Beaujolais! X-mas time for the whole family with the FIRST RUNNER-UP winning X-mas essay! It's a holiday extravaganza that's sure to make everyone warm in their cockles.

[This year's Pigdog Journal Christmas Essay Contest's entries were all brilliant and talented. READ ON for the almost-winning essay by perennial top dog LENNY TUBEROSE. It's a heart-warming tale of blood-curdling revenge and international intrigue!

Meli Kalikimaka from Pigdog Journal -- the Web magazine that won't let the goddamned holiday season end! -- Mr. Bad, Pigdog Journal Christmas Essay Contest Editor]

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My name is Lenny. They calls me 'Lenny the Tailor', on account of I am a button man--I fix it when people has trouble keepin' their zippers shut, and I am very good at fittin' people for wooden tuxedos, if you catch the drift of my innuendo. I am a soldier for the Cosentino family, and this is the story of how me and my partner, Fat Tony, got our own crew.

I was at the Bridge Club throwin' some dice when Tony comes in and tells me we gots a job to do. Now you might expect that Fat Tony would be tomato stake thin, on account of the famous love for ironic monikers among us wise guys, but Fat Tony weighs about 400 pounds without the gold medallions and stuff. We are not sure if this is brilliant double reverse type irony or if the boss' braciole has started to lose its stuffing. In my line of work it don't pay to examine such things too close like.

Anyways, Fat Tony comes in and he takes me aside all quiet like and says we gotta go up to Canada to do a job and I should get the Lincoln and a couple a heaters and some galoshes.

"Now?" I says.

"Now," he says. "This is a big job and we gotta do it right or we's gonna be somebody else's next job. "

So I goes and gets our gear together and picks up Fat Tony in the Lincoln. Fat Tony favors the Lincoln on account of it gots big comfy bench seats to accommodate his big fat ass, and on account of it also gots a trunk that is big enough to carry a couple of stiffs.

So we's driving along and I says, "Hey, Ant'ony, so who is this guy what we gotta ventilate like?" Not that it matters to me, but I was just makin' conversation like.

Fat Tony gives me a funny look, and then he says, "It's the craziest freakin' job we ever got, Lenny. You ain't gonna believe it. Go ahead and guess."

So I'm not so good at this game, but it's a long drive and I figures what the hell. "Union boss?" I ventures.

Fat Tony laughs at this. "Not even close," he says.

"Um maybe a stoolie what talks too much," I suggests, as this is the nature of much of my work.

"No, it is not a stoolie what we are whackin'. You are not even in the correct region on the nature of this job, my friend."

"Ok, yas got me Ant'ony-I give up. Who is it that we's gonna grease?"

Fat Tony smirks at me and says, "We gotta do one 'Santa Claus'," he says, all serious like.

Now Fat Tony gots a reputation for whimsy, so right away I figures he is playin' me. "C'mon Ant'ony, who we doin' really?" I says.

"No shit Lenny-the hit is on Santa Claus. The word comes down all the way from the top."

"From Don Cosentino?" I asks.

Fat Tony points at the roof and says, "Higher."

I whistles softly. "Don Schiroso?"

"Higher," he says.

"Don Adamo? Don Adamo wants Santa Claus hit?" This really was a big job and it was makin' me a little nervous like.

"Higher," Fat Tony says.

This puzzles me, as Don Adamo is the Capo di Tutti Capo. "There ain't nobody higher than Don Adamo, Ant'ony "

Fat Tony looks at me all serious like and then he crosses himself and says, "The word comes from Il Papa hisself Lenny".

"The Pope!" I says, as I cross myself all pious like. "The Pope ordered the hit on Santa Claus?"

"That's right."

"But why?" I asks. "What's the Pope got against Santa Claus?" I asks, crossing myself.

"The way the Pope sees it," Fat Tony says, crossing himself, "Santa Claus has been muscling in on the Christmas racket for some time. When people think of Christmas these days, they don't think of the baby Jesus in his manger all meek and mild like, they think of Santa Claus and stockings full of candy and stuff like that there. The Pope is plenty pissed," Fat Tony says, crossing himself, "and he wants we should explain the extent of his distress to this Santa Claus with lead punctuation, if you get my drift."

