Ho-ho-hopeless: My current Christmassy window display. Observe sad, limp lights on the right.
It's that month!! The one where you can eat anything you like and not feel bad because some bearded guy in flip flops was born in a shed a long, long time ago!
"Oh, go on then seeing as it's Christmas!"
*eats butter from the tub with a spoon*
I'm pretty fricking excited this year. I've bought a tiny tree in a pot (see picture above... And try to ignore the Korn doll that appears to be bumming a small replica of Whinnie The Pooh's Tigger) and my fairy lights are loosely secured with what I can only guess was joke sticky tape (because it ain't fuckin' sticky!).
I'm going for a lonely-drunk-who-dug-their-decs-out-of-a-neighbour's-bin vibe at home this year. Successful, no?
And I've not bought a single gift yet. But's that's okay because I have a plan up my jumper sleeve:
Enter a state of idiotic, grinning denial until the last minute when I'll have to face the cramped streets of Swansea and probably die, crushed up and suffocating in a fellow shopper's armpit.
The perils of being both short and disorganised.
Anyhoo, so this is my second Christmas from within this whole cohbitty thing - living in a house with that guy I met when he recognised as the pissed girl he'd seen. The one who'd dropped her bank card down an impossibly narrow crack between cashpoint and pavement and couldn't get it back out.
It's a comfort in knowing that one of longest relationships I've ever been in started with the male party's first impression of me being "pfft...tit!"
I digress. Last year, we went to our respective families' homes - he to England, and I to Carmarthenshire (or as he calls it "the Iron Age"). This year, the probably justifiably terrified sod is joining me and my family for festivities. But next year, I've no idea what's happening. And it scares the bejesus out of me!
I'm a quarter if a century old and and I've done the same thing every single year since I was first crawling around on the carpet in a party dress. Not much change on that front, either, I suppose.
... I dunno. Sometimes I wear jeans now.
The thought of having to be a grown-up and pretend that I'm cool with eventually having to be anywhere other than in my mum's living room with a stocking I'm much, much too old for but all the more appreciative of, makes me want to hide under a big pile of soft things and sob like a toddler.
I LOVE my family's annual Christmas/all-day-all-ages-piss-up. And for all the sleepiness, petty squabbling and unexpected food coma-naps, I never want to change a thing.
So because I'm feeling nostalgic and loath to let go, I'm going to use this post to share with you a couple of my family's Christmas highlights:
The Uno Saga
Most families love a board game. Especially simple ones like Uno, which are straightforward enough for the young and plastered alike to enjoy with ease. Unless such games involve my stubborn and often grumpy step-grandad, and my then-teenage and equally mule-like sister.
What started out as a friendly post-dinner game turned into an increasingly aggressive squabble about the rules, culminating an explosive "FUCK OFF!!" from my sister. Neither party spoke for a month. I don't know why, but confrontation is just that much funnier when everyone's in little paper hats and trying to stifle burps.
Nowadays, we just watch a standup DVD after lunch instead. Much safer.
"Who am I most like?"
Last year. My grandparents' house. Everyone is settling down around the TV bar from nana, who is upstairs faffing about with something or other. Conversation turns to who most resembles whom in the family.
Me: I don't think I'm that much like you or dad really, am I mum?
Mum: You're a lot more like your nan than me.
Me: Oh? Why's that?
Mum: Well, since she's retired, she's been a little more...y'know?
Me: No, what?
Nan descends the stairs, wondering why she's being discussed. Everyone pisses themselves laughing.
The jumper she's gone to put on upstairs is inside out.
..............
Only a couple of specific memories there, but there are regular features to my family Christmas that I couldn't imagine missing out on:
- Being awoken at 6am by mum's super-subtle "coughing" because she's grown accustomed to children trying to wake her up at 4am every December 25th.
- Being told to "piss off out of the kitchen" by my step-grandad while he's cooking.
- Falling out with either sister at least once for a grand total of about 5mins because we're tired and because "just fuck off, okay!"
- Drink being forced in spare hand because hand currently in use only contains a half full beverage.
- Sulking from step-grandad as he believes that we're not drunk enough and are therefore not being festive enough. Suspect he secretly desires Yuletide rave.
- My nan occasionally refilling the quality street tin with toffee pennies because she knows that if she puts them all in at once, I'll weed them all out in one sitting.
...Eee... Christmas!!! Hope you're all looking forward as much as I am.
Now, I need to dig out Elf and A Muppets Christmas Carol soon otherwise Christmas can't officially happen yet.
