The Ghost Of Christmas Post

You may (those of you who have not indulged too much in the warm liquid pleasures of mulled wine) recall that before Christmas I was performing a mull of a different sort - no, not Kintyre - but musing on the chances of Tom being ill over Christmas due to the effects of his second MMR vaccination.

Well, true to form Tom became very grouchy over Christmas Eve and steadily worsened as the evening drew on. Nothing too serious I'm relieved to say but it did mean Karen and I were extremely lucky if we managed 3 hours sleep that night... which made for a very blurry eyed, barely human Christmas day the morning after.

I must admit I was a zombie for much of the day and seemed to spend much of it trying to distract Tom with all the new toys that he wasn't at all in the mood to enjoy. Ho hum. Despite that though it was a good day. I suspect that when I look back on it the stress and worry over Tom will magically disappear and instead all will be basked in a tinsel glow of chicken cooked in goose fat and marvellous giftage of the superlative sort. Selective memory is a grand thing.

Thankfully Tom's reaction only lasted 24 hours and after a good night's sleep for us all on the 25th Boxing Day dawned bright and sunny and it felt like Christmas had finally arrived - a day late but no matter. Tom had a few presents left unwrapped and piled into them with gusto. That's the spirit!

The rest of managed a good haul too. Ben received a Nintendo DS - and has virtually had his nose pushed into it's shiny smooth screen since unwrapping it 2 days ago. The silence is a real novelty.

I showered my wife (steady, boys!) with gifts a-plenty including a fabulous peredot necklace, choice DVDs and books to entertain, educate and delight.

And as for yours truly... well... Some of you may recall a post from earlier this year. Namely this one.

Yup. You guessed it. I got it.

The term "happy bunny" springs to mind.

My wife is simply the best. And I'll fight any man, woman or reindeer who says otherwise.

God I love Christmas!

Unwrapped

The bin men have literally just hauled off the six huge bag loads of rubbish produced by myself and my family this Christmas. As their filthy dustcart revved off into the distance I felt a pang or two of regret... regret that Christmas is over again for another year and regret at having produced so much waste. The amount of extraneous packaging was frightening, most of it from the kid's toys - huge folded up and moulded pieces of industrial sized cardboard which defied any attempt to flatpack them into as small a shape as possible for easy disposal.

I also have to say that, despite my initial smugness at avoiding the High Street crowds this year by shopping entirely on-line, the negative of this has been loads and loads of extra cardboard packaging, polystyrene and padding hanging about the house which has only added to our Christmas carbon footprint.

Put it this way: I nearly entitled this post "Return Of The Sasquatch".

Refuse gripes aside I must admit Christmas was highly enjoyable - it being Tom's first only added to the specialness of it all. Not that Tom was particularly impressed - or even interested - in any of the presents we'd bought for him, preferring instead the occasional bottle of milk...

However, for the rest of us, there were some cool presents flying around this year that put smiles on all our faces. Among the pile of goodies I lavished on Karen was the Bladerunner 5 disc boxed set, a copy of Newman & Baddiel's History Today, an ocean of DVDS and books and some richly gorgeous jewellery. Ben had a Transformer voice mask (oh how we regret buying that...), a Lego remote control car and his own MP3 player.

Myself? I found myself presented with an ION USB turntable so that I can transfer my immense vinyl record collection to MP3 format, a Lego AT-AT Walker (Star Wars fans will understand the coolness of this) that actually walks (!) and some fab DVDS - Harry Potter & The Order Of The Phoenix, Rome Season 2 and 300 to name but a few. In fact coupled with the stash of DVDs I bought Karen we've now got so many movies to watch we could actually cancel our subscription to cable TV and still have stuff to watch right up to mid April.

Hmm. You know, that's not a bad idea... especially given how dire Christmas telly was this year. Doctor Who was a major disappointment. So much so I can't motivate myself to even write about it. Ballet Shoes was enjoyable and nice to see Emma Watson on TV spreading her acting wings. And Extras last night was very enjoyable. I actually found myself getting quite teary eyed towards the end. I guess I've still got too much Christmas sentimentality flowing around my blood stream.

Talking of which... I got some whisky for Christmas too and it's now baying for my company. Cheers one and all!

Breaking The Law! Breaking The Law!

Having opted to take Geography rather than History at school it is hopefully quite understandable why the following intriguing nugget of information completely passed me by until I had the usual post-breakfast conversation with my wife this morning...

Apparently it is officially illegal in England (and possibly the whole of the UK) to celebrate Christmas. A law was set down during the time of Oliver Cromwell declaring that the celebration of Christmas was to be outlawed and it has never ever been repealed. When Charles II, all round funkster, hip-happening-guy and disco king, ascended the throne everybody just thought buggery to Ollie and started celebrating Christmas like there was no tomorrow (i.e. no Boxing Day) and completely forgot about undoing Ollie Crommie’s silly little law.

It still stands.

So. We are all officially breaking the law.

Hmm.

Suddenly the fun element of Christmas has increased a hundred-fold...!

Merry Christmas and merry rebellion one and all!

MFI

I’m a bit nonplussed by the current MFI advertising campaign.

Not that I particularly care about MFI or their marketing ethos, you understand. I mean, it’s not like I’ve ever shopped at one of their stores or even driven within a 5 mile range of one. I’ve lost count of the number of Boxing Day half price MFI sales that I’ve deliberately avoided over the years. When I’m freshly gutted up on hot turkey the last thing I want to do is shuffle around a mouldy warehouse in Erdington looking at a vast panorama of corner sofa suites and pre-built Devonshire pewter knob handle shelving units.

I mean, come on. I’ve got some taste.

Their new television adverts, however, are impinging on my psyche with some degree of success. Though not in the manner that their marketing experts had hoped for...

The catch line is that an MFI showroom is so expertly put together it’s just like being in your own home. Cue various family groups – all from the scummy end of town – having blazing rows and white trash spats against a backdrop of hastily constructed MFI furniture. The camera then pulls out as Wayne and Waynetta continue their Jerry Springer style dispute to reveal that lo! The couple aren’t in their own home at all but are in fact in an MFI warehouse looking at the wonderful array of suites and design ideas that the store has to offer. Gosh.

So much like home is MFI that the couple have plainly forgotten where they are and are carrying on like they’re in their own kitchen!

Oh ho ho. Chortle chortle.

Unfortunately the advert stops before they start hacking at each other with Stanley knives and then running upstairs to their MFI Kingsize Divan bed to start shagging each other witless like a couple of bit-part actors from Shameless.

Cos that apparently is what the average MFI customer is like.

Hmm.

That’s not exactly selling the store to me.

So it looks like I’ll be spending Boxing Day at home once again this year too.

Half A Sixpence. Mary Poppins. James Bond. It’ll be dire telly but better that than spending the entire afternoon watching Tracey and Kevin gouging out each other’s Marlborough scabbed eyes at MFI...