In time for the holidays, "Scared of Santa" photos

By Laura MacNeil
October 3, 2012
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Courtesy <em>Scared of Santa: Scenes of Terror in Toyland</em>

During the weeks leading up to Christmas, in every shopping mall in every town, parents line up with their fidgety kids for an adorable photo of them on Santa's lap. Only it doesn't always work out that way. And hundreds of readers of the Chicago Tribune submitted the photographic proof.

Two of the newspaper's editors, Denise Joyce and Nancy Watkins, collected and captioned 250 of the most astounding shots of Santa poses gone awry and published them in the recently released book Scared of Santa: Scenes of Terror in Toyland ($10).

To get you into the true spirit of the holidays, click here for a slideshow of our 15 absolute favorites, with condensed captions from the book. Ho, ho, ho—or rather, Ha, ha, ha!

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This weekend: Festive yachts parade in Newport Beach's bay, a 100-year tradition

California's Newport Beach Christmas Boat Parade, an event likened to the Tournament of Roses (the huge parade before the Rose Bowl football game), is celebrating its 100th birthday this year. About 100 boats are participating, from kayaks to huge yachts. They'll parade around 14 miles of Newport Beach's bay and channels, in view of businesses, homes, and public beaches (there's a detailed map and timetable here.) The parade usually attracts 1 million viewers a year&mdash;and boat owners really get into it. Word is that some have spent $50,000 adorning their yachts in Christmas lights, creating elaborate scenes with huge Christmas trees, gingerbread men, candy canes, and Santas (surrounded by palm trees&mdash;this is Southern Cali, after all). The parade has been around in some incarnation for 100 years, but it wasn't until 1946 that the event was moved from a summer contest to a holiday one. In that year, city employees decorated a barge with a lighted Christmas tree that they towed around the harbor, entertaining residents with live Christmas caroling. Newport Beach is an Orange County resort town on one of California's skinny peninsulas that jut out into the Pacific. Wednesday through Sunday, 6:30 p.m. (finishes around 9:00 p.m.) At 6:25 p.m. on Wednesday, there will be fireworks to celebrate the parade's 100th birthday. Organizers suggest you arrive early to avoid traffic and to get parking; all the city's lots will be open. MORE Seattle also has a holiday boat parade And so does Portland PREVIOUSLY Exclusive: New York's holiday windows as festive as ever

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New York City: Hertz starts "pay as you go" car rentals

Hertz, the world's largest car rental company, has just launched a car-sharing service in New York City, London, and Paris, called Connect. Here's how it works in N.Y.C.: A $50 annual membership fee enables you to rent cars by the hour or day. Rates start at $10 an hour and vary by type of vehicle. Cars are parked in designated spots around town. Members reserve cars online, use a card to unlock the car, and find the keys inside. Gas and insurance are included. Some cool perks: a GPS system, EZ pass for electronic payment of tolls (which are billed to your credit card automatically), and an iPod hookup that links to the car's stereo system. You can also connect wirelessly to Hertz's 24-hour Member Care Center if you need help. The first 180 miles are free, but then you'll be charged 45 cents a mile afterwards. The new service is part of Hertz's green initiatives (which we've blogged about before). The cars in the fleet include the Toyota Prius and the BMW Mini Cooper. Connect is strikingly similar to Zipcar. We'll see how things play out as Hertz adds 20 cities to its list in 2009. PREVIOUSLY A bug in Hertz's system? Hertz guarantees a car in 10 minutes or less

Inspiration

Evoking Hong Kong: Q&A with the author of 'The Piano Teacher'

