If you don't want your younger siblings to learn the truth about Santa Claus, then Virginia is the state for you (spoiler alert!).
Last week, Tysons Corner Center in McLean, Va., was swamped with protests to retain veteran Santa Claus Michael Graham, whom the mall had recently laid off.
Graham had appeared at the mall during the holiday season for 18 years. During his tenure as Kris Kringle, he obviously made a lasting impression on the community because news of his battle with his long-time holiday home prompted "an online petition and threats to boycott the mall."
We thought about it for a while, and we couldn't tell you whether our hometown malls have ever switched Santas on us, though we're not sure we would be able to tell if they did.
Every St. Nick is built the same (with or without stuffing). They all have enormous, frosty ZZ Top beards, and each one talks like the jolliest of smokers on Earth. It makes us wonder how a town could grow so attached to a single Santa Claus.
We understand why Graham was so angry about losing his winter job - the guy was making $175 an hour. You don't know how many accident-prone toddlers we would sit through to rake in that kind of dough.
Apparently, Graham is an A-list Santa. If a whole town can learn to care so much for a guy in a generic red suit, then he's obviously going above and beyond the call of Santa duty. If that's the case, then we're glad the mall caved in and agreed to rehire him.
