I work at Home Depot and we've had Christmas stuff on sale since before Halloween. We were actually getting it all in after I returned from a two-month hiatus to work in up-state New York for the Boy Scouts; fun time, would slave 16 hour days again. We're just waiting with baited breath and horror for when we know the Christmas music will begin again, and the protests from the night crew to shut it down after closing (the store never shuts off its day-time shopping music and ad play-list even at night, it's a 24/7 experience).

The managers are as angry about the season as the rest of us. They hate it. I've heard them protest angrily to one another and how Christmas as a tradition is dead to them now. They would rather just ignore the whole holiday.