it might be lifted to the level of the moment, as would be lying or stealing bread, or any other ugly action. But this ugly action is done in cold blood, at leisure, by men who are not sure that it will be of any use to anybody—men of whom the most that can be said is that they may conceivably make the beginnings of some discovery which may perhaps save the life of some one else's wife in some remote future. That is too cold and distant to rob an act of its immediate horror. That is like training the child to tell lies for the sake of some great dilemma that may never come to him. You are doing a cruel thing, but not with enough passion to make it a kindly one. So much for why I am an anti-vivisectionist; and I should like to say, in conclusion, that all other anti-vivisectionists of my acquaintance weaken their case infinitely by forming this attack on a scientific speciality in which the human heart is commonly on their side, with attacks upon universal human customs in which the human heart is not at all on their side. I have heard humanitarians, for instance, speak of vivisection and field sports as if they were the same kind of thing. The difference seems to me simple and enormous. In sport a man goes into a wood and mixes with the existing life of that wood; becomes a destroyer only in the simple and healthy sense in which all the creatures are destroyers; becomes for one moment to them what they are to him - another animal. In vivisection a man takes a simpler creature and subjects it to subtleties which no one but man could inflict on him, and for which man is therefore gravely and terribly responsible. Meanwhile, it remains true that I shall eat a great deal of turkey this Christmas; and it is not in the least true (as the vegetarians say) that I shall do it because I do not realise what I am doing, or because I do what I know is wrong, or that I do it with shame or doubt or a fundamental unrest of conscience. In one sense I know quite well what I am doing; in another sense I know quite well that I know not what I do. Scrooge and the Cratchits and I are, as I have said, all in one boat; the turkey and I are, to say the most of it, ships that pass in the night, and greet each other in passing. I wish him well; but it is really practically impossible to discover whether I treat him well. I can avoid, and I do avoid with horror, all special and artificial tormenting of him, sticking pins in him for fun or sticking knives in him for scientific investigation. But whether by feeding him slowly and killing him quickly for the needs of my brethren, I have improved in his own solemn eyes his own strange and separate destiny, whether I have made him in the sight of God a slave or a martyr, or one whom the gods love and who die young—that is far more removed from my possibilities of knowledge than the most abstruse intricacies of mysticism or theology. A turkey is more occult and awful than all the angels and archangels In so far as God has partly revealed to us an angelic world, he has partly told us what an angel means. But God has never told us what a turkey means. And if you go and stare at a live turkey for an hour or two, you will find by the end of it that the enigma has rather increased than diminished. "Christmas" from All Things Considered. G.K. Chesterton. London: Methuen & Co., 1908. Read also: Christmas quotes ; 60 great Christmas quotes ; Christmas markets in England ; Christmas markets in America ; Christmas Read the full article

The Cratchit

I'm watching A Christmas Carol with George C. Scott, my fave, and I keep wondering why the Cratchits kept having kids when they were so poor. The have 6 kids in ACC and can barely afford a goose for Christmas. Did it never occur to them to stop having kids after the first one when it was obvious they couldn't afford them? Or, was it simply a matter of poor budgeting and wasting money on nonsense?

Gather around the fire for A Christmas Carol at Firehall Arts Centre

Like a radio play come to life, gather around for a cozy one-man retelling of A Christmas Carol at @FirehallArtsCte until December 24th

Until December 24th, The Firehall Arts Centre presents Blue Bridge Repertory Theatre production of A Christmas Carol. Gather around the fire as star Sanjay Talwar recounts Dickens’ classic performing all 40 characters in this one-man performance. A Christmas Carol starring Sanjay Talwar at Firehall Arts Centre until December 24th photo: Jam Hamidi Upon entering the atmospheric theatre, Hans…

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merry christmas! and if you don't celebrate christmas (or even if you do) then still have a holly jolly non-denominationally good golly holiday time! thaaats right ❤️ here's your daily dose of joey richter for today

the gang’s all here!!

It's priceless!

30 years of Muppet Christmas Carol! Oh how I love this movie. It just is so comforting. Muppets make stories better; that’s just science. #muppetchristmascarol

www.instagram.com/pbandjillian

HOT TAKE FESTIVE SEASON!

PRELIMINARY #248

Submission 877

idc if it makes me a bad person i want to punt tiny tim into the fucking sun

"oh i hope people see me in church and remember who made lame beggars walk and blind men see" bro stfu you are 7 years old

also blatant favoritism in the cratchit household

Propaganda is always encouraged!

And remember to reblog your favourite polls to spread festive cheer!

Behold! The Joey Richter family tree!

it's still sorta a WIP currently because I'm trying to watch more Starcanwrecked stuff to see if I can potentially fit more.

And now.. some.. headcanons and backstory about the family!

McDoon, being the bandit king ( ✌️) had a LOT of bastard children on his travels with Cletus. He slept around and never really stuck around. Before the events of TTO he knocked up a Cratchit, who got pregnant and moved out of the country in shame. There, the Cratchit family was made and when Owen moved back to the US the family was moved there.

Robert Cratchit is short for Bob btw

I imagine Bob, out of desperation, in this timeline would resort to.. extreme measures trying to save Tim. And by extreme I mean summoning an eldritch god.

Suffice to say, it did not end well and now Tinky has a new family hyperfixation.

