Ubi Sit Res*

Many years ago, my great friend Madge, left me in tears of laughter following a rant about the new Supermarket that had just opened in town. It was ok, she said, but nothing was in the same place as it was in her local store.
“But, it’s a different shop,” I said.
“I know,” she pouted, “but I went in to look for a new pair of Marigolds yesterday and I went to exactly where they are when I go to Asda, and all I could find was cat food. Who puts cat food next to the water filters? Cat food goes next to the toilet rolls…”
I didn’t understand her bemusement and she didn’t understand my amusement and, as usual, it all ended up in helpless mirth. Very sadly, Madge is no longer with us, but I think about her every time I walk into a Supermarket and, of late, I have started to understand her point of view.

Now, I know that there is a science to the layout of Supermarkets: that the floorplans are designed, based on the principles established by Daedalus** two and a half thousand years ago, whilst the shelves are stacked by bright young things with BSc’s in leading the sheep to chocolate. But they do seem to have been taught in different schools: the school of putting the pasta next to the bread versus the school of putting it next to the cook-in sauces. The school of putting the Pot Noodles with the convenience foods versus the school of putting them with the scratchcards, King-size Rizlas, Peperami and Carlsberg Special Brew. Do you put together things that go together, or things that belong together? Do you put custard with the puddings, or do you put it with the sauces? Do you put pasta with the sauces, or do you put it with the garlic bread? Do you put bread with the butter, or do you put it with the Marmite? Where do you put toiletries? Where do you put magazines? Where do you put all of the cleverly designed, bright plastic gizmos that never quite manage to perform the task for which they were designed? I know that in the closing days of 2021, this really should not be an issue, but does layout depend on location? Do you, for instance, put the fresh organic pasta, next to the truffles and wild mushrooms in Kensington, on a shelf that would be occupied by Spaghetti Hoops in Burnley? Do you even attempt to sell tinned pasta in Chelsea, unless you have a specifically labelled ‘Ironically Stocked’ shelf to put it on? Do you put Vegan ready meals alongside the fresh fruit and veg, or alongside the herbal tea and artisan crafted toilet rolls in the ‘weirdo’ section?

I understand that the fresh fruit and veg always looks great and that it might lure people in because it is bright and colourful, but near the door? Really? Beautiful soft fruit, no matter how carefully placed in the basket, always ends up under the tins and bottles – ok, mostly bottles – accumulated through the rest of the shop. Surely that can’t be right: unless, of course, it is all part of the plan. Once bitten, twice shy? Having arrived home with a terminally flattened punnet of now strawberry puree, or a half litre of raspberry coulis dripping through the holes in what was formerly a nice, neat box, do you thenceforth bypass the fruit on the first sweep and return to it later, so that you can lay it safely on the top of your basket? Do you, in short, walk past everything twice? Aah, you’re getting it now. Walk around the maze in one direction (‘Always turn left’ my dad used to say, although, if I’m honest, I’m not certain that he ever really knew where he was.) reach the end and come back the other way, before picking up some berries and heading for the tills. You wander past the cat food three times. By that stage you will grab a tin even if it means buying a cat on the way home in order to justify it.

I understand why they always put the items they want you to buy at eye level – who wants the eye strain involved in moving the things – but I do not know why everything I want is always out of reach at the back of the top shelf. Imagine you have a stand of five shelves: you put what you want the customer to buy where he/she does not have to look up, down, left or right to see it. You put the things that you don’t want them to buy – the budget versions – at foot level, and the niche products – ‘We don’t get much call for those round here’ – at ladder height. If you want to find a cheaper product, you don’t usually have to shop around, just stoop.

And then I start to think about Madge and I begin to understand what she was saying. Why can’t things always be in the same place? If nappies are by the formula milk powders in Tesco, why can’t they be in the same place at Asda? If the vegan meals are with the bamboo utensils in Morrison’s, why not in Sainsbury’s? If Aldi has the wonky carrots next-door to the cordless hammer-drills, why doesn’t Lidl? If the chocolate is not alongside the whisky anywhere, then it bloody well should be. As you get older, the only thing you want from a Supermarket is the ability to get out of it as quickly as possible. How quickly could you do the shopping if you didn’t have to pass so much that you don’t want, in order to get to what you do? How little would you buy if you didn’t have to pass so much other stuff to find it?

Ah, now I understand…

*Where things should be.

**Daedalus designed the Labyrinth in order to contain the Minotaur and so cunning was his plan, that he could barely escape it himself after it was built. He was the same Daedalus who made wax and feather wings for himself and his son Icarus and managed, unlike his son, to survive as he did not succumb to the temptation to fly too close to the Sun. He also murdered his nephew because he thought that he was a better inventor than himself – e.g. using a good epoxy resin to hold the wings together and affixing a ‘Do not operate this equipment in the proximity of a broiling celestial body’ to the flight feathers…

Christmas Past – A Boxing Day Tale

photo of santa claus sleeping — Photo by cottonbro on Pexels.com

Throughout this Christmas week, in addition to my normal seasonal posts (on Tuesday and Friday) and in the long-established TV tradition of festive repeats, I will re-post six of my very favourite Christmas offerings from Christmas Past. This is the last of those reposts and is from Boxing Day 2019…

‘…Always the same these days,’ said the old man randomly stabbing the buttons on the remote control. ‘Reality TV and repeats. Whatever happened to Morecambe and Wise? Whatever happened to Only Fools and Horses? Whatever happened to Val Doonican?’ He switched off the set as the latest X-Factor winner made his final ever TV appearance before returning to his life of flipping burgers and performing in the local Working Man’s Club on a Saturday evening – a valid life, with which he would have been perfectly happy, if only some idiot had not told him he could be a star.

