Boxing Day

I can only imagine what the shops are like today, especially the supermarkets; what with them being closed for one whole day. How did people manage? At least there was no need to queue before 6.00am, as scores of people were apparently doing at our local Sainsburys last Friday and Saturday (Christmas Eve). Even I, possibly the most disorganised person in the world, managed to get my shopping long before The Bog Day by a combination of on-line and a top-up shop when the shelves were still adequately stocked. But that, I suppose, is the British spirit: get those sprouts early to prevent the bugger who prefers to lie in bed a bit longer getting any.

As for the Boxing Day sales; really? It’s not a time I associate with “big ticket” items. We tend to get those when we need them and not because – let’s pick an example – Curry’s is offering £20 off something that would normally retail at £600. It’s a matter of fact that if shop intelligently during the year you can usually get the things you want cheaper than on Boxing Day, but don’t tell that to the advertisers who extended last night’s final Doc Martin by the best part of a quarter of an hour to try to sell us things we don’t really need and want. The fact that they take out eye-wateringly expensive adverts on Christmas night confirms only one thing: it’s worth every penny for them.

The main reason I am not out shopping at 6.00am and during the sales is that, unless I am in a bookshop or a record shop, I hate shopping. Hate, I know, is a very strong word, but it applies in my case perfectly when shopping centres are rammed.

In any event, we have more than enough stocks of food and drink to last until well into the last two months of winter and quite possibly long into spring and I am not sure we are alone in that. This is not exactly helping my efforts to lose weight and get fitter but that’s Christmas for you. Eat drink and be merry and avoid Mrs Brown’s Boys at all costs.

We did continue one Christmas tradition yesterday by making a visit to our local pub for a pint. To our horror, the landlord rang the last orders bell before 2.00pm which saw most punters leave. But “time ladies and gentlemen” never came, ay least in the hour and a half we spent in a near deserted pub. And today we might possibly – and this is not written in stone just yet – go for a walk somewhere to blow away some of the cobwebs or, as an alternative, do sod all and watch Jeff Stelling on Sky Sports, drinking port and eating Stilton (us, not Jeff Stelling). Let’s see how that goes given that after a very long day which culminated in me falling asleep in bed reading my latest book (a Doobie Brothers memoir), waking with a start to find the book on the floor, with the bookmark somewhere under the quilt, which I found when I started to come round this morning. It’s a hard life.

My only regret over Christmas is that some of our family members had Covid so that buggered up Christmas Day and that my stepmother and my father’s widow has been in hospital. We raised a glass or two to absent friends, some still living and some dead. I know for some of you that’s very hard and indeed I felt a wave of emotion when I thought about people I knew, including one of my best friends, who died this year. That reminded me just how lucky I am to still be here, clinging on to dear life on the simple grounds that it beats the alternative.

Shopping can wait. I have some wonderful new music to listen to and some amazing books to read and will not wont for entertainment any time soon. And in the middle distance, as I hinted earlier, lies spring and the beginning of the end of these grim dark nights. There is a light in the darkness but today, for me, it’s not in Sainsbury’s or some shopping mall. I’ve got better things to do, even if that better thing is nothing.