Features Lounge

IT'S CHRIIIIISSSSTTTMMMMMAAASSSS!!!

Ah welcome reader, you join me as my right eye starts to twitch involuntarily, as my body starts to shudder and as a single bead of sweat breaks on my forehead. It's that time of year again (nope not bath time) - the time of year when Cliff dusts off his vocal chords, drinking Baileys at 11am becomes acceptable and children start to projectile vomit in excitement.

It's Chrissssstttmmmmaaassss!

And whilst I love the twinkle of the tinsel, the smell of the mince pies and Slade on repeat, there's always a sense of dread that starts deep in my stomach as soon as December begins.

It's the present buying thing and, before you send out three wise ghosts to show me the error of my grumpy ways, it's not because I resent buying them. In fact it's totally the opposite. I love to see the look on somone's face when I've absolutely nailed it with the perfect present. Trouble is, getting that perfect present is no easy feat.

Even when you've formulated a plan, convinced the bank to let you squeeze another few quid out of your credit card and made a pretty little list, you still have to do the actual shopping part. (And yes, I know that things can be done online these days, but things can only be done online if you think about doing christmas shopping before May. Otherwise your beloved local postie can't guarantee to get you the goods on time, resulting in daggers from granny over the Christmas Turkey.)

It's that moment that you pull into a queue of traffic five miles away from the shopping centre you're aiming for, that you start to think that your trip might be a bad idea. Still, you persevere because you know that BHS have got a cracking jam pot collection that would be fab for your Aunty Val.

Then you arrive upon 'The Car Park.' For most of the year 'The Car Park,' is a serene place, littered with empty Mcdonalds wrappers and peppered with spray paint, watching cars swoosh in and out until closing time. At Christmas however, 'The Car Park' undergoes some kind of Jekyll and Hyde transformation. It becomes the battle ground of wide eyed, frenzied shoppers, sharpening their weapons ( middle fingers and the C. U. Next. Tuesday word) and ready to take on anyone that dare get in their way. The one way system goes completely to pot as venomous drivers spot a space three rows up and go any which way to get to it first, hitting 70 as mothers whisk their screaming children out of the way just in time.

If you do manage to park, you then have to move around the shopping centre, which is easier said than done with a pram up your arse courtsey of the new mother whose space you've just knicked. Every shop is crammed full of increasingly aggitated shoppers, who quite frankly couldn't give a shit if 98 year old Grandpa Fred doesn't like his Lady Gaga cd because after an hour in the pits of hell "That's what he's bloody getting."

Children swarm around your feet like rats following the Pied Piper, old dears trundle along in front of you and then stop dead just as you start picking up momemtum, causing you to hurtle over the tops of their blue rinses. You start to sweat. It becomes uncomforable and you start to wish that you'd brought a change of pants. The carrier bags in your hands start to cut into the skin of your fingers and then one breaks, scattering presents left right and centre which are then kicked out of reach by wild shoppers who are in such blind panic that they can't see you scrabbling about on the floor.

You think briefly about getting a drink, something to give you a bit of a boost to carry on. Then you realise that twenty thousand other people have decided to do that at exactly the same time as you and vow to courageously carry on without - you are a soldier and this is your Afghanistan.

Then, finally it's done. You've completed the list. You make a run for the car, head down because that torrential rain that they've been predicting has chosen now to make an appearence. Fifty cars sitting in the queue of traffic spot you and whizz towards your car, crowding in around you so that you have to make a five hundred point manouvere to get out of your space. You sit in traffic for another bazillion hours until you eventually see the bright and warming lights of home .......and simultaneously remember that you've forgotten to buy that bloody jam set for Aunty Val.

Ugh. Still we must remember that Christmas is a time to be thankful....and I for one am thankful that I can drink Baileys at 11am without being judged.