‘Here,’ said Mrs Claus. ‘I was watching that.’ With a glare, Santa turned the TV back on. ‘Moan, moan, moan,’ continued the old woman, even as the seasonal Celebrity-Something-Or-Other burst into noisome life. ‘That’s all you do these days, moan, moan, moan. I’ll be happy when December comes about again: get you out of my hair.’
‘Yes, well,’ said Santa, stroking his beard agitatedly. ‘I’ve been thinking about that. I think I might retire. I’m tired. This is no job for an old man.’
Mrs Claus stared at him for a very long time whilst she considered spending even more time with him than she currently did. ‘What do you mean, no job for an old man? Who else is going to do it? It has to be an old man.’
‘Could be a woman.’
‘Not according to all of the literature.’
‘Literature can be modified,’ S.C. muttered, darkly.
‘Besides,’ ploughed on the old lady, ignoring the truth in her husband’s argument ‘You only really work one day a year – it’s a long day I’ll grant you, but other than have a few kids to sit on your lap through December, what else do you do?’
‘Elves don’t look after themselves, you know,’ he snapped. ‘Elves do not forward plan. Leave it to the elves and we’d have, come Christmas Eve, nothing more than dolls and wooden forts. And’ he continued, a steely glint entering his eye ‘Kids do not sit on my knee anymore. Not allowed. If I can drag the little bleeders away from their mobile phones for a minute, they pull my beard, wipe KFC down my coat and kick me in the shin before asking me for a vaping kit.’
‘What you need is a good sleep,’ soothed Mrs C. ‘Why not go to bed? Don’t worry about setting an alarm; I’ll wake you in March.’
‘Why March? What’s happening in March?’
‘Just a few promotional shots. Nothing taxing. Maybe a video or two. Few minutes work; nothing more.’
‘Promotional shots?’ he spluttered. ‘Promotional shots? Why do I need promotional shots? There’s only one of me. I’ve got more people on my books than I can handle already.’
‘Never hurts to advertise,’ she said, placing a small glass of sherry at his side. ‘Here, drink this.’
The old man eyed the drink. ‘Sherry?’ he coughed. ‘Sherry? Have you any idea how many glasses of sherry I drank last night? You’ll be offering me a mince pie next.’ He glared into the fire. ‘I’ll tell them in the morning,’ he said at last. ‘I’ll tell them I’m packing it in; that I’ve had enough.’
‘Tell who?’
‘Well… I’ve no idea. I’ll find someone.’
‘And what about the children?’
‘They won’t even notice, as long as they still get all of their stuff, they won’t care who brings it. The magic has gone already. They’ll never know.’ Despite himself, he drained the sherry in a single gulp. ‘I’m off to bed,’ he said.
‘Fine,’ said Mrs Claus. ‘No problem. Just before you do, though, can you read this so that I can reply.’
‘What is it?’
‘It’s a letter. It came down the chimney earlier while you were out talking to the reindeer.’
‘A letter? My God, they start earlier and earlier with their demands, don’t they? Can you read it to me? I don’t know what I’ve done with my glasses.’
Mrs Claus unfolded the single sheet of paper and, having cleared her throat, she read. ‘‘Dear Santa. Thank you for everything. I hope you get some rest today. I love you X.’ Carefully she refolded the letter, ‘Shall I burn it?’ she asked.

Santa coughed slightly and rubbed gently at what might just have been a little itch in the corner of his eye. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Give it to me. I’ll reply now and then I suppose I’d better go and get some sleep. I’ve got a busy December next year…’

Originally posted 26th December 2019

Christmas Present – A Beginners Guide to Christmas Traditions (part two)

…in which I continue to probe modern festive customs…

Dinner – The main Christmas Day meal is traditionally regarded as the centre-piece of the annual feast day and is, from the pigs in blankets to the brussel sprouts (via the chestnut stuffing and the ‘family recipe’ gravy), unquestionably the most stressful occasion on the festive calendar (unless it has ‘circumcision’ written on it in red pen). Every single element of this mammoth meal has the potential for disaster: over-cooked veg, under-cooked turkey, roast potatoes that fall under grandma’s deathly scrutiny, bread sauce that is to all intents and purposes merely bread, sage and onion stuffing that you can pour from a jug, gravy with lumps that could threaten safe passage along all major routes – for those with a nervous disposition, this part of the day is more threat than treat. [Please note: Christmas crackers are tiny tubes of cardboard stuffed with a gunpowder ‘snap’, a paper crown that will fit any head as long as it does not broaden out from the neck, a joke that has been lovingly translated from Serbo-Croat by a man with a Latvian to Classical Greek translator, and the kind of plastic ‘novelty’ item with which China intends to bring down the whole of Western Democracy – they are not what happens when granny warms the tinfoil-wrapped turkey in the microwave.]

Elf on the Shelf – Who could possibly tire of finding some novel misdemeanour for the knitted little scamp to perpetrate for each of the first twenty four days of Christmas? Ah yes, of course, everyone. Where did this tradition come from? I don’t recall it even existing ten years ago. When I was a boy, traipsing icing sugar across the kitchen floor, wrapping the Christmas tree in toilet roll and riding the cat up the curtains would merely have resulted in a clip around the ear and the possibility of having the tangerine removed from your stocking and the hammer detached from your toffee. Now, the appearance of the kapok stuffed scallywag heralds twenty five days of gift giving and the very definite likelihood of the Hoover giving up the ghost before the month is out. My tip: drop the gnome on the fire on the first of December and tell the kids he’s had an unfortunate little accident. Promise chocolate to whichever child can dig the deepest hole in which to bury him.

Film Night – Settle down and pull up the Bailey’s for a couple of hours bickering together in front of the TV. Miracle on 34^th Street, Love Actually, Home Alone, The Muppets’ Christmas Carol, It’s a Wonderful Life – now is the time to relish sentimentality and drown in marshmallow. Don’t fight it, this is the true spirit of Christmas: laughing together at jokes you’ve heard a thousand times and grinning again at an ending you’ve seen coming right from the very start.

Garden Centre – Do you remember a time when garden centres sold plants? Do you remember a time when you went there to buy the constituent parts of a hanging basket? Do you remember a time when you could find a hybrid tea without having first to join the queue for a cream one? All greenery is now banished from the garden centre on the first day of September and replaced by acres of tinsel, bauble and gnome; the pesticides are usurped for the season by Santa’s Grotto and every person of pensionable age in the county is drawn to the queue for the Christmas Carvery. This is the world of the super-sized, the battery-powered, the twinkling and the singing; the land of everything you had no idea you ever wanted and the source of everything you will never need. It is impossible to enter these dream factories in the search for a potted poinsettia without exiting, some flustered hours later, on the outside of a festive three course (including mince pie and coffee) and clutching a boxful of something that will, with the introduction of a thirteen amp fuse, inflate into a rooftop sleigh at little more than the cost of a new roof. The enthusiastic gardener need not be down-hearted: as soon as Christmas is over, the space will be refilled with everything that has withered away during the last three months.

Mistletoe – Well, it’s obvious, isn’t it, that the symbol of Christmas romance should be a poisonous parasite. Little compares to the horror of seeing an elderly relative stationed under the mistletoe with the facial expression that says they are either puckering up for a kiss or sucking the chocolate off a brazil nut. Pray that it is the nut…

Posadas Pinatas – Other than Mexican Food (also known as edible origami) this is probably the most popular thing ever to come out of that country. Tie up a container full of sweets, blindfold the kids and let them knock seven bells out of one another in the attempt to release the goodies. Once the children are all safely blindfolded, the piñata can be taken away and the kids allowed to thrash around until exhaustion kicks in, whilst the adults eat the sweets and chuckle as their offspring walk into walls.

Present Giving/Receiving – Do not believe what they tell you, receiving is much better than giving. However much joy you might get from giving away something really nice, you can double it by receiving it. Presents require choosing, buying and wrapping. Even worse, some of them require making! Giving them away is a betrayal of all that you hold most dear – you. Tell everyone that you are not giving presents this year but are, instead, giving the money to charity – they may believe you, you have some really stupid friends – but don’t try to persuade them to do the same or you may end up having to buy your own Walnut Whips this year. If anyone asks what you would like, quietly murmur ‘World peace, an end to poverty… and a nice bottle of malt wouldn’t go amiss…’

Walk – The bracing Christmas day walk is a highlight for everyone who can’t wait to get away from the kids in the afternoon. Wrap up warm (or, in alternative climes, deck the thongs) and attempt to get around the block without somebody moaning that they’re cold, tired, hungry or sure they’ve just trodden in something brown and malodorous. The best thing about fresh air is that it makes you desperate to get out of it. Pour the sherry before you leave in order to save time upon your return – and make sure that everyone leaves their shoes outside.

