I’m just going to say it: Christmas is awful. Terrible. The worst day of the year.
I realise this is controversial. There are, admittedly, some good bits, Christmas is like one of those Instagram vs reality memes: we all hold a picture of an ‘idyllic’ Christmas in our minds but the day itself is 24 hours of gluttony and arguing, heartburn and boredom, until everyone goes to bed and it’s all over until the second worse day of the year (New Year’s Eve, if you’re wondering). Think of me as an anti-Christmas angel, here to spread the message of festive disdain.
1 It is so. Fricking. Expensive. Every year, I think: I’ll rein it in. I’ll spend sensibly. Every year, I end up brandishing fifty dollar notes to any shop assistant who has a free till. It’s not just the presents. Add in the parties, decorations, food and drink (literally, get your calculator out) and it soon mounts up.
2. You get a lovely lie in. Oh no wait… Christmas is an official, don’t-have-to-feel-guilty-for-not-working holiday. You graft hard. You deserve a lie in. What do you get? Kids screaming at the crack of dawn. Mum crashing round the kitchen looking for a colander. A 6am alarm reminding you to baste your turkey. That’s not even not a euphemism – I wish it was.
3. Family time is compulsory Don’t get me wrong; spending time with family is great. All 74 minutes. On any other day, the idea that you’d lock yourself into a house with all your relatives for 24 hours is laughable. Yet come the 25th, apparently it’s an entirely sane proposition. Who cares that you barely know, like or ever see these people.
4. It’s not worth the calories I like Christmas food as much as the next person, But holy mother of Mary, there is too much. First there’s a cooked breakfast, then there’s a midday mince pie, followed by a three-course lunch, then dessert, and by 5pm you’re eating again. If it was salads and smoothies we might all be fine, but no: it’s meat, it’s chocolate, it’s Christmas pudding – it’s a coronary event waiting to happen.
5. You get all dressed up – with nowhere to go. You’d like to be in your pyjamas but Christmas lore demands that you put on your fanciest gear, even though you will only leave the house to take the bins out. You are doomed to spend Christmas Day being uncomfortable and hot, especially after lunch when you need to let the belt out a few centremetres.
6. The world stands still, Cities become ghost towns and even the pubs don’t open until the afternoon if at all. Back to the sofa it is.
7. Christmas TV If you’re into the same episode of Fawlty Towers you’ve already seen eight times, or hopelessly un-funny Christmas specials, then you’re golden. For the rest of us, the Christmas television schedule is an exercise in endurance and restraint. Which brings me nicely on to…
8 Love, Actually Possibly one of, if not the worst Christmas film to have ever entered into production, if not the worst film in the f**king world. Whats-his-face trying to steal Kiera Knightley from under her husband’s nose. The annoying kid. Kris Marshall’s ludicrous storyline. Emma Thompson’s bits are watchable, but the rest of this hammed-up, faux-sentimental clap trap is as enjoyable as an elbow in the tit. I resent Christmas for this film.
9. Board games Board games seem like a great idea at the time – despite the fact you would never dream of playing one at any other time of the year. After your third turn, you suddenly remember why. Someone always gets aggressively competitive, someone else has a meltdown and you inevitably lose the dice and everyone gives up.
10. You get presents that you then must pretend to love It’s a numbers game, really. If you get ten parcels, you know at least one is going to be awful, inedible or totally irrelevant. In a better world, a more honest world, you’d peel back the paper, look Auntie Jill dead in the eye and ask why, Jill; what exactly have you done to her to deserve Sodoku loo roll? For the third year in a row? Instead, we smile politely and put it in a drawer. And by drawer, I mean bin.
11. Smug Facebook posts Here’s a fun Christmas game – it’s called, How About you Don’t Post Your Inane Christmas Snaps on Facebook and Make People Feel Bad. It’s really easy: simply turn your phone off and participate in real life. The first one to post something is a moron. If you are having a nice Christmas, surrounded by family and friends, with plenty of food and drink in your nice warm house, then enjoy it. Not everyone gets to have the family and the gifts, and the food on the table. Plenty of people spend Christmas alone, and actively dread it. Christmas is one day a year – you don’t have to spend it on Facebook.
12. The harm to the planet I don’t want to get all Inconvenient Truth on you, but mass consumption equates to mass destruction. Tonnes and tonnes of wrapping paper and cardboard will not get recycled. Gallons of fat will go down the sink and clog up the sewers. Mountains of food will be scraped into the bin or left to go off because there’s too much to eat. I suppose fewer people use their cars…is that something
13. The hangover No, not the film (although that’s dire too): I’m talking about the shaking/headache/nausea/fatigue that comes upon you on Boxing Day like a ghost of Christmas past. By 11 am on Christmas Day, you concluded that the only way to cope with your impending poverty, your current exhaustion, the excess, the relatives, the dross on TV, the wasted presents and the boredom of yet another round of Monopoly…is to have a drink. So you drink it all… You get a bit too jolly… Tra la la la laaa, la la la la.
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