HOLIDAY SEASON — The winter weather outside may be frightful, but the sex toys and lube next to the bed make it delightful – if sex researchers and product manufacturers are to be believed. “Right before New Year’s Eve is our highest sales peak,” observes David Johnson of Trojan condoms.

Apparently not everyone is wearing condoms – Trojan or otherwise – during the festive winter holidays, however, because September births have been all the rage within the western world, according to the University of Michigan’s Population Studies Center in Ann Arbor.

Experts think the surge in sex is likely related to so-called holiday “leisure” time, as well as resolutions to start a family. Others opine that booze and partying may have something to do with the trend toward naked frolicking.

Gabriele Doblhammer says it’s not just dirty Americans getting their wild thing on when the temperatures plunge. Doblhammer, who works with the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research in Rostock, Germany and co-researcher Joseph Lee Rogers contend that increased sexual activity between Christmas and New Year’s “is characteristic of all Christian cultures in which it has been evaluated,”

None of this is a secret to four British public health researchers who compared the season to a “festival on fertility” in a 1999 Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine article. The fab four went on to explain that they based their opinion upon the fact that the holiday season is “associated with increased opportunities for socializing and a generally more hedonistic approach to life.”

Such an approach might logically include engaging in the activities generally associated with the creation of life.

Given these explanations, it’s understandable Trojan reports similar – if less dramatic – sex surges exist during other festive holidays, including those that include precious time off of work such as Independence Day, Memorial Day and Labor Day.

Condom sales also increase around Valentine’s Day and – ironically – Mother’s Day.

Till Roenneberg of the Institute for Medical Psychology at the University of Munich has observed birth rate related statistics dating back to 1669 and believes that prior to 1930, it was weather that influenced sexual activity in developed areas more than actual holiday activity. Because modern industrialized societies have less to worry about from sunlight, temperature and humidity, their populations have less of a seasonal conception and birth trend. Instead, it appears that three-day weekends and the opportunity to unwind, uncork, and undress are more important.

So, happy holidays – and celebrate safely!