Top 10 Tapped Out Holiday Decorations

A combination of a celebration of the weird and unique take that the Tapped Out game takes towards both the tradition of holiday decorations makes you wonder what the most popular are?

Some facts about their real-life equivalents may surprise and amuse you, so let's take a look at the Top 10 Tapped Out Holiday Decorations!

10. Lisa Statue of Liberty (4th of July Decoration)

Most players will see the Lisa Statue of Liberty decoration as being a symbol of the holiday - but it actually is much more than that.

In fact it has a far more deeper symbolic meaning but to know that you would need to know a little about its origins beyond the fairly-floss version of its meaning that you get in school books.

To fully appreciate its symbolism in the game, stop for a moment and think about Lisa Simpson and her philosophical outlook on life and her unwavering belief in social justice and the rights of women.

Now consider this: the statue, a gift from the people of France to the people of the United States, in addition to holding aloft the torch of liberty, has some other symbolic features that are not easily seen from afar, which is how most people view it.

At the feet of Lady Liberty are chains and a broken shackle which symbolize the Statue as a woman who has been freed from oppression and servitude.

09. Practice Snakes (Whacking Day)

An imaginary holiday whose main focus is driving snakes towards the center of town and then killing them with clubs? Yeah, that sounds like The Simpsons... Or does it?

The iconic Practice Snakes are one of the more amusing and enduring of the decorations mostly because of what they appear to suggest in terms of what you should do with a snake... It turns out though that the message being sent may is not the message that the casual observer got.

The episode was initially pitched by George Meyer, whose intent was to create an episode that spoke out against mistreatment of snakes -- which happen to be a very useful even necessary part of nature -- and that was the ultimate goal for the Whacking Day episode and the event in the game.

Did it work? Possibly not, but not due to the graphic mistreatment of snakes. The failure of its social message to catch on may have had more to do with all of the other subplot and extra interests featured in it.

08. Shamrock Topiary (St. Patrick's Day)

You probably know that the Shamrock (on of a variety of types of three-leaf clover) is both a symbol of Ireland and the national plant of the Emerald Isle, but did you know that it was also the textbook used by St. Patrick to introduce Christianity to Ireland? It was!

According to the legend, when St. Patrick was out and about spreading the world in the fifth century, he used the shamrock to teach the Celts the lesson of the Holy Trinity.

The three leaves attached to a single stem, he explained, naturally represented the unity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit in one God.

You may be interested to learn that Patrick wasn't entirely popular on the island - the Druid Priests that had been the dominant religion way before Pat and his message arrived did not like his upsetting the natural order of nature that was the basis of their faith and religion.

To counter the man who would become a Saint's use of the Shamrock as proof of the Holy Trinity the Druids pointed out that while the three-leaf clover was pretty easily found, the four-leaf variety of the same plant contradicts his claim.

Thereafter they spread the word that the four-leaf clover, which had always been viewed as a sign of good luck, was also a reminder to not ignore the other Gods.

Saint Patrick's response to that campaign was to claim that the extra leaf represented "God's grace" which as it was a boon and therefore uncommon, easily explained the rarity of the four-leaf clover!

In 2002, in Hanamaki, Japan, a bloke named Shigeo Obara discovered a clover that has 18 leaves (a Guinness World Record) -- we're still waiting to hear St. Patrick explain that one.

Continues on the next page...