Santa Clause as we know him is derived from a Siberian tradition celebrating the new year. He would come at night after the harvest of amanitas (not the Grateful Dead mushrooms) and leave families their presants, preferably by the fire if they hadn't properly dried. Merry Christmas!
Easter is most likely a mushroom holiday as well. There is much more literature explaining the Christmas part, but in the spring its traditional to look around in the woods for a small round object which you can eat placed in a basket when collected. Who would win in a fight? Santa or EB? I want to say Santa but a 6 foot rabbit could fuck you up.
Santa clause was a catholic priest called St. Nicolas. After he indulged in mushrooms he encountered his fairy helpers and moved with them to the north pole to become Santa as we know him now.
I think... as the Winter solstice was Christianised the red/white wearing mushroom bearing guy (minus the sack of shrooms) was "allowed" to remain part of the holiday. A clause. It was a pre-existing condition. or what the other guy said
One time me and Santa were spun out of our minds and we had a 3sum with the tooth fairy, and then we like oh shit it's Xmas! We were tripping way to hard, and the t fairy just pulled out the ky jelly, so we end up calling Tim Allen to try and do it for us. Bout 30 mins later we realize it's the forth of July. I knew I heard explosions out the window! Man that was one hell of a night!
Yah there is quite a bit of interesting info in regards to the fly agaric and european shamanism, and early beliefs, to the extent that it embeded itself in so many facets of life to become almost unnoticable... like the santa flying with reindeer thing... is a reference to the common sensation of flying when takeng said amanitas. I'm makeing a seperate thread on the topic relating to an interesting movie on youtube, watch this space.
You really did lose me there. Ok, back to Chistmas. The coniferous trees are significant because Aminitas thrive beneath them. Hence the presents magically appearing under the tree. Suposedly as they where picked the mushrooms would be propped onto the branches to dry. This way a big sack wouldn't crush under the weight. A big harvest would most likely result in beautifully decorated Cristmas trees.