Not long ago and far away, Santa was getting ready for his annual trip...
but there were problems everywhere. Four of his elves got sick, and the
trainee elves did not produce the toys as fast as the regular ones so Santa
was beginning to feel the pressure of being behind schedule.

Then Mrs. Claus told Santa that her mom was coming to visit. This stressed
Santa even more. When he went to harness the reindeer, he found that
three of them were about to give birth and two had jumped the fence and
were out heaven-knows-where. More stress. Then when he began to load
the sleigh, one of the boards cracked and the toy bag fell to the ground
and scattered the toys all over the place.

Frustrated, Santa went into the house for a cup of coffee and a shot of
whiskey. When he opened the cupboard, he found the elves had hit the
liquor and there was nothing strong to drink. He decided to have a cup
of coffee, but in his frustration, he dropped the coffee pot and it broke
into hundreds of little pieces all over the kitchen floor.

He went to get the broom and found that mice had eaten the straw it
was made from. Just then the doorbell rang and Santa cussed on his
way to the door. He opened the door and there was a little angel with
a great big Christmas tree. The angel said: "Where would you like to
put this tree Santa?"

And that my friend, is how the little angel came to be on top of the
Christmas tree.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A Christmas Tradition - Version II

It was supposed to be a happy time, but it wasn't. Santa was really
cross. It was Christmas Eve and NOTHING was going right.

Mrs. Claus had burned all the Christmas cookies. The Elves were
complaining about not getting paid for the overtime they had put in
while making toys and the reindeer had been drinking all afternoon
and were dead drunk. To make matters worse, they had taken the
sleigh out for a spin earlier in the day and crashed it into a tree,
breaking off one of the runners.

Santa was beside himself with anger. "I can't believe it! I've got
to deliver millions of presents all over the world in just a few hours
from now and all my reindeer are drunk, my Elves are on strike,
and I don't even have a Christmas tree! I sent that stupid little
angel out HOURS ago to find a tree and he isn't even back yet!
What am I going to do?"

Just then the little angel opened the front door and stepped in
from the snowy night, dragging a Christmas tree.

He says: "Yo, Santa, so where do ya want me to stick the
Christmas tree this year?"