Ahh, my young apprentice... Good, good... let the despirit of Xmas flow through you... I was a huge pro Xmas geezer in my youth. The rose tinted spectacles of nostalgia coloured my whole outlook on the festered season. Then I noticed the odd one or two didn't live up to my expectations, which is ok, there's always next year, right..? Then I thought, these aren't anywhere near th amount of fun Morecombe and Wise promised they'd be, and I started to become a bit jaded. Then I began to wonder why. And I thought that when I were a kid, the whole month of December was given over to the big day. At school, sod all would be done except cut out shitty Xmas decs from paper plates and baco-foil. The school Xmas party was all about making a shitty hat out of crepe paper and bringing in a box of Mr Kipling to go on the pile of sugar and E numbers. Then 4 or 5 days before the event, we'd break up, go home and indulge ourselves with non stop baby sitting TV, sprinkled with running around with our cronies screaming "IT'S XMAS!!" at the top of our voices. Once it was over, we'd have another week or more to wind down and reflect on how brilliant our lives were. My mistake was thinking there'd be no change once I was taking care of myself. If at that point I'd change my mindset, then the dawn of realisation might not have been so blinding. Suddenly I was working hard right up to the end of Xmas Eve and back to work on the day after Boxing Day. I was the one who had to source gifts, decorations, and food & drink and I was the one who footed the bill. No. I'm not playing the worlds smallest violin for myself, I'm just saying that this was the biggest difference between the two times. Not having children, we were really going through the motions just because everybody else was. Roll on many more years and we've reached a new stage in the process. We now have pretty much everything we want, so even gift exchanging needs to be items of a consumable nature, because our house is already full of accumulated Xmas tat... I don't hate Xmas. I now have a job where I have a decent break during it. I don't stray far from the village during it, so I can enjoy a good drink in walking distance and we tend to get Boxing day to ourselves just to flake out, but it's a lot of hassle and expense for all that and to put up with Black Friday Spam too. If you were to run 'The Grinch' backwards... That'd be me.
Yep. My missus has done this for her sister's evil offspring's evil offspring. And I'm saddened to say it was my fault. I brought the concept to her attention. Mea culpa... So there are three glitter sprinkled boxes with Xmas onesies, hot chocolate powder, marsh mellows and service station Xmas DVDs getting in my way in my office at the moment...
Don't get me wrong. I do enjoy certain aspects of it. The time off work being one of them. Our company just shuts at 12:00 on Christmas Eve and we come back in the New Year. I like the drinking and catching up with old friends but the companies trying to get as much cash out of you before the season's over really ruins it for me. I still remember one year at my old job when I was a younger man, keen to impress. The hours we worked there were pretty abysmal to start with. 50+ hours per week, every week, ad nauseam. Alternate Saturday mornings too. We always had to come in during the Christmas period and before leaving on the 24th I'd asked my boss what day we were back in. "Boxing Day", he told me. "And what are we wearing?", I asked, "Shirt and tie job or casual?". "Shirt and tie as normal", was the reply. So knowing that I had a full, crappy day ahead of me on Boxing Day I took it easy all Christmas day. Watching my girlfriend and her family get slowly pissed. I switched to the soft drinks in the afternoon. Eventually getting back home with a drunk girlfriend and me, fresh as a daisy. Boxing day morning I woke up, had breakfast, had a shower, ironed my shirt and tie and got suited and booted, grudgingly said goodbye to my slumbering and snoring better half and headed off to work at 7:45. The roads were utterly deserted and I seriously questioned what the hell I was doing in this job. I arrived at work and the car park was empty. I tried the security office and it was locked. I figured maybe I was just keener than everyone else but after 20 minutes I phoned my boss who answered the blower in a sleepy voice, "Morning Rich. What's up?". "Well I'm outside the offices and there's nobody here. Not a person. What time is everyone supposed to be in?" Silence for a few seconds and then, "Ahhh, sh*t. Sorry, mate. I was only kidding when I said we were working today. I meant to tell you before we left the office but it slipped my mind"
There's no sufficient button to respond to that one... Maybe I'll start a FB group of melancholy old gits over Xmas. We can hold virtual hands after midnight on the 25th...
....I can't believe you've coughed that The only think I'm forking any real money out for is this for my bezzy mate Who has the misfortune to live in Doncaster...
Yep, I'll take that one on the chin. Now my dearest friend in the village also wants one. She's a bit...straight... so I was thinking of a reindeer onesie, a copy of 50 shades, a bottle of prosecco, a box of Lindor and a 12" rabbit...