Yule Goat – Okay, I admit, I had no idea what this was until I saw it in a list of the best Christmas traditions and I haven’t had the chance to look it up yet. Whatever it is, it is already my favourite…

Whatever your own Christmas traditions, I hope that you have a happy and peaceful few days.

Christmas Past – ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas

(with abject apologies to Clement Clarke Moore)

Throughout this Christmas week, in addition to my normal seasonal posts (on Tuesday and Friday) and in the long-established TV tradition of festive repeats, I will re-post six of my very favourite Christmas offerings from Christmas Past. The fifth of these reposts is from my very first WordPress Christmas in 2018 and is, I think, my very favourite Seasonal Special to date…

‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse;
It should have been squeaking away at its wheel
Not laying face down and stiff in its meal.

There’ll be tears in the morn’ when she comes with his bread
And your dear little daughter discovers him dead,
But still, do not worry, she will not stay sad
When she spots, through the wrapping, that she’s got an i-pad.

The stockings we hung by the chimney with strings,
Were not for all the extravagant things:
For those they have hanging, at the end of their beds
Two giant sacks with their names on instead.

The children were nestled all snug in their beds,
Whilst visions of smart phones danced in their heads
And mummy and I, with an hour to kill,
Were fearfully reading the credit card bill.

When out in the street arose such a din,
‘Cos the people next door were trying to get in,
But the key they were trying was turning no more,
Which wasn’t surprising – it wasn’t their door.

‘If you hadn’t guzzled that last Famous Grouse,
You’d have known straight away that it wasn’t our house.’
Said the wobbling wife as she stumbled for home
And was sick down the back of a small plastic gnome.

‘It’s four in the morning,’ an angry voice cried.
‘Just shut up your racket or I’m coming outside.’
Then all became silent, except, from afar
The sound of a key down the side of their car.

As dry leaves start falling from autumnal trees,
So snow began drifting along on the breeze
And high in the sky at the reins of his sled,
A white bearded man with a hat on his head.

‘Now Dasher, now Dancer, now Prancer and Vixen.
On Comet, on Cupid, on Donner and Blitzen!’
He cried to the reindeer in tones slurred and merry,
Having just swallowed down his ten thousandth sherry.

And then, for a moment, I heard from the roof
An outburst of language that seemed most uncouth,
Then a flash by the window – a red and white blur
Of fat man and white beard; of red felt and fur.

He knocked on the door when he’d climbed to his feet
And adjusted his cloak ‘gainst the cold blinding sleet.
‘Just give me five minutes to sit by your fire
And I’ll see that your children get all they desire.’

We gave him some tea and both patiently sat
As he talked about this and he talked about that
And then, having eaten the last hot mince pie
He rose and he slapped on his red-trousered thigh.

He yawned – ‘I must return to my duty
My sled is still packed with a mountain of booty.’
And then, as he turned to the door with a wave
We reminded him of the promise he gave.

‘Of course, yes,’ he laughed, his jolly face beaming.
‘But quick now, while the kids are still dreaming.
Here, look at this dolly with glass-beaded eyes
And this wig and some glasses to make a disguise.’

‘A car made of tin and a train made of wood.
This big Snakes & Ladders is really quite good.
An orange, some nuts and a new, shiny penny.’
But electrical goods he hadn’t got any.

‘You conman,’ we cried. ‘You are not Santa Claus.
If we’d known it we would have left you outdoors.
The real Father Christmas would not carry such tat.
We want top class products – and brand names at that.’

‘Our kids will go mad if we give them this shite:
There are no soddin’ batteries and no gigabytes.
They don’t give a monkeys about innocence lost;
Just leave them a bill so they know what stuff costs.’

He turned to us now and his eyes filled with tears,
‘These presents have kept children happy for years.’
We looked at the list of the rubbish he’d got.
‘You silly old fool, you are losing the plot.’

He sprang to his sleigh crying ‘Sod this, I’m beat!’
And they all flew away to their Lapland retreat,
But I heard him exclaim ‘They are never content.
Now the thought doesn’t count – just the money you’ve spent.’

And so Christmas morning descended with gloom.
The children both rose and they looked round the room
At the i-phones, the i-pads, the Xbox and games
And they pulled at the labels and picked out their names.

Then at last they had finished, all presents unwrapped,
And we sat down for breakfast all energy sapped.
‘This is lame,’ they exclaimed. ‘This day is a bore.’
‘We’ve only got what we asked Santa Claus for.’

Then they saw on the floor where the old man had stood
A doll made of cloth and a train made of wood
And happily, low-tech, they played all the day
Whilst we packed all of their i-stuff away.

Originally posted 22nd December 2018

Christmas Past – Searching for the Spirit of Christmas

Throughout this Christmas week, in addition to my normal seasonal posts (on Tuesday and Friday) and in the long-established TV tradition of festive repeats, I will re-post six of my very favourite Christmas offerings from Christmas Past. The fourth of these reposts is from Christmas in 2020 and is a continuation of the story of Dinah and Shaw. It is, I think, full of hope…

