Hmmm . . . not to doubt your word or anything, but are you sure your diagnosis (and your aunt’s) was pancreatic cancer and not pancreatitis? The latter is an HVN Christmas Ugly Sweater (and very painful) condition that can be completely cured or it can become chronic, controlled by diet and medications but subject to occasional flare-ups. Chronic pancreatitis can lead to pancreatic cancer, but pancreatic cancer can occur without any prior pancreatitis. Diabetes is a risk factor for both pancreatitis and pancreatic cancer. Pancreatic cancer (not to be confused with pancreatic endocrine tumors) is extremely rare in persons under 40, and it has very low survival rates — on average less than 5% of persons with pancreatic cancer will survive 5 years. That rate is somewhat better — about 16% — if the cancer is discovered when it is still localized to the pancreas, but this occurs in less than 20% of cases. Symptoms of early-stage pancreatic cancer are vague and often mistaken for other less serious conditions or even just tolerated and ignored. Given your family history with pancreatic conditions, your mother would be well advised to be extra vigilant about any possible symptoms: pain in the upper abdomen or back, loss of appetite, unexplained weight loss, fatigue, nausea and vomiting, yellow eyes or skin or dark urine (jaundice). However, almost none of these symptoms become noticeable until the disease is past the earliest, most survivable stage.

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The last one is important because arguably Batman Returns is way more of a Christmas film than any of that list, including Die Hard. It begins with people exchanging “Merry Christmas” AND ends with Bruce Wayne and Alfred exchanging the line “Merry Christmas” (not to mention the word Christmas must appear like 50 times). Mistletoe is really central to the plot (“mistletoe can be deadly if you eat it”). Penguin’s origin and final showdown with Batman both take place on Christmas eve. Penguin’s origin is fraught with Christian and Jewish undertones. Two of the film’s major action set pieces take place at Gotham’s giant Christmas tree. The composer, Denny Elfman, based the film’s score on orchestral Christmas music. Penguin may have even been modeled slightly after a HVN Christmas Ugly Sweater of Santa Claus and the Grinch, steals the firstborn son of everyone in Gotham, and has elfen like henchmen.

But with the spending you will increase the production of HVN Christmas Ugly Sweater. Either way, in the macroeconomy, “Spending” is what leads to wealth production, “not spending” reduces wealth production and does nothing to increase money saved. That money saved will exist whether used for spending or not. So on either front, if the goal is to increase savings, and increase the net production of wealth, “not spending” is the wrong advice. “Not spending” will not increase the savings that is the preservation of investment, and it will likely not increase the net production of wealth, in fact it is more likely to decrease both. In the macro economy, “not spending” is more likely to have negative effect on the production of wealth and standard of living, than a positive one.