Zero Angel Richardson's Blog, page 14

Some anime recs: Fate / Stay Night, Fate / Zero, and Sword Art Online

こんにちわ皆さん!

すいません, one of the issues I encounter when I immerse myself in anything Japanese is my brain disconnects and starts thinking in 日本語. Unfortunately, since I haven't really been studying Japanese formally since 2004, that means that half the time my brain basically shuts off because I don't have the vocabulary necessary to think in language when I'm thinking in Japanese.

So I'm a bit behind in my reading list (ごめんなさい!), I have a couple books that were sent to me that I feel especially churlish over, but I've been unexpectedly swamped in my day job every single week, to the point that all I have the energy for is television. Hopefully, I'll rectify that sooner than later, so if you've been waiting on me to finish something, well, hang in there お願いします!

There are a couple anime I'd like to share with everyone today with quick impressions.

First, Fate/Stay Night (フェイト/ステイナイト) hits all of the right buttons for me. Legendary characters that are initially a mystery with named weapons and other hints to their identities fighting in a battle for the holy grail under the command of modern day mages. Shiro is a fantastic heroic spirit that is always willing to sacrifice himself (which is a good thing for my heroes IMO).

Note: the blu-rays are a bit overpriced and there are two of them, while the single DVD set is more than reasonable. Currently, I haven't seen this on Netflix or Crunchyroll. 

The prequel, Fate/Zero (フェイト/ゼロ), although possessing a great name is not as good as Fate/Stay Night, but has some excellent bits, shedding a lot more light into everything that came before (obviously) without sucking anywhere near as much as the other obvious prequels that explained everything in today's zeitgeist (*cough* Star Wars *cough).

Still, whereas I found myself loving Rin and Shiro a lot in Stay Night (ステイナイト), I did not fall in love with any of the "masters" in Zero (ゼロ), even if they were sympathetic. The "servants" on the other hand were even better than in Stay Night (ステイナイト).

Note: Zero is currently on Netflix and Crunchyroll.

Sword Art Online (ソードアート・オンライン) is another series I've watched recently. The first season is a masterpiece. I could not possibly say enough positive things about it. I only wish we could have seen even more about their adventures.

They cover two years in 13 episodes, but it never seems rushed or lacking, it only seems like we are seeing the highlights and points in the characters' lives that develop them past what we know. Surprisingly, both the male and female leads are strong characters and their developing friendship is a true delight to watch. It was incredibly satisfying.

The second season castrates Asuna into a damsel-in-distress unfortunately, but it almost seems like this is meant for us to have a gut-reaction to it. Having such a strong character brutally stripped of power is abhorrent and certain scenes will have you white-knuckling in impotent rage. Leafa is the true female lead of the second season, although she is always inferior to Kirihito whereas Asuna always approached Kirihito as an equal from their very first battle in Season 1.

I don't know what the future holds (season 3 starts this summer), and I was glad to discover Leafa's story in the second season, but it is definitely a drop-off from the first. The first season is self-contained enough that even though there are lingering questions at its end, they do not need to be answered. By the end of the second season, and indeed, even with the "extra episode" "movie", the developments of the first season have backtracked somewhat. It's...unsatisfying.

Asuna doesn't even reclaim her role as a frontline fighter in the extra. One of the two instrumental characters in defeating SAO, and she's relegated to a support caster? WTF? I'm very concerned for the future and am currently wondering if it would not have been better to leave the series after Season 1. 

でも, that first season is amazing.

Anyway, please check these anime out!

Again, the first season of SAO is one of the best single seasons of anything, and it's only 13 episodes.
Next, Fate/Stay Night is really great if you're interested in history and myth.
After that, if either of these two shows have piqued your interest, then please consider the second season of SAO and the prequel to Fate/Stay Night.

I haven't gotten a chance to watch the movie, "Unlimited Blade Works" that goes along with Fate/Stay Night, and I also haven't seen the spin-off that follows Illya as a magickal girl.

Back to work for me. じゃあまた!

The Spectacular Spider-Man

I admit to being pretty depressed after seeing the Amazing Spider-Man 2. Now, I don't get to say that I am a "huge fan" of Spider-Man because I don't collect comics. #1 the cost, #2 the neverending soap opera-esque storylines with characters being killed off and brought back all the time, and #3 I wasn't born in the 60s.