‘…Well, I just hope that my mother never finds out that I’ve got a criminal record. It would kill her.’
‘Kill her? A little melodramatic, I think. I can imagine indigestion, heartburn even, but death – I’m not sure that death is likely.’
‘You don’t know her.’
‘Well, yes, that’s true, but I know you and your mum can’t be all bad. Besides, you haven’t actually got a criminal record.’
‘Arrested in Santa’s Grotto. The shame of it.’
‘We were released without charge.’
‘The ignominy.’
‘Besides, we probably could have sued them. Locking us up in that cupboard overnight.’
‘They had no idea we were in there. How were they to know that a perfectly sane and rational woman would have allowed her partner…’
‘Business partner!’
Dinah smiled. ‘…allowed her business partner to lure her into a stationery cupboard at the back of Santa’s Grotto in a search for who knows what, where they stayed until some unsuspecting member of staff locked them in for the night? They had no idea we were in there. The poor woman who opened the door nearly died when you rushed past her…’
‘You’d been laying on my bladder all night.’
‘…Leaving me to explain the situation.’
Shaw became instantly indignant. ‘You told her that I’d kidnapped you!’
‘Well, I didn’t want her to think that I’d gone in there voluntarily, did I?’
Shaw was holding a potato peeler in his left hand and a potato in his right. He gave the clear impression of a man who did not comprehend the relationship between the two. ‘It might have been wise not to have mentioned kidnap,’ he said. ‘That way we might not have had to spend twelve hours being interrogated by the serious crime squad.’
‘Well you didn’t help the situation,’ snapped Dinah, snatching the potato from him in exasperation. ‘Actually officer, we are Private Investigators, searching for the Spirit of Christmas. He thought that you were winding him up, particularly since you couldn’t give him any details of our client.’
‘I gave him a description!’ Shaw sounded positively affronted.
‘Well, so you did. Fat man with full white beard, as I recollect.’
‘Well he was!’
‘They only let us go because they thought that you were stark staring mad and they didn’t want you in the cells over Christmas.’
‘Well they did, so that’s all that matters,’ said Shaw. ‘Besides, you didn’t help, claiming that you’d never seen me before.’
‘I certainly saw you in a new light having spent a night confined in a tiny cupboard with you.’
‘That’s not the same. They… What do you mean in a new light?’
‘You talk.’
‘Talk?’
‘In your sleep – you talk?’
‘What about?’
Dinah passed him a bottle of wine and a corkscrew, hoping that he’d have more success with those than the potato. ‘I’m not sure what you were talking about, but you said that it was terribly inconvenient. Then you started muttering about having to follow your instincts, and I lost interest.’
Shaw sighed loudly and handed back the corkscrew before unscrewing the lid from the wine bottle. ‘Do you have glasses?’ he asked.
‘Strangely enough Shaw, I do,’ she said. ‘In the cupboard behind you. I’ll have the big one.’
Shaw opened the cupboard and removed the two glasses he found there: a large wine goblet and a shot glass. He filled them both and handed the goblet to Dinah. Dinah put down the mutilated remains of a potato and stared hollowly at the peeler. ‘Cheers,’ she said. ‘Merry Christmas.’ They clinked glasses and sipped the wine.
‘Optrex,’ said Shaw.
Dinah sniffed her wine, ‘Well, it’s not Chateau Lafitte,’ she said, ‘but…’
‘This glass smells of Optrex,’ said Shaw.
‘Ah, yes,’ Dinah stifled a grin. ‘I had a stye. Use a mug.’
Shaw picked up a mug and studied it carefully, before rinsing it under the tap and filling it with wine. ‘Thanks for… you know… asking me round,’ he said.
‘Least I could do… partner,’ she smiled.
‘Yes, well…’
‘Do you mind if we don’t have the full works for dinner?’ asked Dinah. ‘I mean, we’ve got crackers and a pudding, but I thought it would save a lot of time if we went slightly more unconventional for main.’
‘Goose?’
Dinah nodded. ‘Baked Beans,’ she said. ‘To be honest, I wasn’t expecting company. I was going to do some chips, but I think someone’s sabotaged the peeler.’
‘You said you had crackers.’
‘Kind of… virtual crackers, really.’
‘No crackers?’
Shaw’s bottom lip was protruding so far that Dinah feared it might well need support.
‘We can both say ‘Bang!’’ she suggested.
‘OK,’ he muttered. ‘You did say pudding though.’
‘Oh yes,’ Dinah replied. ‘I’ve got pudding. Definitely.’
‘You haven’t got pudding, have you?’ said Shaw, who could only have bettered his impression of a five year old by peeing his pants.
‘No. I can do sherry trifle – as long as you’re not bothered about the trifle.’
‘I suppose it would seem petty of me to check that you have got sherry?’
‘Not at all.’
‘Well?’
‘Well, what?’
‘Have you got sherry?’
‘I already told you, not at all.’ Dinah couldn’t help laughing at her own joke.
Shaw, who was building up to something approaching a full-scale tantrum, caught the joy in her eyes, and began to giggle himself.
‘A fine bloody Christmas dinner this is. I suppose you know that if we had been arrested, we would have got the full works at the Police Station. Turkey, sprouts, pigs in blankets…’
Dinah exploded with a laugh that deposited a fine mist of red wine over half of the kitchen. Shaw, who had received the full force of the explosion clean between the eyes, shook his hair dry whilst Dinah fought for breath, but each time she looked at his uncomprehending face, she started to laugh again. Eventually she hugged him, which gave her the opportunity to not look at him, and so, by and by, she regained her composure. She kissed him on the forehead, without any idea of why, and led him through to the sitting room. ‘Why don’t you tell me about the fat man with the full white beard,’ she said. ‘What did he want us to look for again?’
The settee was small and definitely inclined to pitch its occupants to the centre, which is where both Shaw and Dinah found themselves. They sat, cramped together for a few painful seconds before Dinah began the difficult process of getting to her feet without having to use Shaw’s knee as a support.
‘Let’s talk about it tomorrow,’ said Shaw. ‘Nobody works on Christmas Day.’
Dinah gave him a hard stare.
‘Alright, alright, except for Father Christmas.’
‘Phew,’ she said. ‘That’s a relief. Crisps?’
‘What flavour?’
‘Er…’
‘You haven’t got any, have you?’
‘I’ll get the wine.’
Dinah returned to the kitchen as Shaw sat back, as comfortably as the seat would allow, breathing in the little flat around him. It was warm and the wine had started to mellow him. Un-consciously he picked up a cushion and placed it beside him in the middle of the settee, plumping it absent-mindedly. ‘Actually, you know, I really wish I’d taken his address,’ he said as Dinah walked back into the room.
‘Who?’
‘The man with the white beard,’ he smiled as Dinah topped up his mug. ‘Because the more I think about it, the more I think I might have found what he was looking for…’

First published December 19th 2020

Part seven of this saga is here with links at the bottom that will get you to the whole story so far.

Christmas Present – A Beginners Guide to Christmas Traditions (part one)

You may believe that Christmas is all about eating and drinking, but for many, the traditions of the season are equally important (as long as they feature eating and drinking). My Christmas offering this year – which will be concluded on Friday 24^th December – is a simple guide to the customs we all hold most dear – as long as somebody has filled our glass first…

Advent Calendars – may be traditional in the run-up to Christmas, but as a child I can never remember even seeing one. It could be that they didn’t exist – that they had not yet become ‘traditional’ – it could be that my parents could not afford them, or it could be that they knew full well that if they had bought me one, I would have wrenched all of the little paper doors off on the first of December and eaten all of the chocolate before the first of the Christmas lights had fused. Whatever the reason, I was totally unaware of them until I had children of my own. Back then they were all Postman Pat branded cardboard, with twenty-four numbered paper hatches, each containing an unidentifiable gobbet of something sweet and brown. Today they may be finely stitched fabric, perfectly pierced and crafted treen or intricately illustrated seasonal panoramas: the twenty five little doors concealing gins of the world; handmade candles; the various component parts of something you have never wanted, but now feel obliged to construct whilst everybody else is watching ‘Call the Midwife’ on Christmas day; hand embroidered mottos, or canapés of the world. What I really need are twenty four little cavities containing suggestions for acceptableChristmas presents for my wife and a twenty fifth containing a comprehensive list of suitable excuses for buying her a foot spa again.

Board Games – are what Christmas is all about: pouting children, over-competitive adults and assorted threats of violence. Modern board games can be super-complicated, even when you are not struggling to digest the fourteen sprouts which are bobbing, uncomfortably, on the crest of half a dozen gins, two glasses of prosecco and a triple Drambuie, and are seldom suitable for family gatherings in which the only reason that Great Aunty Valerie has not yet punctured Uncle Derek with a size ten crochet hook is the fact that, after one too many egg-nogs, she is currently attempting to knot the fast unravelling fireside rug with a soup ladle. Stick to the simple and traditional: Snakes and Ladders, Ludo or Monopoly and accept that no game is ever going to finish without tears, recriminations and somebody ending up with a secondhand sprout in the breast pocket of their favourite silk shirt. Never get drawn into Twister: nobody needs that pushed into their face at three o’clock in the afternoon. There is little worse than heading towards the New Year with an embittered spouse and a hip that clunks every time you attempt to pick up your spilled cheese balls.

