December (with a merry Christmas to you all!)

When you mention 'December', it tends to conjure notions of Christmas, with Santa and tinsel and the rich, heady, succulent smell of roasting turkey (I'm getting hungry just thinking about it). With lashings of gravy and crisp roast potatoes and moist pumpkin and plum pudding with whipped cream and... (okay, deep breath). My point is that when the whole month is taken into consideration, I think the best descriptor is actually 'relentless'. That influx of catalogues, pausing just for Christmas itself, the determined stream of shoppers that head out each day with credit card and attitude, the bombardment of must-have toys and treats and technology, and the way so much has to be crammed into so few days. That slip past so incredibly rapidly. Faster than any other month, so that you blink and they're gone. Like one of those view-finder toys from the eighties. Click, click, click.

And every year I make a vow that the following December will be more relaxed, more organised, more casually sublime. But of course nothing changes. Then again, maybe that's what makes it December. That relentless rush, the frenetic consumerism, the glorious kitsch, the over-abundance, and that the feeling of being ever so slightly out-of-control. Like this morning when I slid my credit card over to the cashier and she looked at it and then looked at me, and I looked at her and then looked at it - and realised it was, in fact, my organ donation card. Quick as a flash I said: "What? Don't you barter?" But unfortunately my cutting edge humour was totally wasted on her and I left the store with, as usual for this time of year, my credit card severely dented and organs relatively intact. However that was still a sight better than last night when I managed to argue with a very rude store clerk (Kmart), a pushy woman on the elevator and my amazingly, hugely, ridiculously argumentative fourteen-year old, all in the space of ten minutes. But the thing is that despite everything I love Christmas, really love it, and so all it took after I got home was tumbler of good quality Christmas spirit and I was back in the swing of things.

And I raise the same glass (or maybe a fresh one) to wish you all, each and every one, a lovely festive season. With hopes that you survive December relatively intact and arise on Christmas day with enough energy to have a riproaring good time and a very merry Christmas! Cheers!