Christmas – it’s the most wonderful time of the year. As a parent, it’s just magical and I love watching our girls enjoy the season. However, there are some things about the Christmas season that I really do not like.
Call me a Christmas Grinch or scream “bah humbug” if you must. But I reckon that readers of this post will agree with me on a fair few of the 15 things I hate about Christmas that I’ve listed below.
1) The rise of the Christmas advert
I get it, businesses want to seel stuff at Christmas, of course they do. But I really do think that this obsession that we’ve now got with what the John Lewis Christmas advert is going to be or why Iceland advert was banned before it made it to our screen has gone too far. Is it really Christmas to get excited about a TV advert? We used to get excited about the Only Fools And Horses Christmas special or what crazy plot Eastenders have up their sleeves for Christmas Day. But the advert? Jeez, give me a break.
2) The Coca-Coal Truck
“Holidays are coming, holidays are coming…” – oh crikey not again!
Firstly, WE DO NOT CALL CHRISTMAS “THE HOLIDAYS” – got it?! It’s CHRISTMAS, Christmas is coming.
But that’s not the only thing that annoys me about the Coca-Cola truck. No, we’ve also got this obsession with visiting the damn thing at various shopping centres around the country. What the heck has a big red truck with fairy light on it got to do with Christmas? The only, tenuous at best, link is that it’s from yet another Christmas advert. This is before you get onto the questionable practice of the seasonal promotion staff that events that had out free Coca-Cola.
There was a time a family would go see a nativity or a pantomime – now they go see a bloody great truck!
3) Christmas TV
Apart from a few good bits and pieces, I think we all have to admit that Christmas TV isn’t what it once was at all. The good old days of the 80s and 90s are long since passed. I can still remember the excitement of seeing the Only Fools And Horses Christmas special or waiting to see that latest film release. But TV nowadays is so fractured with Sky, Netflix, Amazon Prime and the rest that the level of anticipation we used to get will never return.
Possible the greatest TV moment of all time, thanks to Only Fools And Horses
4) The sales
I am a Yorkshireman, I love a good bargain like the rest of us. But, last year I think even we sank to a new low by going to the Design Outlet at York on Boxing Day. Never again!
It used to be the new year sales, but as with everything it’s got pule further and further forward. When you do watch Christmas TV you are bombarded with adverts for the sales starting Boxing Day. Whilst Home Bargains may have decided not to open on Boxing Day this year to save a few quid on paying the staff extra, I like the idea. Everybody take a couple of days off and don’t worry about spending money on things you probably don’t even need.
5) The fact it starts in October
I say it every year, and it’s true, Christmas starts earlier every year. It’s crazy and I think it really dilutes the whole enjoyment of the season.
6) Putting decorations up in November (and earlier)
Alright Janet, calm the heck down love and put the tinsel away eh? At least let the dying embers of the bonfire go out first!
In our house, the 1st December is perfectly acceptable as the day to start putting up Christmas decorations. The whole commercialism of Christmas, with it all starting in summer (OK, an exaggeration but not far off), seems to have infiltrated our living rooms, let alone the fronts of our houses.
7) Will it be a white Christmas
Every year there’s the excitement it might be a white Christmas. Bookmakers take bets on it and people are sharing the over-dramatised from front-page of the Daily Express stating that the next ice-age is upon us. The fact that the UK climate is such that a white Christmas is about as likely as me winning the Lotto seems lost on many people. Even more annoying is the fact that if one snow flak so much as falls on a UK weather station the Met Office declare a white Christmas. White for who, exactly?
8) Christmas light visible from space
I enjoy Christmas decorations, I really do. I might even go so far as to put some outdoor lights in the bush at the front of our house. But do we really have to have houses so bright you need shades on at 10pm just to put the bins out? Some folk have more money than sense.
9) Secret Santa
I’ve done it. I don’t like it. A group of people all buying similar crap for each other and everyone looking happy when they open yet another box of Quality Street.
10) Christmas sweet boxes getting smaller
Talking of Quality Street…..
Do the confectionary companies think we don’t realise that these boxes of sweets get smaller every year? The price goes up, the quantity comes down. Great eh?
11) Wrapping gifts
As it goes, I’m not bad as gift wrapping. That doesn’t mean I have to enjoy it.
12) Over-eating
I hate that each year I declare that we’re not buying all that stuff again, and I’m not eating all that stuff again. After my second box of Lidl stolen, I am very much over-eating.
13) Christmas songs
I love some of the classic Christmas songs. All I Want For Christmas, Merry Christmas Everybody, Driving Home For Christmas – all great. But when you’ve heard them for the 11,948th time in the space of 30 days you can go a little crazy!
14) Neighbours Christmas cards
Aside from one particular neighbour, I would say I get on with the rest of them. I say “get on”, I probably only even talk in passing to 4 of them at most. Perfectly normal on any British street (it’s not an Australian soap after all). So why the hell do we insist on posting Christmas cards to them? Because it’s the Christmas thing to do? They don’t send me birthday cards, or Easter cards or a wedding anniversary card – so why do we get a Christmas card from “Maureen and Barry at num. 9”? The fact they have to write their house number in it is a sign that they know we won’t have a clue who they are otherwise! Just say “Merry Christmas” to me in passing, that’s all you’re going to get from me.
15) It’s over-commercialised
It really is over-commercialised. I’m not religious and for me and my family, Christmas is about being together, love, happiness, giving and enjoyment. It’s not about how many presents we can buy our kids and post the grotesque photo to Facebook. The fact that our girls’ school has banned Christmas and asked them to think about the true meaning suggests that I’m not the only one believing this.
So there are the 15 things I hate about Christmas. Let me know in the comments what you think, do you agree with some of all of these or have you got a few of your own?
Thanks for reading.
Dave
Oh Dave, I like your list. I agree with a lot of it. Even if you aren’t religious, you should appreciate where the festival comes from and what it means. It shouldn’t involve the Coca Cola truck, Christmas Eve boxes and the like. That’s too much.
That said, I have got one thing to say, and it’s harsh: York Designer Outlet on Boxing Day! Bahahahahaha