Halloween has past, the snow is here, and it seems the holiday season is already upon us. You know what that means: screaming, entitled toddlers; racist family members; and a hole in your bank account you won’t be able to fill in until this time next year!

If you haven’t noticed, the holiday season sucks. For a lot of reasons.

1. It’s cold

I hate the cold. More specifically, I hate that the cold makes all my joints stiff and useless and makes my fingers suck at typing. I hate having to stand on my porch for ten minutes stomping snow out of my boots. I hate that I will inevitably slip on ice at least once (and probably more than once) and fall on my butt.

And it’s not just my personal body that hates winter. It’s everything about my routine. My commute takes twice as long in the winter. Every simple run to the grocery store is suddenly a twenty-minute process of bundling up to brave the cold. Couldn’t we have put all our holidays that require lots of running around during a time when it’s easier, and warmer, to do all that running?

2. It’s expensive

I finally caved and bought a decent coat and winter boots this year, and just those two things were a substantial chunk of my paycheck. Granted, I make 10 cents over minimum wage and only work 25-30 hours a week. But even excluding the necessities, the holiday season is murder on my bank account. “But Hannah! It’s the thought that counts, not the price tag!” Ha. Maybe in your family. Being from the poor side of a pretty big, pretty middle-class family has ensured that the months following the gift-giving season are months spent eating ramen and boxed mac and cheese just to get by.

3. It’s loud and obnoxious

I could go on for days about how relentlessly cheerful and insufferably repetitive Christmas carols are. But even forgetting the actual music, the holidays are the loudest, most obnoxious time of year. It seems like every time I leave my home, I’m surrounded by children shrieking and crying in front of toy displays and parents snapping at those kids as well as at any unlucky retail workers nearby. Of course, considering the alternative is to walk around in a silent, snow-covered world with your Christmas worries constantly buzzing in your head, I suppose drowning out those thoughts by making all that noise is understandable.

4. It’s dangerous

What, you think you can empty your bank accounts and fill your houses up with expensive goodies without any consequences? Think again. Do-badders know you’ve got extra cash and high-end merchandise just lying around the house, waiting to be delivered. Between Thanksgiving and New Year’s, burglaries increase greatly. But you probably don’t have to worry about that. Christmas thieves usually only go after people who can’t fight back. Like the elderly. Or poor kids.

5. It’s all a lie anyway

If you had even a slightly decent education, you probably already know that the first Thanksgiving wasn’t so much cutesy-cutesy white people having dinner with Native Americans as it was genocidey-murdery white people literally slaughtering entire groups of people. Nowadays, people focus more on the gratitude and food and less on the genocide. But it’s still a bloody and very real piece of the holiday’s history.

And forget about putting the “Christ” back in “Christmas.” Christmas as we know it today is pretty much all just leftover Pagan rituals. Even the date has nothing to do with Jesus, who was more likely born sometime in spring or summer. December 25th was chosen to coincide with Pagan rituals and make it easier for them to accept Christianity as their religion. I’m all for cutting loose at a Pagan celebration, but considering most people use this time of year as an opportunity to preach religion to their captive family members, it’s a bit too hypocritical for me to get behind.

There you have it. But what are you going to do with this newfound and entirely reasonable holiday season hate? I suggest putting on a smile and faking it until it’s over. At least this time of year usually comes with a steady flow of alcohol.