Because Slack's creations can be viewed on his Web site, christmasutah.com, he gets letters and e-mail from all over the world. Some want tips for their own decorating. The ones who have seen the house in person thank him for cheering them up. One woman, who had lost both her husband and a son that year, credited Slack's extravagant, playful display with making her want to keep on living.

But, to tell you the truth, "it's a lot of work and a lot of money," says Slack, who is operations battalion chief with the Unified Fire Authority. What most people don't realize, he says, is that it takes 30 hours just to lay out the extension cords right. And then there are the months he spends figuring out how to program the lights and to line up each blink with a beat of music. One minute of music takes 20 hours of thinking and fiddling. Plus, the lights fade and parts wear out, and before you know it the cost of replacing and expanding adds up to $5,000 a year.

"I look at it this way," he says. "All my friends have boats and trailers and jet skis. And I have Christmas."

"Marty can never do anything in moderation," says his wife. She and their two daughters and son have come into the kitchen on this weekend morning, the day after the official lights-on ceremony, and they all begin to gently rib Slack. He smiles but also looks a little bit hurt.

In the early years of Christmas Utah, before Slack fine-tuned the display, the family had to sit inside the house with the indoor lights out, and if they tried to use the clothes dryer it would overload the circuits. Micalle felt like a hostage in those days. Now the only problem is getting back into the neighborhood if she goes out on an errand. The line of cars waiting to get into Whispering Pine Circle can back up past Vine Street onto 5600 South on the weekends right before Christmas.

The light display is synchronized to music broadcast by Slack on 99.9 FM. The lights are on from 5:15 to 10 p.m., Sunday through Thursday, and until 11 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays, through the first week of January. That's more than 200 hours of viewing — and even then there have been people who have knocked on the Slacks' door at midnight, rousing the family from sleep, asking him to turn the lights back on.

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E-mail: jarvik@desnews.com