Ho! Ho! Ho! Sunday rerun! Christmas in July is Friday!

I’m taking the unusual step of informing you of one of my favorite “holidays” five days in advance to give you time to plan something. Anything. Even a little nothing will make a difference. Yes, Friday is Christmas in July! The surprise in my family is gone and now my greedy little darlings are awash in crass expectation. That ruins it a bit for me. But not for you! Try and throw together a little surprise celebration for Friday. It can be very fun and soul-enriching.

Remember, only five more shopping days until Christmas in July!

The stockings aren’t hung by the chimney with care and St. Nicolas is no where in sight.

You can stand in our doorway and demand figgy pudding until you’re blue in the face. You can go. You won’t get some.

No Black Friday sales stampedes, no wrapping, no in-laws, no Savior-thanking hoo-ha.

Merry Christmas in July! It’s the secular essence of the holy day everyone loves for all the wrong reasons.

It’s only 153 days until Christmas. That means it’ll only be about 54 days until our area retailers begin cramming Christmas down our throats. It’ll be sales, displays, carols, and mercenary goodwill before they even put out the Halloween candy.

For me, it’s all gone from “Oh! Holy Night!” To “Oh! Holy Crap!”

Just thinking about Christmas in October through December raises my blood pressure.

And I’m not talking about the sacred parts, which I enjoy. I love when duties ease and there’s time to bask in soulful understanding about why Christmas really matters.

That lasts about 30 minutes. Then it’s back to strategizing party visits like Ike did on D-Day.

That’s what makes Christmas in July such a subversive pleasure.

I started doing it for the girls about five years ago. I thought it could be a sort of surprise poor-man’s Christmas, which makes perfect sense because I’m a very poor man.

What’s great is the expectations are absolute zero. In fact, as I type this our daughters, ages 11 and 6, don’t even know it’s Christmas in July.

In about 20 minutes, I’ll begin blasting Bob Dylan’s 2009 oddball Christmas carol collection, “Christmas in the Heart.” I love Dylan, but hearing him sing, “Here Comes Santa Claus,” “Winter Wonderland,” and “Must Be Santa” in July is perfectly surreal.

Heck, given his nonsensical interpretations of his own hits, any more hearing Dylan sing “Blowing in the Wind” is perfectly surreal.

The jarring sounds will cause such a clatter, the girls will storm out of their rooms to rage. Their instinct will be to shout at me for waking them and, even worse, waking them with Bob Dylan.

Then -- hallelujah -- they’ll see the Christmas in July card table, the “Merry Christmas in July!” cake surrounded by all the newspaper wrapped presents that include the plastic DVD crate containing the video store rental of the classic “A Christmas Story.”

It’s Christmas in July!

It’s so unexpected.

Part of that is because I don’t do it every July 25. Not having it every year allows forgetful loved ones to be surprised when it suddenly reappears without any typical holiday hype. That’s the beauty of Christmas in July. You make up the rules as you go along.

For instance, one year I bought for a centerpiece a lovely mistletoe and roses floral arrangement. This year I didn’t want to risk feeling stressed, so I instead used my Pittsburgh Pirate ballcap.

It’s nice, too, for Val because for traditional Christmas she does nearly all the shopping, all the cooking, all the cleaning and all the fretting.

Really, with me doing all the drinking, it’s a wonder it bugs me so much.

So I get her a nice bottle of wine and a card thanking her for all she does.

You know what the best part of Christmas in July is?

Telling people you’re shopping for Christmas in July. You get a real charge out of sharing the idea with people. They seem so charmed.

I think that’s because we could all use a little more year ‘round Christmas, but none of us wants to go through any more Christmas to have it. So it’s nice to take maybe one day a year to have a little Christmas without all the hell and the hassle.

It’s nice, too, because it’s a momentary break from having to think about gun violence, pedophiliac coaches and the national heartbreak of “Twilight” actress Kristin Stewart hooking up with snakey director Rupert Sanders.