I mean, by the time I was born, Gwen Stacy had already become backstory like Uncle Ben, except she was the ugly backstory you never hear about in the light of day. She didn't have a great catchphrase "With great power, comes great responsibility," she only had guilt and shame and depression.

But well, I do love Spidey.

And I did love the Amazing Spider-Man the first. I don't really know why people don't particularly care for Andrew Garfield, although one I keep hearing is that he is too attractive to be Peter Parker. He was socially awkward and he definitely had the stammer thing going in the first one, and becoming Spider-Man actually caused him to put ON glasses, instead of take them off (I keep trying to tell everyone that glasses are cool).

But the Amazing Spider-Man 2. Ugh.

There was so much potential, so much amazing, and there's a lot to like about this movie if you saw it chopped up into its itsy-bitsy pieces.

It was so disparate and dichotomous and discordant. Most of the individual pieces were GREAT, but suffered from either too little screen time or not enough screen time. And nothing felt like it fit together. So rushed and railroaded to the what-should-have-been ending.

And the rubbish trailers and commercials, all of them, which gave away the ending everyone knew was coming.

Well, at least to anyone that knows the story.

But whatever. So, back to the present with the Amazing Spider-Man 2. The Amazing Spider-Man the First made me so happy. I was so thrilled to see Spidey in action with an actor that (I feel at least) does him and Peter Parker justice. Gwen was amazing with another great actor with great chemistry between her and Peter if nothing else. I was surprised at the omission of the Lizard's family and his working at Oscorp, but I can understand changes and accept them.

It was...it IS fantastic. I've seen it at least half a dozen times. I really don't understand people that didn't like it and I have no idea what people are smoking that think TASM2 is better than TASM the first.

Here finally was the dream I've had since a child watching the steadily devolving Spider-Man the Animated Series on TV. A larger-than-life, heroic, representation of the character I angsted with before I had ever heard the word angst. The character I mourned with, that I grew up with, the character that I love more than any other hero in fiction. 

...and they dropped the ball.

They dropped the ball so fucking hard.

They dropped the ball with arms outstretched running to the endzone from ten yards out to have it recovered by the enemy and not carried to the opposing endzone, to have sex with that ball in the middle of the field for all to watch like your one-true love's new boyfriend screwing her in front of you on the 50 yard line in a football stadium and then disrespecting her BUT SHE LIKES IT.

It hurt.

I was in shock for hours after. What just happened? Did I really watch that? Why didn't they end it when they should have ended it? Why did they do that? Why? WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY? WHY? Do I have to lose you too? WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY?

And I locked myself away with YouTube to see if anyone could make sense of the trainwreck of my childhood dreams burning away on the screen.

And cries of Sony mismanaging, forcing the hand of not just Mark Webb, but also the motivator behind Sam Raimi's descent into madness with Spider-Man 3 of the Maguire era! Sinister Six and Venom movies already announced! The Amazing Spider-Man 2 more of a Sony presentation to stockholders about what the future of their movie studio looks like for the next 5 years. Mismanagement was the first word to come to mind when I walked out of the theater and apparently is the word of the entire future of this character.

Because really, there are three Spider related sequels on the way already. TASM-3, Sinister Six, and Venom.  THREE. Three Spider-Man movies that will take at least three years to realize, and, IF they fail, which I'm not sure they will in the strictest sense of "Sony will want to stop making Spider-Man movies after those disasters," then another 5 years before their contract reverts to Disney and then how long until Joss Whedon can finally make the Spider-Man we deserve? Will he even still be alive? Will I be alive to enjoy it? Is there any worthwhile Spider-Man fanfiction out there that isn't just shipping and more of the soap opera bullshit that I dread from the comics???

And then there was the Spectacular Spider-Man.

I'd seen a few episodes here and there over the course of the last few years, and I always enjoyed it, but I'll admit to not being able to keep the different animated webhead series in place with how many there seemed to be lately. Some of them were decidedly not entertaining, some of them on the other hand, were.

YouTube turned me on to the Spectacular Spider-Man yet again, one reviewer ("Sam's Review" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJfb6...) had a ridiculous number of great things to say about Spectacular Spider-Man and the twisted downward spiral of a web I found myself caught in latched onto Spectacular Spider-Man as possible salvation.

