The holiday season is upon us, which means two things: first, it is now impossible to turn on the radio without hearing horrible pop covers of already horrible Christmas songs performed by artists whom God never intended to collaborate. After listening to Mariah Carey shriek out far too many key changes on “All I Want for Christmas (Is You)” while sitting in holiday traffic for five hours, I have decided that I am writing my own holiday song. It will be called “I Hope Your Kidneys Don’t Get Stolen This Christmas,” and it will be an instant classic among black-market organ traders and urban myth aficionados alike. Here is a sneak preview:

I hope your kidneys don’t get stolen this Christmas,
‘Cause come Kwanzaa, they’re gonna be mine,
I’ll slip you drugs and when you are unconscious,
I’ll excise your kidneys and leave you in a bathtub full of ice.
Singin’ kidneys, kidneys …

Second (lest you forget I’m listing things), the holiday season is all about maintaining relationships, which means that it is the perfect time for apologizing for past transgressions and making amends. Traditionally, Christmas is a time to let bygones be bygones, to forgive and forget, and to use endless trite phrases in lieu of original content.

As a columnist with a devoted readership of, oh, at least two or three people, I’ve angered plenty; as someone with little sense of propriety I’ve angered many more. In the spirit of Ruben Studdard, whose song “Sorry 2004″ comprised a blanket apology for every mistake he was going to make in the subsequent year, I would like to use my last column of the year as a forum for extending the olive branch to some of the people I have offended in 2004.

In my column last week, “Ch-Ch-Changes,” I mistakenly stated that my roommate’s mother was preparing Stovetop brand stuffing for Thanksgiving, when in fact the mix came from Williams-Sonoma. I would like to apologize to Mrs. Medoway, as well as to any others whom I may have caused undue distress.

I would also like to apologize to the Stovetop company and its affiliates for implying a connection between preparing Stovetop stuffing and moving to Brazil to build an ice factory. As far as I know, no actual correlation between the two behaviors has been established.

To my housemates: I am sorry that, whenever that new Tide with Downy commercial comes on, I spend roughly five minutes ranting about the advertising agency’s extremely unsubtle approach, which seems to be: “let’s play R&B and show black people, because stereotypes will make people want to wash their clothes with our product!” I will try to contain my outbursts in the future.

I apologize to any black people or advertising agencies who feel that I was making generalizations in my previous paragraph.

I am truly apologetic to anyone who has been on a long car trip with me in the past year and has had to listen to me say “Schuylkill!” over and over again until the vibrations from the road lull me to sleep. (It’s pronounced SKOO-kul, for those of you who aren’t in the know.)

I am sorry for the people who live below me, whose bathroom ceiling leaked with the water that overflowed from my apartment’s toilet. I am sorry for using the story as column fodder the following week. I am sorry for bringing it up yet again in the guise of an apology when I really just felt like telling the story one more time.

I do not, however, wish to apologize to the people who live above me, who seem to have a habit of clog-dancing at 4 a.m. In fact, I would like to do the opposite of apologizing, which is to say I wouldn’t mind bashing their subwoofer in with a baseball bat.

At the beginning of the year, I received an e-mail from a disgruntled reader who called me — presumably in a pejorative manner — a “New York Jew.” I would like to apologize both for being Jewish and for growing up in New York; neither was my choice. If I could, I would be a Rhode Island Vietnamese.

I am regretful for all of the times I asked friends for column ideas and then proceeded to reject every single suggestion they gave. It is because of my obstinacy that you are reading this dreck instead of: the worst holiday gifts; the best holiday gifts; the nature of “Christmas spirit”; my New Year’s Resolutions; or what happens to all the socks you lose in the dryer.

I would be remiss if I did not apologize to my editor for accompanying every single column with an e-mail about how I’m so tired and the next one will be better, I swear, and for arguing with 90 percent of her editing changes. I am especially sorry that I neglected to apologize to her in the first draft of this column, and would like to point out that I initially had written “90%” in that last sentence but then changed it to “90 percent” to comply with Sunstyle and save her five seconds.

I am deeply sorry for all those who have had their kidneys stolen and sold on the black market. It was not my intention to make light of your situation — which has no doubt been difficult — through my use of song. It’s just that when you have the music in you, you have to let it out somehow. Hit it, Ruben. This is my sorry for 2004 …