Guest Post: Shiraz, Author of Defenders of the Scroll

I'm happy to welcome Shiraz who I met briefly in New York this past May. He wrote the book Defenders of the Scroll which you can learn more about at his website.


My life as a contractor for software development keeps me on the move, living in different cities, and often countries, for months to years at a time. When I do end up back at my home town of Toronto for the Christmas season, I stay with my brother, his wife, and their four (yes four!) kids who range in age from three to twelve. Now, all the kids are young enough to still believe in Santa, and I am probably the most evil uncle in the world, so I like to have fun at their expense.

Last year a week before Christmas, they walked into the room I was in to see me yelling on the phone. I don’t think they’ve seen me yell before and their eyes widened when they realized who I was yelling at.

“Listen, Santa. I don’t care how bad I was this year, I still think I deserve to get a present! … Ok that was bad but … You can’t count that time! … Ok fat man, if you’re not going to bring me a present, don’t bother bringing presents to anyone in this house!”

I slammed the phone down as the kids gasped, a couple of them exclaiming “No! Uncle Shaz!”

I gave them a frustrated look and asked, “What?”

Their parents had to assure them that Santa would still deliver presents and, of course, the presents arrived. I didn’t get one from Santa though, so I vowed revenge.

This year I informed them of my plan to build a Santa trap. It involved rope placed by the fireplace, and a baseball bat. The goal was to grab the toy bag, so that we’d have all the toys for everyone in the world, toys enough to last us for years! Surprisingly, none of them would help me build it, despite me asking several times over the last week. A few complaints were sent to their parents in hopes they’d convince me to change my mind.

On Christmas morning, they came down and the presents were there with no sign of a Santa trap. I walked in limping and pretending to be sore and they asked what happened.

“Santa beat me up,” I told them.

“What?”

“I set my Santa trap, but he was too good for me. We got into a fight and he pinned me to the ground and gave me noogies until I promised never to do it again. Didn’t you hear us?”

What made me smile was that my nine year-old nephew piped up and said, “I was awake and heard thumping downstairs, but I didn’t know what it was.”

“That was me fighting Santa!” I exclaimed.

“Well, it serves you right for trying to mug Santa,” my niece scolded.

The others agreed with nods and a unanimous, “Yeah!”

None of them seemed concerned that their uncle was hurt!

To top things off, there was a present under the tree for me from Santa (my brother and his wife) which only convinced the kids that Santa is the kindest, “bestest” person in the world because he decided to give me a present after everything that happened.

Sometimes I honestly wonder why these kids love me, but they are excited every time they see me and I never buy them any presents. I think it may be that, even though I tease them a lot, when I’m with them they get all my attention and that’s a gift they really want. Of course, they could just be insane. It’s a tough call.