I knew going into it that the series was already killed and there were unresolved aspects to it, but I dismissed those and actually went out and bought the complete series of the Spectacular Spider-Man.

I didn't watch it all in one go (because I have a real life and a job), but I did devour it in a couple of days.

It started good and it got way better. There were a couple parts that generated sincere emotional responses from my synapses, whether from Spidey being heroic or getting the crap beat out of him physically and emotionally and the end just left me wanting more and more.

It was therapeutic to get to experience Spider-Man in a way that was not just palatable, but in a way that the character deserves. It was extremely unfinished though. There's a lot more in front of the character that we will never get to explore.

Oh, and the reason why is because although Sony kept the movie rights, they lost the TV rights. So Disney screwed up the animated series with the Ultimate Spider-Man and Sony screwed up the movie series with The Amazing Spider-Man 2.

It's still worth it though.

Roots

Most people know that there are two square roots for every number, but for some reason we insert a disconnect and start lying to students that there is only 1 root for roots with an odd index and 2 for roots with an even index. Why is that? Isn't the truth better? Doesn't it make sense that there are n nth roots for every number? Isn't that elegant? Isn't that beautiful?

Oh, it's harder and we like our students to be idiots. I keep forgetting that.

You're right, it's much better to have people learn mathematics as a series of abstract rules that make no sense because understanding was never valued in American mathematics classrooms. Let's approach mathematics the same way as we do the Ten Commandments (#HandedDownFromOnHigh).

So, every number can be visualized as a circle. Specifically, let's imagine the number 1 as the unit circle, the circle with radius 1 centered on the origin.  Then the second root (or square root) of 1 are the two numbers located on the circle, such that when we square them, we get back to one.  In this case, it turns out that -1 and 1 are the second roots of 1, and these clearly split the circle in half.

For third roots, these are the three locations on the circle that when cubed, get back to one.  We can easily visualize this by rotations on the circle.  If you travel 1/3 of a revolution from 1, you get to the first 3rd root of 1, another 1/3 gets to the second 3rd root of 1, and a final 3rd gets us back to 1, the third 3rd root of 1.

For fourth roots, we rotate 1/4 of a revolution, fifth roots, 1/5 of a revolution, and so on. This idea that we can visualize roots as rotations is beautiful in and of itself, but it gets even better.

In order to conceptualize this two-dimensional location as a single number, we need to append an entirely different dimension to our original numbers. We can do this by attaching an arbitrary direction variable, say i. If we let i be the variable that represents traveling 1 unit "up", then -i would be 1 unit down, 5i would be 5 units up, and we can immediately start talking about a two dimensional location with a single "number", say 1+3i, which would represent traveling 1 unit right, followed by 3 units up.

According to this then, the fourth roots of i would be i after one-quarter of a revolution, -1, after another one-quarter, -i, after a third one-quarter revolution, and finally back to 1 after four one-quarter revolutions.

If we wanted to find the values of the third roots of 1, we could turn to trigonometry to find values of the unit circle at any given angle. What? We're incorporating trigonometry into our geometrical discussion of the algebraic principle of roots? Oh my God, it's almost like mathematics is completely consistent and true, and yes, again, beautiful and elegant. Trig tells us that a 1/3 rotation would result in traveling 1/2 of a unit to the left, and \sqrt(3 / 2 units up (where "\sqrt(3)" means "the square root of 3").  Then the first third root of 1 could be expressed by the single number -1/2 + \sqrt(3) / 2 i.

You could plug this into any calculator that understands complex numbers (which is what these numbers I've sneakily described with vectors actually are), cube it, and the calculator would tell you that the result of your cubing is the number 1.

Best Math Teacher Ever

I'm not a very good teacher. I really am not. I'm scattered and disorganized and I work multiple jobs to make ends meet which means that I have never EVER been able to give 100% to a single class.

However, what I am, to MANY students, is the best math teacher they've ever had.

How's that work?
A couple points.

First, one common logical fail people have is to think that they can't have a favorite of things they hate. To put it another way, the adjective "best" is relative whereas the adjective "good" is absolute. "Best" just means better than all others—a super maximum, if you will. "Good" means past some certain standard of excellence. If none ever get past that standard, then the one that got closest to the standard is the "best".

