Technical Writing Related Humor - 'tis the season.

[Cirrus Matusek <CMatusek -at- LTDCommodities -dot- com>]

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'Twas The Night Before Christmas (as written by a technical writer for a
firm that does US government contracting)

'Twas the nocturnal segment of the diurnal period preceding the annual 
Yuletide celebration, and throughout our place of residence, kinetic  
activity was not in evidence among the possessors of this potential, 
including that species of domestic rodent known as Mus musculus. 

Hosiery was meticulously suspended from the forward edge of the wood
burning caloric apparatus, pursuant to our anticipatory pleasure regarding
an imminent visitation from an eccentric philanthropist among whose
folkloric appellations is the honorific title of St. Nicholas.

The prepubescent siblings, comfortably ensconced in their respective 
accommodations of repose, were experiencing subconscious visual 
hallucinations of variegated fruit confections moving rhythmically through
their cerebrums.

My conjugal partner and I, attired in our nocturnal head coverings, were 
about to take slumberous advantage of the hibernal darkness when upon the 
avenaceous exterior portion of the grounds there ascended such a 
cacophony of dissonance that I felt compelled to arise with alacrity from
my place of repose for the purpose of ascertaining the precise source
thereof.

Hastening to the casement, I forthwith opened the barriers sealing this 
fenestration, noting thereupon that the lunar brilliance without, 
reflected as it was on the surface of a recent crystalline precipitation, 
might be said to rival that of the solar meridian itself - thus permitting
my incredulous optical sensory organs to behold a miniature airborne 
runnered conveyance drawn by eight diminutive specimens of the genus
Rangifer, piloted by a minuscule, aged chauffeur so ebullient and nimble
that it became instantly apparent to me that he was indeed our
anticipated caller.

With his ungulate motive power travelling at what may possibly have been 
more vertiginous velocity than patriotic alar predators, he vociferated 
loudly,expelled breath musically through contracted labia, and addressed 
each of the octet by his or her respective cognomen - "Now Dasher, now 
Dancer..." et al. - guiding them to the uppermost exterior level of our 
abode, through which structure I could readily distinguish the 
concatenations of each of the 32 cloven pedal extremities.

As I retracted my cranium from its erstwhile location, and was performing 
a 180-degree pivot, our distinguished visitant achieved - with utmost 
celerity and via a downward leap - entry by way of the smoke passage. 
He was clad entirely in animal pelts soiled by the ebony residue from 
oxidations of carboniferous fuels which had accumulated on the walls 
thereof. His resemblance to a street vendor I attributed largely to the 
plethora of assorted playthings which he bore dorsally in a commodious 
cloth receptacle.

His orbs were scintillant with reflected luminosity, while his 
submaxillary dermal indentations gave every evidence of engaging 
amiability. The capillaries of his malar regions and nasal appurtenance 
were engorged with blood which suffused the subcutaneous layers, the 
former approximating the coloration of Albion's floral emblem, the latter 
that of the Prunus avium,or sweet cherry. His amusing sub- and 
supralabials resembled nothing so much as a common loop knot, and their 
ambient hirsute facial adornment appeared like small, tabular and columnar
crystals of frozen water.

Clenched firmly between his incisors was a smoking piece whose grey 
fumes, forming a tenuous ellipse about his occiput, were suggestive of a 
decorative seasonal circlet of holly. His visage was wider than it was 
high, and when he waxed audibly mirthful, his corpulent abdominal region
undulated in the manner of impectinated fruit syrup in a hemispherical 
container. He was, in short, neither more nor less than an obese, jocund,
multigenarian gnome, the optical perception of whom rendered me visibly
frolicsome despite every effort to refrain from so being. By rapidly 
lowering and then elevating one eyelid and rotating his head slightly to 
one side,he indicated that trepidation on my part was groundless.

Without utterance and with dispatch, he commenced filling the 
aforementioned appended hosiery with various of the aforementioned 
articles of merchandise extracted from his aforementioned previously 
dorsally transported cloth receptacle. Upon completion of this task, he 
executed an abrupt about-face, placed a single manual digit in lateral 
juxtaposition to his olfactory organ, inclined his cranium forward in a 
gesture ofleave-taking, and forthwith effected his egress by renegotiating
(in reverse) the smoke passage. He then propelled himself in a short
vector onto his conveyance, directed a musical expulsion of air through
his contracted oral sphincter to the antlered quadrupeds of burden, and
proceeded to soar aloft in a movement hitherto observable chiefly among
the seed-bearing portions of a common weed. 

But I overheard his parting exclamation, audible immediately prior to his
vehiculation beyond the limits of visibility: "Ecstatic Yuletide to the
planetary constituency, and to that self same assemblage, my sincerest
wishes for a salubriously beneficial and gratifyingly pleasurable period
between sunset and dawn.