looking at Christmas lights

The topic I really want to blog about is too sensitive to discuss here, so let me just express my curiosity about Christmas lights. What is it that possesses people to want to drive aimlessly through neighborhoods and look at other people's light displays? I could understand it if incandescent bulbs had been invented in, say, September of this year; but don't we all know what electric lights look like now? Admittedly, there are a few people who do go all-out enough to make their house an actual attraction, but gas prices are too high to just troll through display after display of the same inflatable Santas and snowmen.