Logic aside, most math teachers don't understand math as well as they need to in order to convey what's important or to teach it more than the way they learned.

To them, real analysis and abstract algebra were not the start of the amazing, they were the final hurdles before their finish line. They don't understand *real* mathematics, so they are stuck thinking that the "horror" problems from physics and any brief engineering applications they've been exposed to in their calc and diff. eq. classes are the end of mathematics.

The problem then is that, not understanding real mathematics, they continue to regurgitate the mathematics the way that they learned it in primary and secondary school. This has led to the promulgation of bullshit techniques like FOIL, PEMDAS, cross multiplication, learning to add integers by subtracting absolute values (WTF IS THAT? I mean, seriously?), and more.

Hung-Hsi Wu calls this "textbook school mathematics" and makes the point much more eloquently in his substantial publications (he's also a better source than I am). I encourage everyone to check him out if you haven't already: http://math.berkeley.edu/~wu/

A little more personally, I always have heard, "People that are too smart are not able to teach well," and if the person knows me at all but hasn't been one of my students, this has always been passive-aggressively aimed at me. Well, that's a ridiculous claim that any person with any amount of logic would be able to refute. The issue isn't how smart someone is, it's how well they understand the material. If someone has an intuitive understanding of the material, but not a cognizant understanding of it, then of course they're going to be shite at explaining it to others. On the other hand, if the person that has that intuition is able to be self-aware and understanding of what's going on in their brains, then that's the one you want to explain it, because chances are they are going to be able to share that intuition with you.

Everything that I am awesome at teaching—arithmetic, algebra, trigonometry, calculus, real algebra, analysis, number theory, operations research, differential equations, statistics, all of it—I fought tooth and nail for. I figured them the fuck out in ways I didn't think ANYONE was doing. The way I was able to figure out arithmetic and high school algebra is through my understanding of number theory, real analysis and abstract algebra along with my natural insights, intuitions, and understandings. This is how I'm able to teach students to the point that their emotions well up when they realize how shoddily they've been managed their entire lives (obviously not all of them, but it's not uncommon for at least one ADULT student to be overcome during the first class they have with me).

The question they ask me is always the same, "Why weren't we taught this way?"

Imagine my surprise that what I fought for, others did also. That there were entire groups of educators dedicated to revamping school mathematics (Wu on the front lines and for decades by the way) and teaching math the way I was teaching math. That not all math teachers sucked!

Just a majority of them do.

Now, now, I'm not trying to ruffle any feathers. And I don't necessarily blame the math teachers either. Or at least, only on a case-by-case basis. But in all seriousness, how could even teachers that WANT to be good or actually DO understand the material teach math the way it needs to be taught when we have curriculum that says pi is 22/7 or 3.14?  That those bullshit techniques I mentioned above are wrote into the curriculum, and as a consequence, the textbooks???

And then there was the Common Core State Standards.

If teachers are serious about adopting these standards and adjusting, re-learning and re-teaching themselves material that they thought was sacrosanct for decades to teach it the correct way—the way that leads to further understanding, not cognitive dead-ends for ease-of-calculation sake—if those teachers start teaching the way they could teach, if understanding of the material holds at least equal weight with getting the right calculation, then I won't have so many people surprised when I come in and blow their understanding of mathematics away.

I won't have to apologize impotently when students lament their entire experience of math to date.

And I won't have dozens of students tell me every semester that I am the best math teacher that they've ever had.

But you know, if that is the case, if I can't effect a mathematical renaissance for those students because they've already been enlightened, well, it will have been worth it.

Captain America is out-of-control amazing

I don't know how Marvel keeps getting sequels that are better than the originals, but Captain America does not just top the first Captain America, but it tops the Avengers as well.

 

The action is some of the best action I've ever seen. When I say, "out-of-control amazing", I mean, so amazing that there were parts where I just couldn't watch because I was so fucking amazed by what had just happened. I had to cover my eyes in order to reset and consume more amazing.

The character development for Cap, Nick Fury, and the Black Widow was welcome and the presence of a storyline and not just a, "aliens are invading, let's come together and save the world" was surprising and super-awesome.

Some name-drops, cameos, foreshadowing for the comic book afficionados (note: you may consider this spoiler-ish, although I'm not distinguishing between actual cameos and just mentions, so that's up to you; if you find the mere thought of spoilers to be anathema, just go watch the movie. It's worth the money, and my fiancee (who hates going to the movies) has already said that we are going to go watch it in theaters AGAIN).

SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS
Dr. StrangeAgent 13CrossbonesQuicksilverScarlet WitchTony StarkBruce BannerThe Avengers TowerThe Infinity GemsSenator SternBatroc the Leaper END OF SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS

GO WATCH THIS MOVIE!

On the Dearth of Works, Blog Posts, and Updates

Hi All,

I've been working my butt off with my mundane jobs unfortunately and have not had the time to do more than check e-mails and comments. If you leave me a message, I'll be sure to reply within a day or so like I usually do, but for the foreseeable future (through March at least), I'll be working more hours than I can sustain while also writing and working for Apocalypse Designs. So I'll be off from AD through March.

Thankfully, by doing this, I should be in a better position than ever to produce quality work and not have to worry about finances as much. It's amazing how much that effects my writing, and I am more amazed than ever by the "starving artists" types that barely subsist for their art.

Thank you for your support and I look forward to seeing everyone in March!

Best Regards,
~Zero

Reuben overload

I've had like 5 New Year's Reubens in the last week.

I can't stop.

They're better than an actual Reuben.

I'm concerned for my life.

There's only enough kielbasa for one more.

Sadness.

Cooking Secrets

There are two things that you hear time and time again that make good food amazing.
Use the best and freshest ingredients.Butter. Lots and lots of butter.The first applies to pretty much everything you can make. Fresh ingredients are always going to taste better than frozen, and if you can find a reliable source of a "good" ingredient, it's worth the extra cost if you care about taste (not worth the extra cost if it means you're not getting enough calories to live on obviously...well, maybe in some situations).

The second applies to only, well, pretty much everything also. Whatever it is that you're cooking, butter will probably make it better. Eggs, vegetables, fish, steak, pancakes, everything. If there's heat enough to melt butter involved in the preparation, then butter should enter into the mix at some point in the recipe.

And by the way, when I say use butter, I mean, a LOT of butter. You can't be worried about eating healthy if you want your food to taste the best, and any recipe that doesn't have butter probably has a poor substitute for one.

I recently made some chocolate coffee chocolate chip cookies and the recipe called for so much vegetable oil and water. Upon careful consideration, I substituted two sticks of butter.

I've recently mastered cooking pancakes (they're cheap, quick and easy and if you make the batter in a tupperware container, you can save it for future uses), and the number one secret is to add more butter for each pancake (at that point, you don't need to spread butter on them after either).

And, if you think that you can get away with skipping butter by using margarine, well you're correct, if you want your food to taste terrible and completely destroy the point of using butter in the first place.

Now, I'm not saying or advocating a butter only diet any more than I'm advocating a bacon only diet. I'm just saying that it tastes freaking amazing to add butter to your food while cooking.

By the way, I actually don't like butter as a condiment usually.

New Year's Reuben Recipe

Hello everyone!

Just a quick original recipe I'd like to share to help you get rid of your New Year's leftovers.

I assume everyone's made kielbasa and sauerkraut for New Year's Eve/Day, but if you haven't, then you'll have to for this recipe.
I used homemade sauerkraut (which I had frozen) and Wasilewski kielbasa (which is a local brand that is freaking amazing, it's worth seeking out a good kielbasa that isn't a huge brand. Wasilewski kielbasa was about half again as much as Hillshire Farms and worth EVERY PENNY), threw it all in the slow-cooker for 8 hours on low with half a large onion and dumped a bottle of Woodchuck Amber Draft Hard Cider into the mix, but you can use your own preferred recipe for all that biz (although be aware that YMMV with the following recipe when you change things).

Anyway, this is pretty simple. You'll need the following:

Ingredients:
Leftover kielbasa and sauerkraut (enough sauerkraut as you prefer for your Reubens and enough Kielbasa to cover a piece of bread)

I've found cutting the kielbasa lengthwise provides the best sandwich eating experience, but cutting it in small slices also works

Your choice of corned beef or pastrami or a mixture. I use about 4 slices of pastrami per sandwich, which would be about 2 slices of corned beefYour choice of a hearty bread (traditionally rye).Swiss cheese Butter for frying and butter for toasting1000 Island Dressing (or your condiment of choice. Ranch is a nice alternative)
Directions:

Heat your pan up with some butter (the more the better. I use about 1 Tbsp per sandwich, so if you're making multiple sandwiches, use more, it will make it taste better).

