Got Eggnog?

Often during this so-festive-you-could-puke time of year, your thoughts turn to booze and how much happier you would be if only you drank more of it from morning to night to mask the pain and problems of gift-shopping. (You know, gift-giving is supposed to be so glorious, and it just might be because when you actually hand over the gift, the long search for said gift is finally over and you're throwing in the towel; gift-shopping sucks. A ton.) Sometimes, though, while wasting away at home making gift lists and watching the Christmas television specials, you drown your selfish sorrows enough to actually puke. Not happy. That's why you should drink in public, you know, where there're social mores and all that to keep you in check. So head to the Clayton Triangle (the area bordered by Maryland Avenue and South Brentwood and Forsyth boulevards in Clayton) from 5 to 8 p.m Thursday, December 1, for the Champagne Stroll. This grownup shopping event features store promotions and specials, glasses of bubbly (yay!), carriage rides, free wine tastings at Parker's Table Wine & Food Shop (woo-hoo!), edible treats at Straub's and more. Call 314-727-2020 for more information.

And if you're perfectly stable — mentally, that is — and love the holidays so much that you don't even need to drink because you're so perfect, we have an event for you, too: the free Maplewood Christmas Tree Walk, beginning at 6 p.m. Friday, December 2, at Citizens' Park (7308 Manchester Road, Maplewood). You'll get there just in time to witness the tree-lighting ceremony and Santa's grand entrance on a fire truck. Afterward there will be special shopping discounts and plenty of trimmed trees to admire throughout the 'Wood. And Santa will take your kids on a trolley ride (my my, is he a man of many transit options or what!) while you sneak into Boogaloo to have some delightfully gingery pink sangria, um, we mean while you go on a carriage ride (wink).