I reflected upon this development in silence for a while as I drove. So the way I figure it, the Pope is a very holy man, and if he wants this guy knee-capped or whacked or whatever then that's ok by me. I mean he's the freakin' Pope right? It's like killin' for Jesus. Anyway, this whole 'givin' stuff away for free' like is just plain anti-American-it's like communism or something, which I guess is why the guy lives in Canada instead of somewheres civilized like. The more I thought about it, the more I warmed up to the idea.

Gettin' into Canada was a snap. They do not guard the border with much diligence up there as it is a well- known fact that there ain't nothing worth boosting in Canada, and nobody with a full deck would try to sneak into the place. We told the Mountie at the border that we was going to a funeral, which was sort of true in a way, so it was funny like.

So we drives for a while and then Fat Tony gets all hungry like and we stops at a place called the Olive Grove for some dinner. Fat Tony finds that the comestibles is not adequate to his lofty standards, on account of Tony's mama is a splendid cook, which is how Tony got to lookin' like a meatball in the first place. When the waitress comes by and asks if everything is copascetical like, Fat Tony says to her, "In fact I am greatly distressed. What have I done to deserve this overcooked, mushy pasta and bland meatballs what taste like they are made from dogfood, or something worse maybe?"

So the waitress looks all confused like, as Tony is apparently the first person who has ever failed to recognize the rhetorical nature of her line of inquiry. "I'm terribly sorry sir," she says, "Is there anything that I can ?"

At this point Fat Tony has stood up and I am getting a very bad feeling in my gut about what is about to transpire.

"I will go into the kitchen and give the chef some helpful pointers," he says. The waitress tries to say something, but Fat Tony brushes her aside and walks into the kitchen like he owns the joint. Immediately I hears a commotion of disturbing proportions emanatin' from the vicinity of the kitchen area. This causes me some distress, as we is on our way to a job and should not be calling attention to ourselves and I know that Fat Tony can get a little carried away when the subject of food is at issue. So I runs into the kitchen, and there is Fat Tony demonstratin' to the chef a somewhat unorthodoxical method for checking if the pasta is done-he has stuffed the chef's mouth full of the dogfood meatballs and is holding his head in the pot of boiling water and pasta. Then he pulls the guy's head out of the pot and he says, "My associate and myself will be returning to make sure that you have understood and appreciated this helpful tip what I have given to you." At this time we decides that it would be best if we leave through the kitchen door all quiet like.

The rest of the drive to the north pole is without incident, so I am beginning to relax a bit when we reaches our final destination. So we gets our gear together and we enters the building what looks like the front office. The place is a real merdaio-it gots three desks that is overflowing with girlie magazines, full ashtrays and empty liquor bottles. The kid at the first desk is loungin' in his chair with his feet on the desk and his eyes closed.

So Fat Tony clears his throat all noisy like, but the kid doesn't even twitch. "Where can I find Santa Claus?" Tony asks.

The kid opens one eye, all bleary like, and says, "Who wants to know?"

"I wants to know," Tony says, "so answer the question junior, and don't gimme no lip."

So the kid leaps up all irritated like and he starts screaming at Fat Tony, "I ain't no kid, I'm an elf you fat bastard!" Then he pulls this little stiletto out of nowhere and stabs Fat Tony right in the ass.

"Aiee! Mia culo! Little figlio di puttana stabbed me in my ass!" Then Tony pulls out his piece and starts shooting. The elves scatter like Frenchmen running from a cap gun. Tony is holdin' his smokin' gun and doing a little dance like he gots the cacarella or something and then I looks out the window and sees Santa Claus running for his sleigh. He musta heard the gunplay I figure.

"Tony!" I says, "the guy is getting' away!"

Tony is closer to the door than me, so he runs out and starts shootin'. Santa has his own piece out and is shootin' back, but Tony is a real good shot and Santa is a somewhat easy target seeing as how he has dressed his big fat ass in bright red. Tony puts three bullets in him and bada-bing bada-boom Santa Claus is now Santa Was.

