Yes, Virginia: Summer 2011 Edition.

Q: Do Santa's elves do stuff over the summer? -Virginia, age 7

A: 

Virginia, the simple and childish answer to this absolutely ridiculous question is to humor you and say that the elves spend the summer hammering toys and sipping vodka sours on their summer holidays in the Bermuda Triangle. But that would be an utter lie, and I would be doing you a great disservice indeed. By this point, you've probably already asked your mommy this very same question, and your mommy's answer was probably something like what I just typed, and your dissatisfaction with such an appallingly cheery response is probably what led you to ask me. 

Well, first, I commend you on doubting your mommy--a healthy sense of doubt is the key to becoming an intelligent young lady. In the future, some may call you a quack or a conspiracy theorist, but I'm sure you've heard the phrase "haters gonna hate." Please take this phrase to heart. You are not a quack, you are right. And you are right to have written to me. Your mommy wants you to be happy, but typically the people who want you to be happy will do anything to keep you happy. And you know what we call people who will do anything to keep you happy, Virginia? Liars and cheats. Yes Virginia, your mommy has fed you more than just her breast milk and her sloppy joes. She has fed you her lies. It's a dark, lonely world out there Virginia, you just have to look beyond the plastic rainbow mane of your My Little Pony. 

Anyways Virginia, what follows is the real answer to your question. Santa's elves become ENSLAVED during post Christmas season. They are rented out by the Claus family to a giant network of other extraordinarily wealthy families. Due to their small size, they are oftentimes kept in dog houses. (Paris Hilton's dog house houses 17 elves every summer)

Do elves do stuff over the summer? Yes Virginia, they typically do house chores. Their nimble hands and fingers are exploited for things like scrubbing floors with toothbrushes, delousing Persian cats and braiding Gwen Stefani's son's hair into corn rows. Virginia, don't listen to your mommy's nonsense! These elves do not sip on vodka sours!

Virginia, the exploitation of these elves is absolutely disgusting and if people like you and I don't do something about it, then the rest of the world, the people like your mommy, will never know the horrors! Virginia, just last week, a customer at a yoga spa in Puerto Vallarta wrote this on a comment card:

Hi, this spa is great. Food is soooo clarifying (who knew bark and sea water would taste so good!?), the Marc Jacobs store next door is convenient and the oxygen chamber in my room felt like the one I have at home. But I have one major problem. Your instructors need to stop spraying lavender spray on me while I'm in restorative pose. All those free radicals immediately wrinkled my skin and now I suspect I also have pink eye, also known as conjunctivitis. Why don't you just have elves come dangle organic lavender sprigs over our faces? No free radicals! Sooo easy. Xoxo, gossip girl. 

Yes Virginia, elves do stuff over the summer. They labor, they toil, they suffer, all the while with sweat and tiny elf tears lubricating their delicate elf skin. They die too, Virginia. As their nimble fingers clutch one last time onto a lavender sprig, they die.

It's a dark, lonely world out there Virginia. Don't believe your mommy's lies.