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Curt
CURT
And yes, here he is, Santa Claus himself.
Here we go.
Welcome to The Alligator Blog Christmas Edition.
Today is December 11, 2023, and I'm your host, Curt Ghormley.
Today we have with us the jolly old elf feverishly getting ready for Christmas Eve.
It's only two weeks away.
A busy time to be sure.
This is the first of three interviews with Santa Claus exclusive to The Alligator Blog.
Here we go.
<<BREAK>>
So we're here today with Santa Claus.
Santa, listen, I know that you are really busy this time of year because we only have like, what, 14 days before the big day or the big night, I suppose it is for you.
So I know you're busy, so I really appreciate you taking the time out of your schedule to join us today.
SANTA
Oh, it's my pleasure, Curt.
Good to be with you.
CURT
By the way, so good to have you.
Are you more busy now than you have been before?
SANTA
Well, yeah, great question, Curt.
We are in a population decline in certain parts of the world, as you can imagine.
Other parts have exploded.
We have increased our robotic activity, I would say, on the assembly line.
CURT
In terms of the manufacture of the toys?
SANTA
Yes, toys manufacturing, which allows each
Fortunately, that all happened before the big three strikes, auto strikes happened.
So we were able to negotiate that early on.
And I think they're reasonably happy with our negotiations.
CURT
So do you have a standing legal team to handle that, Santa?
And does the workforce have a standing legal team?
Or did you just hire people ad hoc when you need them for that?
SANTA
Well, I think very few people know this, Curt, but Mrs. Claus has her degree and really able to handle all of the legal aspects.
CURT
Really?
SANTA
That's great.
And she is able to negotiate both sides, actually.
We have some of the younger elves.
The older ones sugar up.
They don't care.
But the younger ones are watching the gluten.
They want to be totally gluten free.
Really?
CURT
You know, it's the coming thing, isn't it?
You really can't get away from that.
I guess I understand that.
So speaking of things like that, how has COVID impacted your business model the last couple of years?
What impact did the lockdowns have on you, Santa?
SANTA
Well, yeah, it's a great, great question, Curt.
It was a challenge, the lockdowns.
We found that people were at home more, so we had to be careful as we were delivering toys.
However, if it did with COVID, the COVID scheduled bedtimes,
As you know, Curt, we're a nonprofit organization.
And so profit is not an issue.
But we do.
It is a bit of a secret.
As you can imagine, we don't, we do want to keep that a little bit under, under the Santa whiskers.
CURT
I understand.
But it's not like you have a lot of competition, though.
Or is there?
SANTA
No.
CURT
Amazon? You don't do any deliveries for them, do you?
Or do you have any relationship with them at all?
SANTA
No, no.
We consider Amazon delivery system rather, well, they're in the infancy stage.
You can imagine we've got to deliver.
We have 14 hours, as you know, to make all of our deliveries.
They're coming along with their same day delivery, but
But we do have a book coming out though.
CURT
Do you really?
How do you have the time, man?
That's really time-consuming.
SANTA
Well, you know, I delegate.
We let the elves, the senior elves, make a lot of decisions.
We push it down to that level, all the way down, so you can imagine, to that
Well, we've, we've instituted certain indigenous almost extinct holidays for the elves so that they're able to celebrate their indigenous festivals.
Okay.
And
They, and again, it's highly secret, as you can imagine, no one's seen them.
In fact, they only let me in on certain occasions, but it's quite interesting.
CURT
So you and Mrs. Claus are locked out of a lot of those things.
SANTA
Yeah, yeah, we have to allow them to manage their own tribe.
CURT
But you do deliver the cookies and milk to them for those events though, I presume, or do they have their own diet?
SANTA
Right, yeah, Mrs. Claus caters to their
They like the shortbread cookie.
CURT
Really?
SANTA
Yeah, yeah, it's it's a great I may have some with with with reindeer milk, of course.
That's really that's their favorite.
Yeah.
CURT
Okay.
SANTA
Yeah.
And by the way, that's that's the treat.
I would prefer shortbread cookies with reindeer milk.
CURT
Really?
SANTA
Yes.
All right.
Get the word out to all the families.
CURT
We'll do that.
Because we have we have a very
We have an audience whose size on The Alligator Blog here that you really would not believe.
The size of our audience is just really beyond description, frankly.
We couldn't even tell you how many people are listening to us right now.
CURT
Reputation, you know, the rotund guy and maybe that's some of that's overblown.
I don't know.
But how do you how do you manage your own diet and exercise in preparation for this really grueling once a year event?
SANTA
Well, that's, you know, my favorite exercise tool is a stair stepper.
I've got one, especially those buildings that don't have elevators, any access.
It's the stair stepper that I prefer.
But but but my waistline
My ample girth.
Yeah, no, it's part of the image.
I can't slim down, so I've got to be able to keep up the pace.
I will join in with the reindeer and whoever the elves are working out to, and they enjoy
Curt, glad to get the word out to all the many, many listeners which are beyond count.
CURT
Well, it's just untold.
It's an untold number.
The audience size is just incredible.
Just unbelievable.
And we'll make sure that they all know about the shortbread cookies and the reindeer milk.
<<BREAK>>
CURT
And there he was.
Boy, what a delightful discussion that was.
That man is really busy and will be for the next couple of weeks.
Don't miss next week.
We'll check in with him again.
Get your Christmas shopping done and you have a good week!
2023 Santa 1 of 3 Interviews