CD’s – specifically the CD’s that only see the light of day on Christmas morn: ‘Val Doonican sings Albanian Sea Shanties’; forty seven failed auditionees for Britain’s Got Talent all sing the same Slade anthem in a range of styles and keys unknown to all but the most dedicated of amateur cat spayers; Aled Jones ‘After the Snowman’, you know the kind of thing… The best thing that can happen to these discs is that they remain where they lay for the other 364 days of the year, in the box with Barry Manilow sings the songs of Marilyn Manson and the Original Cast recording of Lionel Bart’s ‘Twang’. Fans of traditional vinyl will be keen, of course, to listen instead to the true crackle of Christmas – “It is very important that you can appreciate the full dynamic register of Bony M’s ‘When a Child is Born’” – and will need little encouragement to chastise any child that inadvertently causes vibration near the yuletide pickup. Those of more tender years will, of course, hook up to Spotify and not spare a single thought for all the writers of Christmas classics, dying in penury as a consequence.

Carol Singing – Wrap up warm (UK and all points north) light the candles and head out into the dark armed with a fourteen page lyric sheet and a battery operated cassette player loaded with the wrong cassette. This is a rare seasonal opportunity to meet up with several dozen like-minded souls (the only other chance being the bi-annual bus trip to the Blake’s Seven appreciation society convention and candlelit supper in Llandrindod Wells) and annoy the hell out of the neighbours. If you know anybody who is in the very early stages of learning how to play the trumpet, encourage them to join in and persuade them that it always sounds much better when they play it loud. If householders refuse to give you money for your efforts, remind them that it is all for charity (never say which one) and refuse to move from under their window until Eastenders has finished and the kids have gone to bed with an ipad and a family pack of Tuc Sandwich crackers.

Clothes – ‘Tis the season of the Christmas jumper and the tinsel bedecked shirt, of bow ties and reindeer braces, of Santa hats and inappropriate underwear. Embrace the satin waistcoat. Celebrate the on-sock bell. Honour the pom-pom. Enjoy the fact that, for one day at least, you are not always the worst-dressed person in the room. True Christmas spirit will lead you to consider having a limb transplant in order to fit the pullover a great-aunt has just knitted for you. Whatever you wear on Christmas Day, wear it proudly – before putting it in a bag in the attic and ensuring that it spends a minimum of 364 days up there before it comes down again as multi-coloured mulch.

Coinage – placing good luck tokens – most often silver coins – into the Christmas Pudding has always been considered a sign of good fortune, especially if you happen to be a dentist. Remember that silver 3d coins are almost exactly child oesophagus-sized and carry more harmful germs than a Wuhan laboratory. The most fortuitous addition to such an augmented Christmas pudding is actually a fully comprehensive insurance policy.

Decorations – Hanging the decorations is often seen as the second task of Christmas. Getting the bloody things down from the attic is the first. Christmas decorations are traditionally carefully stored away on the Twelfth Day of Christmas so that they can be safely disposed of on the first day of December the following year. What can be broken, taffled, knotted or torn will inevitably become so after eleven unmolested months in the roofspace. How this occurs is one of life’s great mysteries, like why women are so drawn to shoes they cannot walk in or why men’s eyes so seldom work above breast-level. If you feel that you must string 32 mega-watts worth of electric bulbage across the front of your house, accompanied by a thirty foot tall inflatable snowman and an animatronic crib on the front lawn, then there is probably no more suitable time to do so – unless, of course, next-door’s budgie has just died…

End of part one – don’t miss part two, released Friday 24^th December: get the lowdown on Elf on the Shelf, Mistletoe, Posadas Pinatas, the Yule Goat and much, much more…

Christmas Past – A Pre-Christmas Conversation

Throughout this Christmas week, in addition to my normal seasonal posts (on Tuesday and Friday) and in the long-established TV tradition of festive repeats, I will re-post six of my very favourite Christmas offerings from Christmas Past. The third of these reposts is from Christmas in 2020, and is the fifth ‘Conversation with the Bearded Man’ story. It has the slightly melancholy air of a story written during Lockdown…

Yet another day when my spirits had descended to previously unplumbed depths: I was a compromised bathysphere, slowly sinking into the abyss whilst building up the kind of internal pressure that could foretell of nothing other than impeding disaster and a date with the fishes. My mood was black – I would say blacker than black, because ordinary black had become my normal default mood, but my mum always told me that there were no shades of either black or white, so whilst no saintly youth club leader could ever be whiter than white, I could not be blacker than black, just black, very black indeed – and my spirits were lower than the Trustpilot rating of the average Italian politician. I could not have been more down without being out. Except Christmas Day lay just around the corner: the knockout blow; the nightmare scenario for a man whose very best efforts at false bonhomie fell somewhat short of the minimum expected, a man abandoned by the Grinch because of his over-zealous views, a man whose ho-ho-ho had somehow become a strident no-no-no. I am tempted to say that I have always felt the same way about Christmas, but it would involve me in the kind of lying that would redden my cheeks and make my nose itch. This seasonal melancholy was relatively new to me, although I had been engendering it in others for years apparently.

Christmas is no time to be alone. I have no family, whilst the few friends I have, do have family, with whom they choose – treacherous scum – to spend the festive period, so, as usual, Christmas Eve found me alone in the pub observing life through the bottom of a beer glass. I had almost reached the decision to go home early – a plan that was only forestalled by the fact that the kebab shop hadn’t opened yet – when a hand reached out to take my glass. I was about to protest that I hadn’t finished, despite the fact that I patently had, when I noticed the cufflinks and the crisp white cuffs. The landlord was ok, don’t get me wrong, salt of the earth and all that, but not really a cufflink wearer. The kind of people he employed as bar staff were much more likely to have them through ears, nose or nipples than shirt cuffs. Given the state of the table tops, nobody in their right mind would wear a white shirt in the Public Bar. To be honest, a full forensic overall would be less out of place and definitely more suitable.

“Same again?” said the voice that I knew I was going to recognise even before its owner had spoken.
“How do you do that?” I asked, simultaneously nodding an affirmative. The man that I now knew as Lorelei simply smiled and walked to the bar. The landlord left his conversation and served him without a hint of rancour. If I had wanted serving in mid-Brexit rant, I would have been told to hold my horses in no uncertain terms. For Lorelei he was all genial host. But for the fact that he was as bald as a coot, his forelock would have been on the receiving end of a severe tugging. I could not hear the conversation, but whatever my bearded friend had to say, the coot found it exceedingly amusing. He made no attempt to short change him.

I thanked him for my drink and took a long draught from the glass. “I’m surprised that you drink beer,” I said.
“I don’t,” he answered, “but the landlord was so happy to serve me, I didn’t have the heart to ask for a dry sherry.” He took a long drink without flinching. “A bit more hoppy than I was expecting,” he said, after pause for reflection, “but quite adequate, all in all, I expect.”
“So,” I ventured, trying to sound as cool as I could. “What brings you here on Christmas Eve? Not exactly your local, is it?”
“Isn’t it?” He looked shocked and I realised – with a flicker of the surprise I had grown used to in his presence – that I had no idea at all of where he lived.
“Well I’ve never seen you in here before.”
“No,” he said. “Is this your local?”
I was painfully aware that he already knew the answer, but I gave it all the same: “It used to be” a mite more sulkily than I intended. “When I was… you know…”
He nodded. “More local?”
“We used to come in here a lot, when we were… you know… Before she left me for that…” I wanted to swear, but I felt quite certain that I would feel as though I had let myself down by doing so. Odd, I can normally barely stitch two sentences together without writing out an IOU for the swear box. “…Estate Agent,” I concluded, feeling it a more than adequate signal of my distaste.
“Ah,” he said. “Should I have bought peanuts?”
“What?”
“I was just wondering, I’m quite new to this, Christmas Eve and everything: should I have got snacks with the drinks?”
“No,” I said. “No. This is fine. I’ll get some when I go to the bar. You will have another?”
“As long as it doesn’t have to be the same,” he said.