In her first novel, a high stakes love story, Janice Y.K. Lee keenly describes the expat social whirl and everyday flavor of Hong Kong, shifting between 1952 and the tumultuous Japanese invasion in late 1941. Out on January 13, The Piano Teacher has already won praise from big names like Gary Shteyngart (Absurdistan) and Elizabeth Gilbert (Eat, Pray, Love). Flipping through a review copy at work, I found myself immediately swept up&#8212;in part because of a personal connection. I've been to Hong Kong repeatedly as my husband, like Lee, grew up there in a non-Chinese family. I e-mailed Lee, curious about where to find traces of the old Hong Kong she depicts, how the expat community has changed, and what she makes of the local cultural scene. Read on for Lee's perspective and a video of her discussing the novel&hellip; How did you go about researching the Hong Kong of the '40s and '50s? I read a lot of memoirs by people who had been in the camps and who had lived in Hong Kong at the time. I really loved the feel of the writing of the time, which gave me immediate insight into how people talked and how they had parties, and how they related to each other, etc. I also watched a lot of movies like Love is a Many Splendored Thing. Anything that was set in the '40s or '50s I would watch with a heightened interest for the details, like what kind of coat or dress they were wearing, what they ate at restaurants, or what kind of car they were driving. Where can travelers go to find traces of old Hong Kong, particularly from the period of the Japanese occupation? Unfortunately, there are not a lot of old buildings left in Hong Kong. In the middle of Central, Statue Square is still there, pretty much unchanged, and the Legco [Legislative Council] Building is in the old traditional style, a wide, large, gracious building surrounded by skyscrapers. The Helena May is still around; it's a women's club with dining and lodging facilities and it's very colonial in feel and look still, but it's a private club. Tea at The Peninsula is fun, but it's pretty modern now. Still, it's nice to go and have a proper English tea. Are there other places you would suggest readers visit if they make it to Hong Kong? The Repulse Bay is a large arcade that overlooks the beach. In it, there is a restaurant called The Verandah that I remember visiting as a child in the 1970s for its Sunday brunches. If you squint your eyes very, very hard, you can imagine you are back in the '50s! I live close by so I'm always there for the supermarket, coffee shop, and also a restaurant called Spices that I love. Visitors to Hong Kong always go to The Peak but I fail to see the attraction, although the view is pretty spectacular. How do you think the current expat scene in Hong Kong compares to that of the novel? In many ways, it can feel very similar. Many an afternoon, I'm sitting at a table at a club with other women watching our children play on the lawn. There is still a languorous, non-American feel to much of life. Of course, the pace is more frenetic and it's very international, but many women are not working and their husbands are working a lot, and you form your own community. The expats are still the privileged minority, although attitudes have changed for the better. This is a very specific type I'm describing though. Of course, there are many sorts of expats: young, hard-driving expats, older people who have been here for ages, etc. Hong Kong initially struck me as thriving, chaotic, and shopping-crazed (not unlike NYC), but I've wondered about the cultural scene. How do you find it to be living there as a writer? Are there local organizations or events that you'd recommend? People always complain about the cultural scene in Hong Kong. And they're not wrong. Although there has been an effort to bring culture into Hong Kong, more often than not it seems a bit forced. The Arts Festival is a several-week event that highlights many different performances, many of which are good, but what ends up happening is that you have to cram all your "culture" into a few weeks, which is a bit hard to digest. The Literary Festival is good for book nuts like me. Having lived in New York, where culture was an enormous smorgasbord you could pick from any night of the week, it's odd to have comparatively little to choose from here. There are often productions that come into town but there's that&hellip;and often nothing else (I'm talking about a Western taste here). I don't speak Cantonese so I can't speak to the local scene. As a writer, it's been good, actually! I just read books and stay at home and write! In the three-minute video clip below, Lee shares more about the book and the city&mdash;including her love of Hong Kong's quieter, greener side and the long-time phenomenon of people washing up there to reinvent themselves. thSetupPlayerShell("pg_jlee_piano"); More on Literary Travel DESTINATION INSPIRATION A Family Trip to Hong Kong Fresh Air: Hong Kong Gets Green

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A few good links: Italy's holiday witch

O little town of Bethlehem, Pa. "White 26-point Moravian stars twinkle into life on every porch&hellip;" [Chicago Tribune] Crapped out? Vegas still offers fun at low stakes These days looking for cheap fun isn't a sucker's bet. [AP] Australia's National Breakfast Spread Gets Its Own Museum Vegemite is now behind glass, where it belongs. [Jaunted] A bespoke tour of Manhattan Bicycling around the island on the Waterfront Greenway. [Guardian] Taking Flight with Italy's Holiday Witch In many parts of the country it's an "ugly, broom-flying and present-wielding witch who keeps children on their toes" for Epiphany. [Spiegel]