It’s a nice respite.

And, you know, for just one day it really ‘tis the season.

Merry JesusChristmas to all! (even you sinners)

I’m such a superior Christian I will no longer limit my holy culture warfare to just heathens who say “Happy Holidays!”

For me, even “Merry Christmas!” insults my savior.

So let me to be the first to wish you a most politically incorrect, “Merry JesusChristmas!”

Wishing someone a mere Merry Christmas and not including His first name is, to me, as insulting as calling the Messiah, “Dude.”

At one time I may have been like you. I said what I thought was an innocuous “Happy Holidays!” to everyone I met during the two-month-long mirth march that is the sprawl-i-days. I did this because people got bored and walked away as I stood there and gushed about just how much happiness I wished to bestow.

I wanted them to have a Happy Halloween, a Happy Thanksgiving, a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. B-list holidays like Groundhog Day were merely implied.

But I have Jewish friends, too. I want them to have a Happy Hanukah and all the other days, too. 

In my travels I meet blacks who celebrate Kwanza, agnostics who are devout in celebrating nothing and people of every religious stripe. It’s a big ol’ world out there, full of Buddhists, Hindus and celebrity Scientologists who swear their sacred beliefs are key to looking fabulous and getting invited to star in movies made by successful Jews like Stephen Spielberg.

I recently read of a California inmate who persuaded the court to let him celebrate Festivus, the Frank Costanza-orchestrated anti-Christmas.

Now, I may have disagreed with the beliefs of many of these individuals, but I didn’t want to crusade against them, especially during the holidays.

That would be rude.

Really, I just want everyone to have one hell of a good time. Life’s short and full of pain. Dance whenever you hear the music.

I wish everyone had the time to hear my most heartfelt and colorful wishes.

I hope you’re sitting down for this. It’s a mouthful. Here goes:

“May tonight you sleep soundly and enjoy the world’s greatest dreams and may tomorrow you awaken to a golden sunshiny day when all those dreams begin to magically come true. May it be the best day of your life and may every day after that only get better and better and better until your whole happy existence is complicated by a fantastic Powerball jackpot victory.”

Despite is earnest intentions, that one cost me friends who were either too busy to stick around for the full incantation or thought having things like man caves full of worshipful harems would distract from watching the football games.

Everyone -- Jews, African-Americans, Celtic Druids and imprisoned Festivusians -- seemed to prefer the snappy omnibus “Happy Holidays!”

All but the Christians.

If you didn’t say “Merry Christmas!” you were in league with Satan -- and I wonder is there is a Satanic equivalent to Christmas? Do they exchange gifts?

If it involves orgies, and I suspect it must, they aren’t publicizing it enough during membership drives.

In a season when many of us somehow manage to squeeze in a little worship, I want to reference The King who wore around his neck a cross, the Hebrew letter chai, and a star of David because he said didn’t want to be excluded from heaven on a technicality.

That’s The King all right. The gospel according to Elvis.

It’s my second favorite Elvis quote right behind, “Milk makes ya sexy!”

Like Elvis, I wouldn’t want to be excluded from a posh afterlife for not being Christmasy Christian enough. That’s why I’m one-upping even holiday busybodies like the American Family Association.

Again this year, the  organization issued a McCarthy-like list of companies that insist their employees greet customers with a cheerful, yet secular, “Happy Holidays!”

Well, they’re now subversive in my eyes for abbreviating “Merry Christmas” at the expense of the birthday boy.

That’s all for now. I’m off to find more ways to save Christmas for us poor beleaguered Christians and warn everyone that Santa is just Satan to a careless typist.

So, to all my devout Christian friends, Merry JesusChristmas!

And to those insufficiently sacred and, in the spirit of the season, I wish for you the previously referenced bit that starts with a good night’s sleep and ends with the Powerball winner.

Either way, may you all hit jackpots, spiritual and otherwise, on this holy, happy day.