Bah Humbug. I blame genetics for the fact that I am a giant green Grinch, but Christmas does not help itself. Or rather, every store across the country does not help Christmas.
I am a November child, and don’t appreciate my birthday being overshadowed by loud loathsome music, glaring garish lights and overly cheerful adverts. But this is not where it starts. Christmas now begins months before the occasion, to the point where I am bored of the 25th December at the beginning of September. It starts with the little baubles in the corners on the TV, or snow throughout an advertisement and then BAM full blown annoying kids in stupid costumes singing irritating songs about how their mother can miraculously buy every single thing in a catalogue whether relevant or not – yes Littlewoods, I’m talking to you. These children do not induce sympathy or make me want to buy from this store, but run. Run as far as possible as I can away from this store, for fear that if I do go there the children will follow me and torture me until my ears bleed from pain. Every single advert on TV is about Christmas. Stores bragging about the ridiculous amount of money you can spend on items that will end up in the trash after Boxing Day. I’m sorry but the only commercial allowed to signal the beginning of Christmas is the Coca Cola advert, which in being so honoured retains its glory until due time. But the misery does not end there, oh no. It’s every channel displaying their Christmas specials: or basically, exactly the same shows just with all the characters wearing Christmas hats. Except in Friends, where Ross stars as the Holiday Armadillo instead. Another thing - I don’t get why The Wizard of Oz and Sound of Music are heralded as the great Christmas movies – what exactly do they have to do with the season at all? Nothing says happy Christmas like a collection of Nazis and people dressed in green. As of now, the only films that are acceptable at this time of year are The Nightmare Before Christmas, A Muppets’ Christmas Carol and Love Actually. End of story. Except of course you can watch “Christmas 24” – one channel dedicated entirely to Christmas movies and other unnecessarily chirpy trash. It’s enough to make me want to grab a stocking and stick it over my head until the holiday is over.
Yet the travesty extends further than the simple four walls of a TV screen. Each year Christmas grows, but only in the necessity for the need to buy presents. It's a poor excuse for picking a man's pocket every December the 25th, but I seem to be the only one who knows. Everyone spends an absurd amount of money on gifts that either have had no thought put into them or are absurdly hideous. I’m not going to be a hypocrite – I get as excited about opening presents as the next person (providing the next person is a six year old child), and most of the time my presents are perfect. But when the number of Impulse, So…? and Charlie fragrances I have outstrips the number of weeks in a year, I begin to think that the season of giving has gotten out of control. And let it be said for the final time – the horrendous Christmas jumpers are not wanted, welcome or winning. I try and restrict the number of people who I give presents to, but every year it seems to spiral out of control, costing me more than I ever wanted to spend on people who I probably won’t know in a few years except on Facebook. Logical.
And then comes the music. The endless drones of pointless sentiments that clearly haven’t been thought through – nobody wishes it would be Christmas every day, unless we couldn’t remember the day before, otherwise we’d either be bankrupt faster than St. Nick can travel or opening the same presents for the next millennium yet never having time to enjoy them. Then there’s the whole dilemma as to whether people age if there is only one day each year – see? This whole can of worms that was clearly not considered when the song was written. And don’t even get me started on Jingle Bells. The only song I can stand is Fairytale of New York for the epic moment after an assembly in primary school when the song started playing and my Headteacher informed me that this was her favourite song and started to sing along, at the exact moment where Kirsty McColl sings “You scumbag, you maggot, You cheap lousy faggot, Happy Christmas your arse, I pray God it's our last” – well, some moments stick with you forever.
Nevertheless, my favourite part of Christmas is the flowing amounts of food. A magnificent opportunity to eat till you’re sick, put on a ton of weight and then break that easily formed new year’s resolution to lose the mass when you find the leftovers of your stocking. A true yuletide miracle!
Still I think it’s safe to say that there are many pre-Christmas Spirit Scrooges that would love for the Noel celebrations to be toned down a bit, so we’re no longer affronted by tinsel everywhere we look. This year, the anti-Christmas begins. Game on.
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