The Christmas Journey ( & Brussel Sprouts)

The City of Winchester is not longer dark and dingy through the cold winter nights! Yes, now we have very elegant looking Christmas lights to brighten up our walks through town in the evenings! They are wonderful; yet something tells me they aren't the signifying the start of Christmas. Sadly, Christmas to me has come to mean endless onslaughts or rather advertising 'campaigns' by the supermarkets; the grand manufacturers of Christmas and festive joy. Or not. So what is important about Christmas, really? Does my family really hit the Church on the 25th for religious celebration? Well no, not exactly. The last time I visited a Church in any type of religious capacity, it was a Christingle service in Oxford. Question this you might, but in truth, it was the free oranges that enticed me; not to mention the possibility of holding a 'live' candle in my hands, buried deep into an orange (I did even get to eat the aforementioned 'orange' after the 'show'!). Note to self, I really do have to stop using inverted commas all of the time in my writing; it gives the impression that I mock everything these days...

Religious, my family are not. But Christmas to us is all about family. Getting the family together, logs on the fire, snow outside, and the distant dream (for me) of surfing Christmas Day with nothing on but a Santa hat. Somehow, I haven't gotten around to that yet, but every year I leave it, I stand the risk of creating a bigger chance of being arrested for indecent exposure...nevermind.

But I suppose Christmas is made by those who attend it. Every year, we're on the way down to Devon; to the haven that is Pyeworthy - my parents keep a holiday cottage there, due to pick up my Nan on route, who provides us with a halfway meal and a good cup of Tea. After that, we bundle both her and her huge baggage and every Christmas present she's bought; because she refuses to hand them over earlier in the year, into the car. It's not because she hasn't bought them earlier, she buys them years in advance... As grandparents seem to! So after picking up my Nan, we're on the road to the best place in the world. Our house is in the middle of nowhere, so after driving through fields of nothing, we reach nothing, really. Except that it isn't. Pyeworthy may be in the middle of nowhere, and yes, we might not have streetlamps, but it isn't about that! Perhaps a more entertaining arrival would be when our extreme sports neighbours are out in force. If you're lucky, you'll be coming back to the cottage in time to see the mother outside firing arrows in the garden. Yes, actual arrows - next door are busy establishing themselves as the most premier archers in the Westcountry in our garden. We share grounds, it isn't as if they aren't supposed to be there; but one can't help but thing one day one of those arrows will fall stray of the target and end up hitting an unassuming Llama; who won't be best pleased. (a curious animal to have in a field you might think, but apparently these hefty beasts keep the others in line - I'm told, by Dave, our local animal keeper. Well, actually, he's a builder, but Llamas seem to help with planning permission a lot...Don't ask.)

Christmas comes so slowly when we're there though. Things seem to drift by, as I spend a few days shouting randomly at my laptop as I try to stay online in a place where the internet just isn't supposed to exist. This usually involves a rather elaborate skill as I try to multitask by talking to my Nan at the same time. I love my Nan, she's like my second Mum; but things definitely get tough when I'm having to explain the way in which the sound system works for the third Christmas in a row. It isn't that hard; but when my sister decides to bail, I'm forced to explain the inner working of the volume buttons. I often hide the DVD and Playstation controllers in order to minimalise the risk of my Nan turning on GoodFellas or Casino on Christmas Day - the only two HD-DVD's that I; and for that matter, probably anyone in the UK owns to go with their HD-DVD player. You might laugh, but no, we didn't mess up and buy it when the format wars were going on - Blu Ray vs. HD-DVD; my old man bought it cheap from Comet, after the final shots had rung out and Blu Ray had won. We now use it as a glorified DVD player, of which my Dad is still immensely proud of getting for "£40 plus a HDMI cable". Often, it is the opportune time for me to receive a good old ribbing from my family for choosing the Christmas movies we should watch, and subsequently purchasing them for each member of the family. Come on, I thought some of the classics were meant to be seen every year. From the cringeworthy antics of Harry and Marv in Home Alone (the second film is definitely better!) to Chevy Chase's desperate actions to offer his family with the perfect Christmas; there's something for us all.

Oh! I almost forgot! As well as the movies, we've now got the music videos! I come down from my room at 8AM (I know, that's late for Christmas Day, but I'm an 'old man' now, my housemates often tell me... besides, we are all sozzled by about lunchtime, so I figure whats the point of starting earlier!?) and my sister is already there with the controller flicking through music channels looking for the ultimate Christmas song - I think that Noddy Holder probably just puts on his furry ear warmers, goes to bed on December 1st, and wakes up just after New Years' (it's disgraceful if you didn't know that he and his band Slade created the theme to Christmas 'Merry Christmas everybody'...) I mean, would it not be ripping your soul a bit after thirty years of use!?

And then there is the Christmas Dinner. An epic Smörgåsbord of festive food, sitting on a table laden with small explosive devices that one has to pull before eating, when really all they want to do is dine! Yes, there's super thick gravy, mini cocktail sausages wrapped in bacon, and especially for my Nan, A small army of Brussel Sprouts; one of God's greatest fail foods - why did he waste some time on one of those seven days making these horrible little nefarious soldiers, whose sole purpose is to lead a cavalry charge of vicious aftertaste, and potentially deadly after effects.... People, you know what I mean. Don't pretend that you haven't felt the attack of the Sprout!