We sat for some time in companionable silence. I studied his face as closely as I was able to without seeming… weird. He seemed genuinely happy to be there, smiling, out of place in my mind, but not in his. He did not touch his beer. After what seemed to me to be a suitable pause, I asked him if he would like another drink. He asked for a whisky. “He keeps a nice malt under the counter,” he said. “His little weakness, I think. I’m sure he’d be pleased to share.”
I approached the landlord with caution, it always seemed wise, and explained what my friend had suggested. “A gent,” he said pouring an unmeasured tot into a tumbler. “Tell him it’s on the house. Here…” he said, handing me a freshly filled water jug. “He’ll want this.” Unsurprisingly, my pint was not on the house.

Lorelei seemed much more at home cradling his whisky than he had appeared to be with beer, although he did not appear to be convinced by the pork scratchings. “Well,” he said at length, “it’s so nice to be in company, isn’t it?” I had to admit that, even though the conversation between us was sparse at best, I was happy and comfortable in his company.
“Sometimes,” he said, “you’ve got to let old things go before you can find new things.”
“Sometimes,” I said, “it’s easier said than done.”
“Yes,” he agreed, “but it’s a whole lot easier to not even make the effort. Why don’t you like Christmas?”
“Well I… I… Why do you say I don’t like Christmas?”
“Do you?”
“No.”
He smiled.
“But,” I continued. “I used to.”
He swirled his whisky in his glass, peering down into it as though he was looking into a crystal ball.
I felt obliged to fill the conversational void. “It’s not the same, is it,” I whined, “when you’re on your own.”
“The same?” he sipped his drink with exaggerated pleasure. “The same? No, I suppose not. Nothing is ever the same, but you can find pleasure if you choose to look for it. Perhaps you ought to start looking.”
“Where?”
“Where? Everywhere. Maybe not through the bottom of that glass – it’s not been cleaned properly in years and the beer… oh dear, the beer – but if you look for joy, you’ll find it. If you’re content with what you find, then friendship will find you.” He drained his glass and began to rise from his chair. I looked at the clock on the bar; 11:30. Where had that time gone? What is it they say about time?
Lorelei had waved his goodbyes to the landlord, who looked like a dog who had just been given a Bonio, and had moved towards the door. “Do something tomorrow,” he said. “Don’t wallow. Paddle.” He opened the door and a cold rush of late evening air spilled in. I tried to stand, drain my glass and put my coat on, all at the same time. Two things too many as it turned out.
“Do you fancy a kebab?” I asked as he disappeared into the night.
“No,” he answered…

First published 12th December 2020

Previous conversations are here:
Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Part Four

Christmas Past – A Christmas Tale

three kings figurines — Photo by Jonathan Meyer on Pexels.com

Throughout this Christmas week, in addition to my normal seasonal posts (on Tuesday and Friday) and in the long-established TV tradition of festive repeats, I will re-post six of my very favourite Christmas offerings from Christmas Past. The second of these reposts is from Christmas in 2019, just before the world went mad…

‘…And you are absolutely certain,’ said Melchior, ‘that this is the right place? I mean, I know that it is under the star, but then, truth be told, so is the rest of this village. So is the rest of this country, I shouldn’t wonder. High up, stars, shine all over the place they do. Must be some margin of error there, star-wise, that’s all I’m saying. Maybe we should check out the five star places first.’Balthazar sighed – again. ‘None of the five star places have angels hovering over them,’ he said. ‘Nor,’ he continued, ‘are they packed with shepherds watching their flocks, donkeys and assorted beasts of the fields.’
‘Or giraffes,’ said Gaspar.
Balthazar nodded his agreement. ‘Or gira… Did you say giraffe?’
‘Yes.’
‘What’s a giraffe?’
‘It’s a bit like a tall cow,’ said Gaspar, ‘with a long neck. My cousin brought one back from his travels. Dead, mind. Same as the big tusky, grey thing. Don’t travel well, apparently.’
Balthazar stared. ‘Do you see any of these tall cows around here?’
‘No,’ said Gaspar.
‘Then in what way, pray, are they relevant?’
‘I’m not sure,’ answered Gaspar. ‘I just have a feeling that someone will find that there’s only the giraffe left to play, in the future…’
Balthazar stared manically at Gaspar, his fists tightened and his jaw clenched. A small vein squirmed like a lug-worm below the skin of his forehead.
‘Shall we go and look inside,’ suggested Melchior, summoning the slaves to help them down from their mounts.
‘And where did you come by these things?’ asked Gaspar. ‘I’ve never sat on anything so uncomfortable in my life. They smell like the inside of an old sock and they spit. What’s wrong with a horse?’
‘These beasts are our traditional mode of transport,’ answered Melchior. ‘A man’s wealth is measured by them.’
‘I,’ said Balthazar, ‘have thousands.’
‘Sooner have gold,’ said Gaspar, gripping the gift-wrapped parcel he had borne with him from Arabia. ‘Think I’d rather travel on one of them long-necked cows, if I’m honest. At least they don’t have lumpy backs. And also,’ he continued as he was helped down from the musky beast, ‘how come yours has got two lumps and mine has only got one? Know exactly where to sit with two lumps. Never sure with one: either slide off its back end or wind up dangling from its neck…’
‘Rank,’ blurted Balthazar, suddenly aware that he had brought myrrh for the baby and nobody else even knew what it was. ‘The higher your rank, the more lumps you get on your camel.’
Gaspar gave Balthazar one of his stares. ‘So,’ he said, ‘where’s his then?’
‘His?’
‘His lumpy thing. Surely you’ve brought one for him if they’re so valuable; King of Kings and all that. Must be worth at least three lumps.’
‘They’re called camels,’ said Melchior, breaking the uneasy silence. ‘And they only come in one and two humped varieties.’
‘Bit of a design flaw there then, isn’t it? I’d be inclined to have a bit of a word.’
‘A word?’
‘With Himself, you know, when we get in to worship him, have a quick word in his ear. See if he can get it sorted.’
‘He’s a baby!’
‘Got connections, though,’ said Gaspar.
The three wise men had, by now, all been brought down from their camels and were straightening their robes in preparation for their big moment. Melchior was checking his frankincense. ‘You can never go wrong with perfume,’ he thought. Gaspar was scraping camel doings from his satin slipper. Balthazar, meanwhile, was chastising his Chief of Staff. ‘‘Take him myrrh,’ you said. ‘Everyone likes a bit of a rub down now and then,’ you said. Nobody else has even heard of it. Have we got nothing else we can give Him? Maybe jewels, or something?’’
The Chief of Staff looked crestfallen. ‘We left in a bit of a hurry,’ he said, ‘if you remember. Didn’t really have much time to shop around and myrrh always goes down really well in my family.’
‘Your family the myrrh merchants, you mean?’
‘Come on,’ said Gaspar, who had by now got the worst of it off with a stick. ‘Let’s go in.’
The three wise men entered the stable and fell to their knees at the side of the manger.
‘Gawd,’ said Gaspar, peering in. ‘He’s an ugly little bleeder, isn’t he?’
‘That’s a pig, you fool,’ snapped Balthazar.
‘Really?’ sneered Gaspar. ‘One humped or two?’
‘I think, gentlemen,’ said Melchior, rising to his feet. ‘That we may be in the wrong place.’
Balthazar and Gaspar also rose, brushing the crud of the stable floor from their robes as they prepared to leave.
‘So what now?’ asked Gaspar. ‘This had to be the place. What about that star?’
‘It appears to have moved on,’ answered Melchior. ‘They have a habit of doing that, apparently.’
‘And the Heavenly hosts?’
‘They appear to have found themselves rooms at the Travel Lodge. Perhaps we should join them. Try again in the morning…’
‘But how long is it going to take us to find him?’ asked Gaspar. ‘How long do we have to keep looking?’
‘Who knows,’ answered Melchior. ‘Could be days. Could be weeks, years…’
‘Could be,’ said Balthazar, ‘millennia…’

