Bad Santa. Bad, bad Santa.

The kids will be disappointed, but maybe we shouldn’t be too surprised if Santa just doesn’t feel like making his traditional Christmas Eve rounds. It’s been pretty rough lately for the jolly old elf. Just look at this list of related news-item headlines from MSNBC.com:

Naughty list growing after Santa ‘cold-cocked’
Woman on crutches accused of groping Santa
Santa’s chopper shot over Rio slum
Canada seeks author of nasty letters from Santa
Store Santa gets the heave-ho-ho-ho
Microsoft shuts down Santa for talking dirty
Charges filed after Santa left with pie on his face

What’s next? A sleigh recall? Mrs. Claus embroiled in an embezzelment scandal? A fine for excessive carbon emissions at the North Pole?

As far as I can tell, Santa’s round of problems began early this month with Microsoft (don’t most problems these days?), which set up an artificial intelligence application several weeks ago on its MSN Messenger software that would allow children to “talk” to Santa, who would message back appropriate-sounding responses based on what the kids typed in. But some of the responses weren’t so appropriate. In fact, they were highly inappropriate, as two British girls, ages 11 and 13, found out when they tried to offer Santa some pizza. After first downplaying the problem, then taking steps to “mitigate the issue,” then trying to attribute it to user error (does any of this sound familiar, Windows users?), Microsoft pulled the plug on its St. Cyber-Nick “automated agent.”

But that’s not Santa’s only potty-mouth problem. In Ottowa, at least 10 boys and girls received nasty letters from Santa after they had written to him with their wish lists. This turned out to be an inside job. Canada postal workers and volunteers write the responses to kids’ letters that are sent to the special Canadian postal code of H0H 0H0 (really), so they may be closing in on the offending elf. Hope it’s resolved by the 24th. The last thing Santa needs before a long winter’s sleigh ride is more bad PR.