46 Weeks Until Christmas

Greetings all! There are now only 46 weeks until Christmas and it is an interesting time at the North Pole.

I attended a meeting for Mrs. Claus this week at North Pole Flight Command. I was there only to listen and then prepare a report back to her about what I heard.

Whoo boy, did I hear a lot.

They were discussing a new sleigh for Santa this year. Some felt that the sleigh last year was SO good that no further improvements are needed. They think they just built Santa a new sleigh based on those old plans.

Others felt Santa’s sleigh needs a whole new design – something that can go higher, faster and further than ever before.

And yet other elves are advocating making a sleigh that is radically different – one that isn’t even powered by reindeer.

It was a shocking meeting to attend.

Afterwards, Elf Roger Star, who is the head elf now at Flight Command as well as my former boss and still a very good friend, pulled me aside. He knew why I was there.

He told me not to get too excited or upset by what I heard in the meeting. He said my report to Mrs. Claus should just share that the meeting was a “spirited debate of ideas”, typical of all planning meetings at this time of year.

Well. Hmm. That’s not exactly how I would put it.

You see, we’re still kind of operating here at the North Pole without any direction or even word from Santa. He’s still meeting and talking to a lot of people.

Meanwhile, every department here at the North Pole is watching the countdown clock and we’re quickly approaching the 300-day mark until Santa launches.

Frankly, some elves are getting a little antsy.

And that would include the elves in the Sleigh Department who are in charge of Santa’s sleigh.

You see, most years Santa gets a new sleigh. And that means someone has to come up with a new design. That takes time.

Then they need to build some prototypes of that new design. Santa needs to see it. He needs to sign off on it. They need to build in the changes he recommends and then they need to build another new prototype.

That takes more time.

Then, once they get a working design, there needs to be some local initial test flights. Teams of test pilots and reindeer need to come together. After the first flights are done, another big design meeting is held to discuss results and make further refinements.

By the time this all takes it’s like June 1st – and it is time to really start the test flight schedule because, well, time is running out.

So they build a bunch more of these proposed sleighs. Flight Command gets involved and then the North Pole Navy and before you know it we’re celebrating Christmas in July and test flights are all over the place.

More flights means more changes and more changes mean more sleighs are being built and more sleighs means more test flights. Around and around this goes – time burning up like gas in a big rig – and before you know it December is here.

So elves know this routine. And they are worried because as of today, the first week of February, all that has been done is a big debate about what they are going to do.

There is one thing we know for sure about Santa’s sleigh this year. Vixen is going to be here involved with it.

Doctors over at the sleigh barn have approved a new plan from her trainer to build muscle. Yes, it’s therapy but it seems Vixen is feeling really good and she wants to move things along with her recover. She wants to build strength.

She has expressed a desire to work on the test flight team this year for Santa’s sleigh.

That’s really big news and we don’t know if Santa will approve that kind of activity for her. He is not afraid of further injury but Santa is concerned about Vixen being too tired come Christmas.

So, there’s a lot going on here at the North Pole. Even though its February.

I hope you’re paying attention.

I think there will be a lot of big news very soon here.