An Upper East Side socialite has been torturing her neighbors with nonstop Christmas music, prompting one of them to sue her. Are there bigger problems plaguing the country right now? Undoubtedly. Should we instate a nationwide ban on Christmas music? Hell yes we should!
Lisa Maria Falcone, the wife of hedge fund billionaire Philip Falcone, has turned the front of her three adjoining East 67th Street townhouses into a whimsical Christmas wonderland, complete with a loudspeaker that allegedly blasts holiday music at all hours of the night and day. Her neighbor across the way, Nick Wilder, has had enough.
“It’s not like she plays it a half-hour every day. It’s on from 7 a.m. to midnight,” he told the New York Post. “I like a Christmas song on Christmas Day. But I’m tired of hearing ‘Jingle Bells’ like 700 or 800 times a day.’’
That sounds like hell, and also reminds me: Why do we have Christmas music anyway? It’s uniformly awful, and even if it weren’t, there’s truly no song good enough to withstand being played over and over and over and over and over and over and OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER in one month.
Imagine, you’re walking down the street after just getting laid off, or broken up with—and let’s face it, in 2016, you’ve probably enjoyed both—only to be accosted by the relentless plastic joy of some tinny Yuletide bullshit. You’re in a Duane Reade, just trying to buy some cold medicine because you’re sick for the 15th time this year, and there it is again: “Santa Baby.” “Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer.” Motherfucking JINGLE BELLS. The tunes are wretched. The lyrics are worse. And there’s no escape—especially not when it’s being blasted onto the street like airborne poison.
“She’s a prima donna who thinks she can do anything she wants without consideration for anybody,” Wilder said of his neighbor. “She’s invading other people’s homes with her elevator music.”
In 2014, Falcone caused a stir with her Halloween display, which featured an old woman cradling a ghoulish dead baby. Okay.