Originally posted December 24th 2019.

Christmas Past – I Believe In Father Christmas

Throughout this Christmas week, in addition to my normal seasonal posts (on Tuesday and Friday) and in the long-established TV tradition of festive repeats, I will re-post six of my very favourite Christmas offerings from Christmas Past. The first of these reposts is from my very first WordPress Christmas in 2018 – I Believe in Father Christmas.

Come on, even in the short time that we have known one another, you and I, you must have realised that the very mention of Christmas was going to set me off on one. It is unfashionable, I think, to admit it but I still get excited by Christmas: the whole thing. The carol singers, the TV specials, the food, the drink, the panicky rush to the local petrol station for the last minute present, the never-ending trailers for this year’s Eastenders Christmas disaster… Well, perhaps not the TV trailers. I just can’t understand the desire to witness such unremitting melancholic disaster as the highlight of Christmas evening. The vicarious thrill of eavesdropping on an entire community of joyless and soulless characters as they plunge headlong into increasingly preposterous seasonal scenarios of calamity and bedlam is not, for me anyhow, any way to let the sprouts go down. I’ll take Eric and Ernie making breakfast together anytime, thank you very much.

So many people seem to want to be depressed by Christmas: ‘I can’t wait until it’s all over,’ ‘It’s such a lot of fuss for one day,’ ‘I don’t even like Christmas pudding…’ What is this nonsense? For a start, Christmas pudding, Christmas cake and mince pies are the three kings of the epicurean calendar and the greatest consumable inventions of all time: fact. I would buy mincemeat flavoured toothpaste if it was available. Everyone’s happy* – especially the maker’s of eggnog – and even the dourest of aunties will agree to wear a paper crown for the duration of the meal. When it is all over, you have 364 days to wait until the next one. Enjoy the day, embrace the mayhem. I know it’s overhyped, unnecessarily expensive and endlessly protracted, but come on! It’s once a year. As far as I’m concerned, the best Christmas present is Christmas. A sense of benign serenity pervades the house and will last all day, as long as nobody gets the Monopoly out.

What’s not to love?
• Hungry Hippos? Tick.
• Whoopee cushion on Aunty Elsie’s chair? Tick.
• Hugely inappropriate joke from Great Uncle Derek? Tick.

As for mawkish sentimentality – well, why not? Twenty first century life is completely hidebound by startling and grimly held reality: dreaming is something we are only allowed to do when we’re asleep. What’s wrong with allowing a little fantasy into our lives from time to time?

So, does Father Christmas actually exist? Well, why would I choose not to believe in something that brings so much joy to so many? Father Christmas exists in spirit. That spirit itself may exist for just a few hours each year, but as long as it is here I will embrace it and yes, I do believe in Father Christmas.

I have actually, in the past, ‘played’ Father Christmas for the village children in my Father-in-Law’s pub on Christmas day. I have to tell you, it is not a job for those of weak disposition. I was prepared for all of the children who wanted to pull my beard. I was prepared for all of the children who wanted the opportunity to complain about what I had brought them that morning (or even what I’d brought them the previous year). I was even prepared for the sinisterly whispered, ‘I know who you are really…’ I was not prepared for all of the children who wanted to kick my shins.

We are asked to believe in so many things for which there is no proof. Most of them are intended to constrain or control us. God knows, millions have died for some of them. I believe that Jesus existed. I believe that he was a very great man whose life has impacted on millions for centuries. But a virgin birth? No, surely not. The whole Christmas story is a metaphor isn’t it: a fable become lore – either that or a very cynical ploy by the manufacturers of hand-made wooden cribs and personalised Christmas tree decorations. To be honest, after some of his frankly appallingly vengeful behaviour in the Old Testament, I think God had probably been spoken to by somebody from PR before setting off on the New Testament. A story of love and hope and peace and joy; just what we need at Christmas time.

Of course, as with all major undertakings, planning and preparation are the keys to a successful operation. Allow me to talk you through some of my own basic preparations for the big day:

Miracle on 34th Street (the Richard Attenborough version). If you need proof that Father Christmas really does exist, it is right here. Settle down with a glass of something seasonal, a warm mince pie, a little stilton and watch this film. I defy you to leave it without feeling the spirit. (And by the way, just for the record, Christmas did exist before Prosecco.)
Love Actually. I know, I know, and frankly I don’t care. I could watch this twice a week and it would still warm me cockles. A must for the pre-Christmas run-in. Christmas is not Christmas without an in-depth discussion of what’s the best bit of this film. (It’s the Colin Firth/Lucia Moniz bit, by the way.)
A trip to the supermarket to purchase several hundred-weight of snack foods and any number of bottles of sweet alcoholic beverages that would not be allowed through the door at any other time of the year. Sweet British sherry is produced for this single occasion alone: along with Advocaat and those little marzipan fruits, it has no purpose other than to keep the (more) elderly relatives quiet during the afternoon session of Charades. Nothing grates quite like an over-lubricated Great Aunt yelling ‘Casablanca’ to every single mime, especially when nobody else is getting your superb rendition of ‘Oops… I Did It Again’ by Britney Spears.

Drinking the overlarge tot of whisky and eating the mince pie left out for Santa remains my final Christmas Eve task (Santa does not like sherry at our house). No carrot to nibble on behalf of Rudolph these days – he can fend for himself. Every year the startling realisation that, by a process I do not fully understand, somebody has bought and prepared everything for Christmas lunch and dinner. I’m not sure who. The Pixies I think… And then one last check of the night sky:
• Giant airborne sleds? No.
• The unmistakable glistening of snow in the air? No.
• Superbright star on the eastern horizon? No.
…and so to bed.