Owen found out about Tinky through spy shit, on a mission to a little town in Michigan. Tinky saw this British bastard and was like 'descendant of the Cratchits? GIMME' and started tormenting Owen. One of the ways he did this, was taking the form of Owen's boyfriend.

The reason Dan's last name is different from the rest of the Spankoffskis is that he changed it. 'Dan Spankoffski' does not have as nice of a ring to it and he's a public figure. Despite that, he's still relatively active in the family.

Dan is not short for anything. Not Jordan, not Daniel, no. Its just Dan. And he is Danough

Dan and Ted both looked extremely similar growing up and were constantly confused for each other. It didn't help when both of them happened to start growing a mustache at the same time.

OT and Pete have a pact not to ever do anything similar in terms of appearance. Pete grows his hair out? OT will always cut it. OT starts growing a mustache? Pete starts shaving. They really don't wanna end up like their brothers.

OT is older then Pete, being around Lex and Ethan's age.

SPEAKING OF ETHAN he unironically calls Pete, Dan, and Ted uncle. The only one he doesn't is OT, who he constantly bullies and targets for no reason.

Dan and Ted were surprisingly close in their childhoods, and had this sort of understandimg that the other was the only one who got how they felt.

As they grew apart however, Ted secretly started growing jealous of Dan. How come HE had this perfect life and great job and great 'girlfriend' but all Ted had was this shitty ass tech job and being the sidehoe to his coworker?

Dan has never noticed this jealousy and still remains nice as hell to Ted.

Dan and Ted both teamed up on bullying their younger siblings.

Dan and OT are surprisingly close. OT comes back from college (He goes to U of M) once a month or so and comes back to hang out with his big bro.

One of the reasons Dan took up the volunteer counseler job was to keep a closer eye on Pete and make sure he doesn't get bullied. So far, it has not worked out at all.

Pretty much no one knows Dan is part of the Spankoffski family, so Pete has to hear Ruth talk about how hot the news anchor is and Ethan has to listen to Lex rant about her mom's stupid obsession.

Dan and Ted are LITERAL bastards somehow being both teenage pregnancies and their parents had Pete and OT when they were more ready. Once again, blame Tinky.

SPEAKING OF TINKY he loves tormenting this family but can't keep track of them whatsoever. Sometimes he'll follow one of them home only to realise that it was the wrong one.

Sometimes he appears at family reunions and people just assume he's someone's kid.

One time Donna was literally walking down the street and did a double take seeing Ted just casually flirting with the Greenpeace Girl. 5 minutes later she saw Dan while doing the show and was so confused.

The family is stereotyped as this slutty family of hopeless romantics by the town, which is secretly another one of the reasons Dan changed his last name.

How true is this stereotype? Well, you got both Dan and Ted being teenage pregnancies. Both of them being born on Valentines Day. Ted notoriously sleeping with half the town. Dan being on the same show with a woman who he constantly makes googly eyes at and is possibly in love with (the entire damn town ships them together) Pete somehow surviving being horny at the damn ABSTINENCE CAMP of all places. Ethan literally doing anything for Lex. Suffice to say the entire town has their eyes on OT and what shenanigans he'll get up to.

Which is why I think it would be very funny if it turned out that OT was aroace and will never experience those feelings.

Whenever they get together they like teasing each other about their love lives.

Dan eventually becomes the central target in their teasing, with them BEGGING to know what's up with him and Donna.

The family used to get together every week to watch their favourite tv show, Doctor Who. Yes, I am aware of the irony of the Spankoffskis liking Doctor Who.

They feel an odd sense of... companionship with the homeless guy from downtown. They don't know why, they just DO.

And last but not least.... Every single one of them eventually gets stuck in the Bastard's box. Doesn't matter how or when, Tinky will get them.

And that's about it! What do you guys think?

bob cratchit!

I'm reading along with A Dickens December, though I haven't managed to post about it so far.

I'll just make one comment for now:

An underrated detail from the original book of A Christmas Carol is the fact that Bob Cratchit is only called "the clerk" in the first chapter. His name isn't revealed until much later, when the Ghost of Christmas Present takes Scrooge to his house to see his family.

This wouldn't work in a screen or stage adaptation. The audience usually needs to know the names of the major characters, unless there's an important plot reason for hiding a name.

But in the book it's subtle genius, because it's how Scrooge sees him. Like a typical selfish rich person, Scrooge doesn't give much thought to Bob's humanity at first; he's just the clerk, who works for Scrooge and whom Scrooge has to pay more than he wants to. His wife and children are even less; in Scrooge's eyes, they're just financial burdens on Bob. But the ghosts force him to see Bob and his family as human beings, who have thoughts and feelings, who love each other, and who will suffer unless Scrooge changes his ways. How appropriate that at this point, the narrator shifts from calling Bob just "the clerk" to calling him "Bob Cratchit."

@ariel-seagull-wings, @cliozaur

Once again I am delighted that Dickens took the time on what Bob does after work. This poor man who had to spend all day freezing his ass off and listening to his boss tell people why it's fine if he and his family starve to death or something? He went sledding and stopped to play a game on his way home. Just because he can. It's maybe my favorite little detail in this story.

Bob "Babygirl" Cratchit

❤ a collection ❤