Grampa's Christmas Origins: Christmas Carols/Quotes

Quotes

[Bart and Lisa are Christmas caroling, and Bart is getting tired.]

Bart: When are we gonna be done caroling, Lisa? I'm all fa-la-la-la-la'd out!

Lisa: Just a few more houses and then we can go home.

[She knocks on a door. To her surprise, Grampa answers.]

Grampa: Go sell your critter-catching lullabies someplace else!

Lisa: Grampa, what are you talking about? We're here to sing Christmas carols.

Grampa: Then you don't know the true story about how this business got started!

[The scene shifts to several centuries ago.]

Grampa: [narrating] It was the fourteenth century, and the Black Death had spread all over Europe...

[A few townspeople—historical analogues of present-day residents of Springfield—are in the street. They're all pockmarked with plague boils.]

Principal Skinner: [reading from a piece of paper] Here we come a-wassailing, among the leaves so green! Here we come a-wandering, so fair to be seen!

Homer: Ahh... Forget it. No one cares about our spoken word wassailing.

Apu: And there are no green leaves anywhere, nor are we fair to be seen!

[The wassailers hear someone singing "la, la, la" nearby.]

Barney: Who is singing so beautifully from yonder alley?

[The wassailers investigate and find that the singer is Crazy Cat Lady. Her singing has attracted a large group of rats, and she keeps singing to them as she feeds them.]

Barney: She's singing to those rats... and they like it!

Skinner: Why don't we just "borrow" her melody and set it to our poem?

Barney: Sure. What else is there to do except cough up blood and starve to death?

[A few days later, Crazy Cat Lady returns to her spot in the alley and is perplexed that there are no rats around. Down the street, however, singing is heard.]

The Be Sharps: [singing] Here we come a-wassailing, among the leaves so green!

[Eleanor finds the wassailers singing in the street. Passersby don't seem interested (only Chief Wiggum is watching the wassailers), but, to her dismay, their singing has drawn a crowd of rats.]

Wassailers: [singing] Here we come a-wassailing, so fair to be seen!

[The wassailers notice the crowd of rats and recoil in horror.]

Homer: Okay, so maybe this wasn't such a good idea!

Wiggum: Excellent work gathering up these plague-spreading beasts, not-so-fair serfs. Men, gather yon rats!

[Officers Lou and Eddie appear with gunny sacks and follow Wiggum's orders, filling their sacks with rats. As they take the rats away, Eleanor cries out in dismay and lunges toward them, but Wiggum restrains her.]

Apu: But we were only caroling to raise the spirits of the downtrodden for Christmas!

Wiggum: Well then, your Christmas carols can entertain the masses while you save them! [He drags Eleanor away.]

Homer: "Christmas carols"... I like the sound of that!

Barney: Guess we better steal some more music!

Grampa: [narrating] Those first carolers went on to lure thousands of rats out of Europe before their own melting organs did them in.

[Back to the present.]

Grampa: So you see, kids, Christmas caroling is a dirty business, and should only be performed by trained music plagiarists!

[An angry Reverend Lovejoy appears on the porch. Evidently, they're been at his house all along.]

Lovejoy: I don't know how he broke into my house, children, but just try to keep a leash on your grandfather.

Bart: Sorry, Reverend Lovejoy. We won't let it happen again. [He and Lisa lead Grampa away.]

Grampa: Oh goody! I get to help you lure more rodents to their doom? This will be the best Christmas ever!