First Fruits

For today's non-Christmas post, I thought we'd take a look at Kwanzaa.  According to the Official Kwanzaa Website:

Kwanzaa was created in 1966 by Dr. Maulana Karenga, professor of Africana Studies at California State University, Long Beach, author and scholar-activist who stresses the indispensable need to preserve, continually revitalize and promote African American culture.


Finally, it is important to note Kwanzaa is a cultural holiday, not a religious one, thus available to and practiced by Africans of all religious faiths who come together based on the rich, ancient and varied common ground of their Africanness.

It's a time of reaffirming bonds, remembering the past, and committing to bring out the best of the culture.  It's a beautiful, ritualistic, week-long celebration (Dec. 26-Jan. 1), encompassing the seven principals of unity, self-determination, cooperative economics, creativity, collective work and responsibility, purpose, and faith.  Candles are lit.  There is a day of meditation.  Children are given gifts (generally a book and a symbol of the holiday).  Having never been a part of a Kwanzaa celebration, I can only go by what I've read, but it sounds lovely.

If you happen to be in the market for a children's Kwanzaa book, About.com has a list of their favorites, with #1 being National Geographic's Celebrate Kwanzaa:  With Candles, Community, and the Fruits of the Harvest.  MSRP $15.95. 

In unrelated news, the holidays are starting to stress me out.  To start with, I had to stand in the same ridiculously long line at Walmart twice because I picked up an item without a tag, and the cashier didn't feel like looking it up, nor would he give me back the other couple of it so I could find another register with a shorter line after going and finding a tag.  Last night, I spent twenty-five minutes in line at a drive-thru, only to find out that the coupon I'd just gotten in the mail was only good in a town several hours away.  Left there and went to a different drive-thru and got yelled at because no one was around to swipe my card.  Apparently, that was my fault.  Now, I have a mysterious return fee on my bank account, but haven't returned anything.  I can only assume that an item I ordered was returned by the post office by accident, but the only thing I haven't received has not had a valid tracking number, and the drugstore.com customer service line broke up and hung up on me twice.  I've now tried emailing, and will hopefully hear back soon.  If I've been charged $6 on a $15 purchase because the post office failed to deliver my package, I'm going to be livid.  And yes, you'll hear all about it.  Bah, Humbug!

***UPDATE***

So....I finally got a hold of a real person, Elton, at drugstore.com.  I would like to thank Elton for being an awesome human being.  Seriously.  He had the same experience I had:  saw it had been shipped, but no tracking number.  The return fees were not from them, but since it hadn't shown up (and should have), he sent out a new one and upgraded the shipping so it wouldn't have to go through the post office.  Not only that, he did it all with a sweet attitude.  I heart Elton.  Thank you for restoring my faith in humanity.  Excuse me, but now I have to go call my bank.