Christmas in the Park

My colleague: “I’m all about the selenium!” Obviously it is another exciting day at the office.

Christmas in the Park was on TV last night – I was going to watch it and then remembered that I watched the televised version last year and it was awfully, heinously depressing. I’m sure that when I was small, CitP was a firework-laden extravaganza with talented performers, high production values and – wait for it – actual Christmas songs. Maybe the intervening years have warped my memory, but it is now definitely nothing more than a festively wrapped, commercialised turd of an event, corn-studded with the celebrities of yesteryear, B-listers reeking of desperation, and up-and-coming ‘young entertainers’ of highly varied quality – all of them attempting to belt out distinctly non-festive songs and turning the whole thing into a shambolic mess which probably embarrasses Santa somewhat, to say nothing of the city councils involved.

It would probably be better if I was actually there. When you’re actually there you’re with a group of friends, and during the boring numbers you can chat, top up your wine, go and buy a hotdog, and say things like “Ooh, Shane Cortese is on next, I think I might go and line up for the Portaloos.” And if it rains it adds an air of faint excitement and distinct nostalgia, rather than just making everyone look like they’re having a crappy time and getting drops of water all over the camera lens. Then, when it actually gets Christmassy near the end, you can ooh and ahh and point at the giant Christmas tree and generally release your inner sentimental bugger. And that’s nice.

Whereas if you’re watching it from the comfort of your living room you can’t really do any of those things, you just sit through the crappy numbers in the hopes that the next one will be better, and then the next one is Shane Cortese, and you become less festive by the minute and the only inner bugger that comes out is your grumpy one, and you can’t spend a bad number lining up for the bathroom because there’s no-one home but you, and by the time they start singing actual carols (two hours later, not including ads) you’ve gone to bed in disgust and miss the only part you were really interested in watching anyway.

Christmas in the Park? Christmas in my ARSE.

In other news, Sister Flatmate’s half-sister on the other side (it took me several minutes to explain this to my boss this morning, so there’s no use in you asking) went into labour yesterday, and so SF did a mad dash to the airport and I’ve got the house to myself for two weeks! This is a bit of a shame as SF and I were getting on well and having much fun recently, but the upside is that I have the house to myself for two weeks! Basically this means I’m going to fall asleep on the couch and play loud music and stay up late being noisy and basically have a total relapse to studenthood. I’m excited. Are you excited?

Right. I am going to do some work now, because all I’ve done in the last half hour is eat bread and cheese and muck about.