(For isolated people who rely on the Net for human contact)
'Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the house, Not a modem was stirring, nor clicking, a mouse. My keyboard was covered in plastic with care, I'd given up hope that e-mail would be there.
No children were nestled all snug in their beds, While visions of Megadrives danced in their heads; No wife in a nightie, just me in my sweats, Tackling my worries 'bout post-Christmas debts.
My wife, she had left me and taken our kids, And left me alone with my life on the skids; It was me and my 'puter, now silent and still, An empty quiet house and a lack of goodwill.
When from my computer there came such a clatter, I sprang from my seat to see what was the matter; Away to my study, I flew with a grimace, To open my Windows and tackle the menace.
But the 'puter was switched on and merrily running, The modem was winking, the disk drive was humming, The brightness and glow of its freshly-lit screen, Gave lustre like pearl to all of the scene,
Then what my aching and tired red eyes found, Was a marvelous web site which was complete with sound! With my out-of-date browser, and a modem to match, The web-pages loaded, quite slow as I watched,
More slowly than snails the images loaded, With no "Text Only" option as I silently goaded. And from the .WAV files, I heard with my ears, A ho-ho, some sleigh bells and some galloping deer.
So I clicked on the icons and surfed all around, Up on the monitor came St. Nick with a bound. He was dressed in all red, with boots and belt black; To download just his belly took all of my RAM.
He looked like a peddler, burlap pack on his back, Then he drew forth some e-mail out of his sack, A look of good cheer lit Santa's round face, As he handed me email greetings from cyberspace.
I read all of the email, felt no longer alone, Through my computer people came into my home, From Search Engines, Browsers, World Wide Web, Usenet, Came web-sites and email, chat rooms and more yet;
The vast Internet connects far distant lands, The marvel of cyberspace had given me friends. Santa sprang to his web page while I clicked at the keys, Responding to e-friends who'd sent greetings to me,
There's not many cards on my bookshelves this year, But I have an inbox and it's full of good cheer. Then I heard him exclaim as he faded from sight, "Merry Christmas my friend, now click on 'Reply'"