So now that the heat of the moment has passed, Tony sits down on the stairs and covers his face with his hands all despondent like. This job has not been our finest hour. The plan was that we was going to put Santa in the car all quiet like and then drive him to the woods, make him dig a hole, and then whack him with the piece we brought special for the job-a .22 throw away with the serial number filed off. Instead, we has shot the place up real bad and now we gots to get rid of the stiff the hard way. To make matters worse, in the heat of the moment, Tony has reached for his own piece instead of the .22. Now he realizes that he has got to get rid of this gun-a baretta what is Tony's most favoritest gun on account of his mama gave it to him the day he got made by Don Cosentino. Add to this that Tony is bleedin' from his ass like a pretty boy what was voted Miss Congeniality by his cell block, and yous can see why my associate was distressed.

After a while, Tony looks up and says, "Whadda we gonna do now Lenny? We can't just leave him here. This would be considered death by natural cause back in New Jersey, but up here people is gonna talk."

So I get the shovel outta the trunk and tries to dig a hole but the ground is froze solid like.

"Well," I says, "If we can't leave him here then I guess we gotta take him with us."

"Take him where?" Tony asks. "You know they is gonna pop the trunk at the border. This has gotten very messy and Don Cosentino ain't gonna like it."

So things was lookin' very grim for myself and my associate at this juncture and I was seriously thinkin' about sittin' down wit' Fat Tony and havin' a good cry myself, when I hears this voice behind me.

"Looking for a date, Honey?"

I looks up, and I sees this broad a real looker. She has platinum blond hair and black fishnet stockings on a pair of legs that goes all the way up like. Fat Tony puts his hand in his jacket but he doesn't pull out his piece. "Take a hike, sister," he says.

"My name is Trixie," she says. She takes a step closer and this brings her in sight of the compost formerly known as Santa Claus. She raises an eyebrow at this.

"Um...sorry 'bout that," I says. "It was a accident like."

She just shrugs. "Whatever."

"Yous wasn't terribly close then?"

"He was my boss. Now I guess I'm the boss. The girls won't mind. He was a freak you know. I didn't mind the regular stuff it's my job you know but sometimes he wanted to bring the freakin' reindeer in with him. I'm not going to miss that at all. And now that I'm the boss I get to keep the proprietor's cut. Even if I let the girls keep a couple extra points, I'm going to be very rich. You boys did me a favor."

"Santa was your pimp?"

She laughed. "You see a guy in a red velvet suit with a fur trimmed hat, what line of work do you think he's in?"

"Shit," I says. Not very poetic, but the whole thing had sort of caught me by surprise like. "Well Trixie," I says, " we gots ourselves a little situation here. This dead guy ain't gonna be so good for business and our disposal arrangements have fallen through like. I don't suppose you got a way of disposin' of this stiff all neat and quiet like, do ya?"

Trixie thinks about this for a minute and then she smiles. "Ok," she says, "I know just what to do. You wrap him up in something so you can put him in the car," she says to me. Then she turns to Tony and says, "You come with me. We are going to need a few things to make this work."

So I wraps the stiff up all cozy like, and by the time I's done, Fat Tony has arrived with a small bag. We has a little trouble getting' the stiff into the trunk, on account of Santa was a real lard ass who made Fat Tony look slender. When we finally accomplishes this difficult task, we gets in the car and heads for the border as Fat Tony explains to me the details of Trixie's brilliant plan to make this guy's passing look accidental like.

A few miles from the border, we puts Trixie's plan into action. First we steals a little Toyota pickup. Next, we takes Santa out of the trunk and goes to work on him. We strips him outta his red suit and dresses him in white pajamas. Then we tears up a white sheet and wraps it around his head. Finally we takes some black shoe polish and colors his beard all dark like. Next we bundles him into the Toyota and bada-bing bada-boom, goodbye Santa Claus, hello O-santa bin Laden. Then we points the Toyota at the border, puts the stiff's foot on the gas pedal, and away he goes.

Just like Trixie figured, when the truck approaches the border, the Mounties fire 126 warning shots into Santa's head and chest. Santa is no longer our problem and we now crosses the border with ease. Don Cosentino was so impressed with our work that he gave Tony his own crew and made me his lieutenant.

So now it occurs to me that maybe it wasn't such a good idea for me to right all this down, and it was definitely not a good idea for you to read it as you now knows too much if you know what I mean. So I guess Tony and me got one more job to do. Merry Christmas, and we'll be seein' you real soon.

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