One bright December morning, I showed up at work and found a brand-new, still-in-the-box nativity set lying there. There were many possible culprits, of course, but Beth was the most obvious, so I wandered into her office.

“Did you put this nativity set on my desk?”

“It’s not a nativity set, it’s a crèche.”

“Did you put this crèche on my desk?”

“Maybe I did.”

“Why did you put this crèche on my desk?”

“Perhaps I thought you needed a little Christmas spirit!”

Satisfied with her answer, I returned to my desk and unpacked the crèche from its neat styrofoam casing. Wanting to share my “Christmas spirit” with the rest of the office, I neatly arranged the figurines in a common area of the office.

And, of course, in order to really take ownership of the manger scene, I naturally supplemented the traditional cast of characters with my collection of Hercules and Xena action figures.

(This was long enough ago that I can’t remember why I had a collection of Hercules and Xena action figures, but it was my first “real” job and I probably didn’t know what to do with my salary other than spend it on toys.)

At first I merely scattered Hercules and Iolaus and Xena and Gabrielle throughout the scene. After a bit of reflection, I decided Xena might be more comfortable if she was holding her sword, and after this I realized the scene needed some fake blood (for which I used ketchup from the cafeteria). The scene still seemed a little bit sterile, so I scattered more weapons around, let Iolaus carry the baby Jesus, encouraged Hercules to put the moves on the radiantly post-pregnant Mary, and added an additional wise man, Jack-in-the-Box.

My crèche lasted only a day or two before I arrived at work and found it disassembled, all the pieces dumped in a pile on my chair. No one took credit for this anti-religious vandalism, although I think I know who did it, and a decade later I almost have enough evidence to hire a lawyer.

Luckily, digital cameras had just been invented at this point in history, and I got a few pictures of the manger crèche before its demise.