06:00
A dawn chorus of Wham! will never be a great way to wake up; already I’m being reminded of the nightmare that was last Christmas. My sister is at her presents tooth and claw, and I get an unwrapped book. “It’s the thought that counts” reverberates until my ears bleed; but on a day of gift-giving, you have to be as thick as two short planks not to grasp that the thought is reflected by the quality of the gift. This is not to say that I am not riveted by my brand spanking new copy of Michael Jackson: Unmasked, I just feel the lack of wrapping made it a pretty feeble sentiment. Meanwhile, the dog gets a stocking.
06:07
The dog vomits up the contents of his stocking. Too early for clearing chunklets.
09:15
The first time I’ve ever been to church on Christmas day. The carol service was led by OAP on electric keyboard, an unholy combo. The rev gave me a Christingle- you gore an orange with a candle, and further impale it with Haribo-laden cocktail sticks. This made bugger all sense to me: it’s supposed to represent unity, joy, love etc., but really it just looks like something a toddler smashed together in playschool. But hey, at least I got free boreholed fruit. Beneath it all though, the Christingle did act as a powerful metaphor for Christmastide: for like the orange, I too have been shafted by the candle of Christmas gaiety.
10:00
Emergency food shopping in Lidl, because we’re classy like that. The twenty-something in the queue behind me called it “Santa’s B’day”. It made me think we actually should celebrate Saint Nick’s birthday, given he’s the guy pulling out all the stops. Jesus is one of those Sweet Sixteen brats, inviting everyone to his crib, and Santa’s the cowed club rep left shitting themselves if the party’s not perfect. It also made me think that b’day sounds a lot like bidet.
14:00
With the force-feeding over, I understand those Greenpeace Foie-Gras campaigns. Best cracker joke of the day: Q – What’s a specimen? A – An Italian astronaut. Just waiting now until the Brussels sprouts catch up with the grandparents: it’s going to get gaseous.
15:00
Grandparents want to watch the Queen’s Speech, so I let my brain turn to mush for ten minutes. Not as lively as Colin Firth, but thank God she’s not got that stammer or we’d be here for fucking hours.
17:30
Bonding over the new board games. There’s a good five minutes or so before we descend into utter carnage. We spit venom over Snakes and Ladders, eff and blind over Scrabble, pettifog over Trivial Pursuit. That’s why everything is red at Christmas: to mask the bloodshed. All is well once we settle down to appreciate the Christmas Spirit, this year Grey Goose.
19:30
Watched the Doctor Who Christmas Special, with “special” being the operative word. “On the ball like a dead seal”, in the words of Dr Malcolm Tucker.
22:00
Gambrinous. Fissiparous. Badinage. I have been reduced to reading the dictionary (NB whilst fornication is generally quite nice, formication is the sensation of bugs crawling all over you). I hadn’t planned to do any of this, but since my gambrinous grandfather was in the mood for some fissiparous badinage, the night ended abruptly. So now I’m reading the dictionary, as good a nightcap as any. Feeling flatulopetic.
PHOTO/Jack Myers
