GilesGuthrie
Staff Emeritus
- 11,038
- Edinburgh, UK
- CMDRTheDarkLord
So, here we are in October, and Christmas is already starting to annoy me.
I couldn't find a number of the products that I buy in the supermarket. I buy them every week, but they were either moved or deleted in order to make way for Christmas crackers, decorations, and those ridiculous over-sized boxes of chocolates (which inevitably remain half-full until June, when someone realises that only the stinking ones are left, then a huge argument breaks out over whether it's worth keeping the tin).
It threw me into quite the glum mood as I realised that from now on the harmless, inoffensive music piped into shops would be replaced with Christmas tunes, which are always exceptional only in their tackiness and irritating hook lines. Even now, I can hear Slade's So this is Christmas in my head. If I ever meet Noddy Holder, I'll ask him to sing it, so that I can punch him in the mouth at that really annoying bit whee he screams "It's Chriiiiiisssstmaaaaaassssss".
And TV commercials, currently dominated by blatantly misleading ads for women's cosmetics (what the hell is "Nutrilium" and "Boswelox"?? Actually, the latter has been re-christened "bollocksox" in our house, such is our estimation of its power), and patronising ads for diapers ("You're 18 months old" No I'm not, and it's two-thirty in the morning, if I'm 18 months old, what am I doing up?), are replaced with countless ads for "Christmas Specials", pre- and post-Christmas sales, all with that desperate "Please buy our stuff for this faux-Religious Festival" tone, and chocolate-box snow-scene.
And everyone talks about Christmas all the time. "Have you done your shopping yet?" seeming to be the most common question. Already, for a month, my line manager has been responding to the question "How are you?" with "Oh, you know, looking forward to Christmas", and he signs all his e-mails off with the number of days left to go.
It's always involved a large amount of travelling for me too, which has been a bind. Especially because I don't live near my parents, and I don't know anyone where they live. Last year, I went mad, as I was dragged hundreds of miles from friends, the internet, mobile phone coverage and cable TV. And just as I was quashing homicidal thoughts, my parents said "Oh, next time, you should come down for longer". Gah! NoooooooO!
Then, when you actually get to the day, you find yourself compelled to spend the time with people that you probably don't get on with all that well, eating and drinking until you're fit to burst (because there's nothing else to do), and watching re-runs of Moonraker. There are heaps of James Bond films, so why do they always show Moonraker? And the present-thing is a massive anti-climax, usually because you don't get what you want, or because that present that you thought someone would love has had only a mediocre reception.
I respect the people who genuinely celebrate the religious side of Christmas, but suspect that these make up about 1% of the population. The rest of us are caught up in the rampant money-making exercise, bowing to the pressure to buy more and better, be nicer, make more effort than last year.
It's an arms race, and it starts earlier and earlier every year.
Or is it just me?
I couldn't find a number of the products that I buy in the supermarket. I buy them every week, but they were either moved or deleted in order to make way for Christmas crackers, decorations, and those ridiculous over-sized boxes of chocolates (which inevitably remain half-full until June, when someone realises that only the stinking ones are left, then a huge argument breaks out over whether it's worth keeping the tin).
It threw me into quite the glum mood as I realised that from now on the harmless, inoffensive music piped into shops would be replaced with Christmas tunes, which are always exceptional only in their tackiness and irritating hook lines. Even now, I can hear Slade's So this is Christmas in my head. If I ever meet Noddy Holder, I'll ask him to sing it, so that I can punch him in the mouth at that really annoying bit whee he screams "It's Chriiiiiisssstmaaaaaassssss".
And TV commercials, currently dominated by blatantly misleading ads for women's cosmetics (what the hell is "Nutrilium" and "Boswelox"?? Actually, the latter has been re-christened "bollocksox" in our house, such is our estimation of its power), and patronising ads for diapers ("You're 18 months old" No I'm not, and it's two-thirty in the morning, if I'm 18 months old, what am I doing up?), are replaced with countless ads for "Christmas Specials", pre- and post-Christmas sales, all with that desperate "Please buy our stuff for this faux-Religious Festival" tone, and chocolate-box snow-scene.
And everyone talks about Christmas all the time. "Have you done your shopping yet?" seeming to be the most common question. Already, for a month, my line manager has been responding to the question "How are you?" with "Oh, you know, looking forward to Christmas", and he signs all his e-mails off with the number of days left to go.
It's always involved a large amount of travelling for me too, which has been a bind. Especially because I don't live near my parents, and I don't know anyone where they live. Last year, I went mad, as I was dragged hundreds of miles from friends, the internet, mobile phone coverage and cable TV. And just as I was quashing homicidal thoughts, my parents said "Oh, next time, you should come down for longer". Gah! NoooooooO!
Then, when you actually get to the day, you find yourself compelled to spend the time with people that you probably don't get on with all that well, eating and drinking until you're fit to burst (because there's nothing else to do), and watching re-runs of Moonraker. There are heaps of James Bond films, so why do they always show Moonraker? And the present-thing is a massive anti-climax, usually because you don't get what you want, or because that present that you thought someone would love has had only a mediocre reception.
I respect the people who genuinely celebrate the religious side of Christmas, but suspect that these make up about 1% of the population. The rest of us are caught up in the rampant money-making exercise, bowing to the pressure to buy more and better, be nicer, make more effort than last year.
It's an arms race, and it starts earlier and earlier every year.
Or is it just me?