Begin frying the lunch meat. Fry to your desired levels. If you've never made a Reuben before, some like the meat torn, some like it sliced into strips, and some like it sandwich sized, experiment to find your preferences. Make sure you swirl the meat around in all that butter.

When the meat is nearing desired levels of done-ness, add your sauerkraut and sliced kielbasa.

Fry that up in the juices of your melted butter and grease with what juices are left from the sauerkraut.

At about this point, you should either toast your bread in a toaster, or spread butter on it and toast it in a semi-dry area of the pan (I use the toaster for convenience, but if you are using a flat skillet, you probably have room for it there, and should also adjust your butter levels so that there's not as much).

Note: Toasted bread is highly recommended for stability purposes.

Arrange your lunch meat into sandwich sized portions, layer sauerkraut and top with Swiss cheese until the cheese is gooey.

Once the cheese is gooey, add sliced kielbasa to the top so that the gooey-ness of the cheese helps hold the kielbasa.

Use your toast and a spatula to scoop up everything. If you have a nice spatula, you can probably scoop an entire sandwich without assistance, and this will help maintain the sandwich's integrity.

Add Thousand Island Dressing. I make these with ranch instead when I'm out of Thousand Island, but my fiancee swears by mayo and mustard.

If you're an experienced sandwich eater, you shouldn't need a fork with a hearty toasted bread providing structure and cheese providing stick, but I won't look down on anyone that prefers to eat these with a fork (although others might!).

I like these even more than Reubens, but the additional requirement of 8-hr slow-cooked kielbasa and sauerkraut means that it is a bit of a task when that's not readily available.

Note: All the meats in this (at least the ones I used) are ready-to-eat, so cooking is purely for flavor-enhancement.

Let me know if you end up trying this!

Twelfth Day of Christmas

Today is the twelfth day of Christmas! Traditionally (and I mean wayyy back in the day), this was the biggest party night of the year that brought to a close the 13-day long non-stop party that was Christmas (from Christmas Eve through the Twelfth Night).
Nowadays, it is the Feast day of St. John Neumann, who is, I believe, the first American saint, and definitely the first male American saint. He was the Bishop of Philadelphia in the 1800s.

Unfortunately, Americans have gotten pretty lazy, and to encourage that, American Catholic bishops decided that instead of making everyone go to church on the Epiphany of the Lord, which is supposed to occur on January 6th, they shifted the holiday to the second Sunday after Christmas, occurring between the 2nd and 8th of January. This is because everyone already has to go to church on Sunday, so this way they don't have to go to church more often, but what really happens is that most people don't make a big deal about it anymore. This is just one of the many stupid things about the Christmas holiday today.

We've gone from fourteen days of parties (and really, the festival season is supposed to start with All Hallows' Eve) with presents, feasting, trick-or-treating and merrymaking (i.e. drinking) to getting all of the presents on the first day of Christmas and only having parties on Christmas Eve/Christmas Day and maybe the weekend before or after with another party on New Year's Eve.

Anyway, on Twelfth Night you're supposed to take down the edible portions of your Christmas decorations and eat them, such as fruit in your Christmas wreaths, and obviously anything that you've stripped bare to eat you should take all the way down, and this is probably where we now have the idea that you take down all of your decorations on or after the Twelfth Night/Epiphany. (Traditionally though, it wasn't bad to leave up your Christmas Decorations until Candlemas on February 2).

Twelfth Night is also when you should drink the most wassail, but it's OK to drink wassail earlier in the Christmas season. If you'd like to come a-wassailing today, I'd guess you're going to meet with pretty staunch rebuttals by Grinches that think Christmas only occurs on Christmas Eve and Day. Personally, I don't keep ready pennies, wassail or figgy pudding for wassailers, but this is more because of my situation than it is that I wouldn't like to.

Twelfth Night is also when you are supposed to put the magi into your nativity scene (since that is one of the things that is epiphanic about the Epiphany: it's the revelation of the divine nature of Christ to the Gentiles, at least in Western Christianity).

Anyway, a very sincere Merry Christmas to everyone! Whether you stopped celebrating two weeks ago or not.