'Tis the season, and it's nice to sit down and listen to some traditional Christmas carols in a cozy candle-lit room with plenty of biscuits. And sometimes it's nice to hear more modern takes on these ancient (and not so ancient) classics.

Unfortunately, whenever I look for this sort of thing, what I usually find is really bland CCM — some woman breathily singing "O Come All Ye Faithful" so slowly I can feel my life draining from me with every beat, a completely unnecessary modern bridge replete with painful key change, and so on. I know this stuff can be done right — Annie Lennox's Christmas album is a great example of taking classic carols and setting them to new music in such a way that it can completely change how you hear them. But finding more stuff in that vein is surprisingly hard.

So does anyone here have any suggestions or ideas for modern takes on classic carols that actually try and do something interesting?

American Thanksgiving was yesterday, so I get a nice long weekend. My husband and I spent yesterday with family, while today has been us chilling with our dog while enjoying canned cocktails and delicious leftovers.

In the spirit of the holiday (and speaking on behalf of the drinks I’ve consumed) I want to let everyone know that I’m happy this place exists and is filled with kind, thoughtful people. Tildes is marked by a coziness that, I believe, is largely missing across the modern internet.

I like recognizing people’s usernames and getting to know them. I like the slower pace of things here. I like that people put in effort. It feels good.

I know we’re all random internet nobodies inhabiting a tiny, niche corner of the web, but I’m happy I get to share this space with y’all. What luck that we ended up here, together.

Cheers, everyone. 🍻 Thanks for being awesome.