Christmas 2008

So it's Christmas Day in the afternoon and all's well. But it has been an odd Christmas. Could be the credit crunch to blame. I mean take last night, Christmas Eve. In 1964 a week before Christmas I started work as a Taxi Driver in Manchester, on nights. On Christmas Eve I started work at 6pm and didn't stop until hunger forced me to switch off the "For Hire" sign and heads for Nic's snack bar in Oxford Street for some breakfast otherwise my stomach would begin to think my throat had been cut. But of course by now it was Christmas morn and Nic, like all sensible people was at home in bed so I went home. I could have carried on carrying people between drinking dens, which in those days did a roaring trade and stayed open, illegally I might add, as long as there was someone one the premises capable of buying a drink. All evening and right through the night it had been the same. Stop to let on lot of passengers out and more would pile in. It’s true, the spirit of Christmas came out of a big copper vat somewhere in the Scottish Highlands.
And so Christmas Eves have continued ever since, drinking at home then out on the town for more drinking then down to a club for more drinking then home to find the loudest record in the collection to be played at max volume with all the windows open just so the neighbours two miles away knew you were having a good time even if they weren’t. I tend not to go in for all this drinking etc, I used to in the dim and distant past, so time in the last century but now it’s an early night for me which is usually the case, I rarely go to bed later than 1 O’clock these days. Now the front of the house, which isn’t too far from town centre also faces the town centre so last night I expected to be disturbed by loud music blaring out followed by specially recruited, highly trained teams of singers giving their very own version of that old favourite, “We Wish you a Merry Christmas.” In case you are unfamiliar with the words it goes sometime like this. “We wish you a merry Christmas, We wish you a merry Christmas, We wish you a merry Christmas, We wish you a merry Christmas, We wish you a merry Christmas and a happy new year. there is then a slight pause while the singers, and I use the term singers with my fingers crossed, consult their song sheet, take a deep breath and sing the second verse. Which goes like this. “We wish you a merry Christmas, We wish you a merry Christmas, We wish you a merry Christmas, We wish you a merry Christmas, We wish you a merry Christmas and a happy new year“. That is followed by a slight pause before the third verse starts. I’ll let you guess the words to that and the 4th, 5th and nth verses. Then there are the sirens of the police cars on their way to the local shop window smashing party. They weren’t invited so they wont be welcome but the ambulance that turns up later will. Then there are the fireworks. It used to be that firework were only for Bonfire Night, now shops, if you can find a shop, sell them all the year round but now there is a firework display at the drop of a hat. That isn’t too bad if they all go off at once, but there is always some one who waits a few hours until those who have made to effort to get to sleep have just reached that point where consciousness is at last just slipping away, sometime about 03.47 in the morning then BANG. Only once but that is enough, you may as well get up and eat the turkey now.
So can anyone tell me what happened last night because I got to bed at the usual hour, opened the window as usually I do thinking I’ll have to get up later and shut it and next thing it’s 5 past eight and I just had a restful, undisturbed night’s sleep. Don’t tell me everyone in Torquay got religion and went to Midnight Mass. No, surely not?

Merry Christmas buy the way.