It’ll be lonely this Christmas…

Anyone remember Mud’s Elvis rip off from the 70s? Firstly what happened to good old Christmas novelty number ones? Come to that what simply has happened to good old fashion pop music? There’s a lot of good music out there still but there is a lot of guff as well and the radio isn’t what it used to be. This post is in danger of becoming something from Grumpy Old Men at Christmas.

I was at an AA meeting last night and Christmas was, not surprisingly, one of the topics of sharing. What was surprising however was how many people honestly shared that they really don’t like Christmas, it disrupts the routine, it costs you a load of cash you can little afford and for many it isn’t really a time of celebration with families fractured or moved away etc. However one thing we were all agreed on I think is that a sober Christmas will be a thousand times better than a drunk Christmas.

I used to be one of the big organisers of Christmas nights out etc. in my drinking days. One I remember was a pub crawl around Canterbury, to be fair anything I organised was a pub crawl somewhere, normally Canterbury cos it’s quiet nice sometimes Ramsgate for reasons I’ll never understand. (Proof reading edit - there are a lot of pubs there you Muppet). Anyway on this one I was wearing a roll neck jumper and with my goatee beard and tousled hairdo (it’s quick and simple) one lady on this jaunt made the comment I looked gay. I turned to the barmaid and said “Do I look gay to you?” I swayed gently as though a tree in a breeze as she considered her reply. “You’ve just ordered your second large dry sherry so I’d already assumed you were”. Now why did I used to drink sherry when I was drunk? No idea – I think I thought it showed more class than vodka. I then spilt one all down me which meant when I collapsed onto the last train home several people moved down the carriage leaving me in peace it was freezing cold that night and after the 2 mile walk home from the station I caught a horrible head cold for the rest of the holiday.

I can smile at all that now looking back but this will be my fifth Christmas sober. Mrs F has a load of nights out with work, the girls etc. planned. I’ll be staying in, I’ll not miss it one bit. So the bottle of sherry we have in the drinks cabinet and that sometimes comes out when recipes demand it – normally as a substitute to rice wine in the Chinese - will be the one that is lonely this Christmas hopefully. Nice cup of tea will see me right.

Oh I had my annual appraisal at work yesterday and my rating was 0.1 below the norm. (I didn’t even know we had a Norm working here, or do they mean the French bloke in the team, but he’s from Paris not Normandy). Anyhow I think that is about the best summing up of me I’ve heard in a long time :-)