A guide to this season's calendar

These days, its hard to know what holiday traditions you should be a part of, and what you should skip. For your peace of mind this season, I've put together a guide on what to do and when.

November 28: The first Sunday of Advent. Light a purple candle on your Advent wreath, burn for the day, then extinguish it.
December 1: The first day of "commercial Advent." Open a door on your little paper advent calendar, on this day, and all the following until the 24th.
December 2: The first day of Hanukkah. Light one menorah candle each night until Dec. 9
December 5: The second Sunday of Advent. Re-light the purple candle from last week, and light another purple candle on the Advent wreath, extinguish at the end of the day.
December 6: Feast day of St. Nicholas. Today is the day everyone should await the arrival of Santa Claus, bearing gifts for children OR if you are reading this from the past, before the arrival and conquest of Catholicism, you would be awaiting the arrival of the Germanic god Odin, riding his 8-legged flying horse leading a great hunting party through the sky. It seems everyone is waiting for someone.
December 9: Reminder, it is the last night of Hanukkah.
December 12: The third Sunday of Advent. Re-light the previous candles, and light the rose colored candle, extinguish at the end of the day.
December 13: Feast Day of Saint Lucy. By the Julian calendar, this would have be the longest night of the year. If you are Scandinavian, Roman Catholic, Lutheran, Anglican, or Orthodox, you should go to church for a special service in honor of this patron saint of blind people; the service also mourns the loss of daylight. Young girls will be dressing in white with candle-lit wreathes on their heads. Note- the saint is often depicted holding a tray of her own eyeballs, but have no fear, any religious service you go to this day will not require young girls to gouge out their eyes.
December 19: The fourth Sunday of Advent. Light all the candles on the Advent wreath, burn until the end of the day.
December 21: The winter solstice- Yule. A three-night festival. Start drinking now. Drink a toast to Odin for victory and power to the king. Then drink a toast to two gods whose names you won't be able to pronounce when you're drunk, for the harvest and peace. Then drink a toast to the king. Then drink a toast to the dearly departed. This is my kind of holiday. Also, send your drunk men out into the woods with instructions to find the biggest honkin' log they can find, bring it back, and burn it. For the heck of it. We'll drink a toast to the log too.
December 24: Christmas Eve. Tonight, you lie to your kids about a fictional, overly commercialized character who is loosely based on the characters from December 6, in order to get them to go to bed early because they've probably been on a sugar high since Thanksgiving and you are sick of the little brats. If you are German, your kids will be awaiting the arrival of Kris Kringle (who is NOT Santa Claus or Saint Nicholas), or Christkindl (Christ child). Traditionally, today is the day to decorate a Christmas tree, which dates back to when St. Boniface cut down the tree of Thor to prove the helplessness of Norse gods, and a spruce tree grew in its place.
December 25: Christmas Day. Commercially, all the junk bought on Black Friday will be given today. In some cultures, it was given last night. From a religious perspective, we commemorate the day God gave the ultimate gift to mankind by miraculously coming to earth in human form.
December 26: Kwanzaa begins. This is a holiday which was invented in 1966. It combines the lighting of colored candles (Advent) on something that suspiciously resembles a menorah with the giving of gifts and a week-long celebration. It ends January 1.
December 31: Another reason to party. Its the last chance to make mistakes in 2010, so get drunk and make them before midnight because after midnight it will be a new year and you don't want to get off on the wrong foot.
January 6: Twelfth Night/Epiphany. This day concludes the 12 days of Christmas. Tell all the maids milking, pipers piping, lords leaping and drummers drumming to go home because your true love is tired of the gifts. Today also concludes the "winter festival" that begins on All Hallows Eve (Halloween). Additionally, it is the day Christ was supposedly revealed as the Christ by the "wise men from the east." Because, the angels and the shepherds weren't revealing enough. You may now remove your Christmas tree on any date after this one.
February 2: Candlemas. This feast day represents the day Jesus was presented at the temple in Jerusalem. If your Christmas tree is still up, it is a bad sign. Because in addition to all the religions represented here, we have to get non-theistic superstition somewhere in here as well, so here you go.

Please note, I have attempted to list the holidays you are most likely to encounter while going about your daily activities. I have deliberately left out Festivus (December 23), National Regifting Day (the Thursday before Christmas, also December 23), Boxing Day (December 26), Handsel Monday (the first Monday of the year, January 3), and Distaff Day (January 7) because honestly, you are not likely to encounter many people observing them.