🎄 It’s 1981, and a jolly swagman who may or may not be Santa Claus is flying me around the world in a sleigh built out of a bench and some rope we had lying around to search the globe for a lost baby kangaroo.  

Today’s Christmas in July episode begins where it’s actually winter in July, and only gets stranger and more inappropriate from there. It’s “Around the World with Dot,” also known as “Dot and Santa Claus,” starring the title character from an 1899 Australian children’s book, “Dot and the Kangaroo.”  

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🎙 Guest:  

Dan MacPherson (@danmacpherson.bsky.social)  

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💬 Topics & Tangents:  

1. Watch “Around the World with Dot” on YouTube (Aussie Kids TV).  

2. But you may want to watch “Dot and the Kangaroo” first.  

3. Director Yoram Gross endured World War II in Poland; his family was on Schindler’s list. His studio, now Flying Bark Productions, more recently animated “Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles” and Marvel’s “What If…?”  

4. Barbara Frawley (Dot) singing “The Black Cat” on “Play School.”  

5. Today’s TV Trope: Magical Homeless Person.  

6. “Sakura Sakura,” which I recognized from Punch-Out!!  

7. How a White Lie Gave Japan KFC for Christmas. (Gastro Obscura)  

8. “The Real World of the Circus” opens similarly to the movie “Chaplin.”  

9. Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon.  

10. “Alouette” is about plucking the feathers off a lark.  

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📼 Commercial Break:  

Mortein “Louie the Fly” Commercial (1980s)  

Myer “Celebrate Christmas” Commercial (1980s)  

Bad Princess Movies, a catalogue of terrible movies about princesses and princesses-to-be. 

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“Dot and the Kangaroo” © 1981 Yoram Gross Filmstudio Pty Ltd.  

Theme song by Bronwen’s Ghost.  
Full show notes and social links at adventcalendar.house.