Christmas morning, I usually wake at about 5am. When they were at home I used to creep into the children’s rooms and try to make just enough noise to wake them. Oh the joy of seeing their little faces as they looked at the clock before burying their heads under the duvet. I am certain that both of my children learned to tell the time simply so that they could tell me to go back to bed on Christmas morning. But I’m up – no point in going back to bed now. Christmas jumper, Christmas shirt and Christmas socks: it’s the one time of the year when everybody else is just as badly dressed as me.

Christmas dinner is a big deal in our house. Crackers are cracked, paper hats are worn and terrible jokes are read. The lighting of the Christmas pudding is a ritual that cannot be missed. It usually comes directly after the mass panicky dash by the assembled adults towards one of this year’s high chair incumbents who, with some encouragement, manages to cough up half a sprout, two carrot sticks and a red Lego brick. A spirit of benevolent bonhomie pervades even in the midst of the communal clear-up and dishwashing that follows the meal. The dregs of the wine are consumed, perhaps a small coffee and Bailey’s, and then for many the mass, slack-jawed snooze of Christmas afternoon, whilst the rest of us (me and the kids) construct Lego housing estates or attempt to disentangle the new mini drone from the light fitting without fusing the rest of the street. Sometime later, everybody wakes for the afternoon ritual of ‘Oh look at the time. We’ve missed the Queen.’ And ‘who’s putting the kettle on?’

The rest of the day is filled with the welcome drifting in and out of various members of our joyfully expanding family. Every available chair, pouffe and footstool is utilised. As the afternoon draws into evening, people are routinely stepped on, sat on and, if certain members of the family are having a nap, dribbled on. Board games are begun and almost immediately dismantled by children who crawl through them, sit on them, fly a Lego rocket through them or otherwise decimate them because they are being ignored. Everyone, except grandad, who has just evaded a very large snake and reached the top of an equally long ladder, thinks that it’s funny. Come the evening and anything that is vaguely soft becomes a crib. All rooms are occupied by people sleeping on beds and mattresses, on inflatables and floors in a selection of duvets, blankets and sleeping bags, many of which have not seen the light of day since Glastonbury 2004.

Anyway, that’s Christmas for me, and a joyous occasion it always is, until, of course, I turn on the news on Boxing Day and discover that the world is still in exactly the same mess as we left it in on Christmas Eve – and a whole new year to look forward to…

Oh well, Merry Christmas One and All.

*Not totally true, I know. This is a very lonely time for lonely people. Nobody chooses to be lonely yet loneliness could be the future for any of us. It’s easy to ignore the future as you get older; there is a lot less of it and the end of it is quite a lot closer than it was. If you get the chance, then making somebody less lonely could be one of the best presents you could ever give yourself.

Originally posted 20th December 2018 when the world was sane.

Two Brains Good, One Brain Better

I’m guessing that many of you may well know the specific point: you are drunk enough to slur slightly, but still sober enough to realise you are doing it. (For those of you who do not understand this sensation, imagine walking a tightrope: you know that you are leaning slightly to the left but, for some unfathomable reason, your brain compensates by pushing you further to the left. You know that this will take you over, but what the heck; what’s the worst that could happen?) This is the moment when the sober cortex knows that you are about to say something incredibly indiscreet and drunken cortex says, “What the hell, everybody knows it anyhow.”

It is only when you have trodden this path a thousand times that you begin to realise that no matter how drunk you get, one tiny part of your brain remains sober, annoying the heck out of the rest of you. It takes notes: when you tread profiterole into the mushroom shagpile and blame the grandkids, it tuts gently in your ear and advises you that the only reasonable thing to do is to scrub it with bleach because, here’s the thing about sober brain, all it ever really wants to do is to find the hole that drunken brain is digging and deepen it. Whatever idiotic scheme your inebriated brain can concoct, sober brain will encourage it because it knows that, in the morning, whatever you have done, drunken you will take the blame – even though it was really sober you that put the blueberries in the knicker drawer in the first place.

Sober brain believes that this is the only way to keep a rein on drunken brain: let it get on with whatever it is that it does, exacerbating the fallout if at all possible, so that come the morning light, hung-over brain might wake up to consider its own shrivelled potential, the consequence of its actions and who to contact in order to get the guacamole chiselled off the cat. In short, non-dependent brain wants the majority share-holder to feel the pain in order that it might remember not to do whatever it was it was doing, the next time it is offered the opportunity to do it. It will not.

Now, I don’t want you to think that this has occurred to me because I am, as it were, living the moment. I am not writing this whilst under the influence – at least not of alcohol. Every time I sit down to write, I do so under the influence of something. I always have something on my mind that I have to get off it and, however bonkers that something is, part of my brain is very keen for the other half to get it off. It occurs to me that no brain is ever 100% convinced about anything. There is never a time when every single synapse is as one, never a time when at least one of them is not standing at the back yelling “Now just hang on one minute”.

I can’t help but wonder if each human being does not actually have two brains*. I Googled it and glory be, some scientists claim that we do, but that the other one is in the stomach, which probably explains everything you ever needed to know about six year old boys. In the end, I decided to discount the theory because I got confused with the idea of my head having philosophical discussions with my small intestine over the essence of humankind:
“So, what is it, to be human?”
“Have you got any biscuits?”
“Is it companionship? Family? Is art essential to human fulfilment: I think, therefore I am?”
“Cake maybe, or a sandwich would be good…”
I think it is highly likely that men do have two brains, but those looking for the second one in the digestive tract are setting their sights far too high. Also, they should realise that the second brain we do have is stupid and responsible for most of the bad decisions we will ever take. Personally, as a man who is permanently confused whilst having access to only one centre of rational thought, I could not countenance the possibility of having two, but I must accept that the brain I do have is essentially split into two halves (I’ve seen the pictures. How can something that looks so much like a pickled walnut be in charge of my entire rational ‘self’?) although it is hard for me to understand why they can never agree.

Each brain is a democracy. Each decision is taken on a majority vote. Every conclusion is opposed by at least part of the legislature. Every brain is The Labour Party**. Every brain wants to do better for everybody else, until they realise that that means doing less well for themselves. My own cranium contains what is far too often a hung-parliament: regardless of how many resources I pour in to it, no decision is ever taken that does not involve reappraising whatever decisions I may have taken in the past, whatever the circumstances. My brain is Italy, and only a dictator could get the trains running on time.

Life is constructed of decisions, although if you are a married man, you will know that they are usually taken by somebody else. My own life consists of Pros and Cons, and Pros of Cons and Cons of Pros. No decision is ever taken before I have programmed in every conceivable variable; analysed*** every single pitfall, assassinated every possible benefit – and then it is invariably wrong. I spend my entire life dangling from the horns of some dilemma or another: what to wear, what to say, what to eat, what to drink – whisky, gin, tea, coffee, orange squash. Today, as most days, I have settled on squash, but I can’t help but thinking how much clearer everything would be if I just succumbed to the lure of a little whisky – purely to give half my brain the edge, you understand…

*Steve Martin’s ‘The Man with Two Brains’ was one of the first films I ever remember watching twice in order to catch up on some of the gags I realised that I was too stupid to catch the first time through.

**The Labour Party always claims to be a broad church, which means, like all political parties, it is filled by people arguing with everybody else about everything upon which they are all agreed.

***No surprise that the base of ‘analyse’ is ‘anal’.