Christmas...

The kids have been compiling their Christmas lists. In fact, I think they’ve been doing it since about September. Last week their work was finally deemed complete. One of Two put both lists in envelopes and addressed them to:
 
Santa Claus
1 The North Pole
House Number 1
 
I suggested she add Finland to the bottom of the address, and she wrote Findland. Then she gave them to me to take to the Post Office. Three days later, when the envelopes were still lying around the house, she gave them to the babysitter and asked him to take them to the Post Office. Such trust in her dad. Unbeknownst to her, the babysitter then gave them back to me that night. I do intend posting them, but since there’s a kind of de facto relationship between me and the mystery bearded figure known as ‘Claus’, it’s not really too important that they end up attached to a stamp.
 
One of Two’s list runs to thirty-nine items. That’s a lot of disappointment she’s setting herself up for. There are three main categories of present she’s looking for. There are the ones where she was thinking about what she would really really want in her life. e.g. a rabbit. Rabbit is number one on the list. She’s been told that Santa doesn’t do livestock, but she’s pressing ahead with the claim. Actually, with the honourable exception of mince pies, a rabbit is the only item in this particular category, until we get to number thirty-eight, where she’s asked for a rabbit cage. Santa does do rabbit cages, but that’d be pretty cruel. “Here’s your rabbit cage, sweetheart, but Santa ain’t bringin’ no stinkin’ rabbit…” Even Billy Bob wouldn’t have stooped that low in Bad Santa. Finally in item thirty-nine she seems to accept the inevitable by asking for a FurReal Rabbit, a more realistic aim. A FurReal Rabbit is more or less the same as an actual rabbit, except for the removal of the option of eating it for your dinner once the kids have got bored looking after it.
 
Category number two is for items which she thought of when she had some sort of moral ethicator fitted to her brain. This category contains things like a new school bag, pencils, school shoes, a jumper and work books. It also contains the critical entry, Vitamins, A, C, D & E. What stocking would be complete without them?
 
The third, and largest category, are toys and games which she’s seen advertised on Boomerang, and has hurriedly written down as the adverts piled quickly up, one on top of the other. Consequently there are a lot of spelling mistakes. Or, at least, one hopes there are. A sawing kit for example would seem an unlikely thing to be advertised on a kid’s channel.
 
Fed up with your Mum & Dad? Too many rules and regulations? Not enough fun? Worried that if you have to kill them you won’t be able to get rid of their bodies? With this All-New Winnie the Pooh and Tigger Too Sawing Kit, you’ll never need to worry about parental body disposal ever again.
 
I’m similarly hoping that Bratz Fukky Fashion is a slip of the pen on her part. Otherwise those dolls for the under-10’s are getting way too advanced.
 
Two of Two’s list is in two parts, one that his sister wrote with sixteen items – clearly she has a lot fewer ambitions for her brother – and the one he wrote himself with nine items. His lists are much more one dimensional, full of the kinds of things you’d expect from a little boy. Star Wars figures, a goal post, boxing gloves, Biker Mice From Mars etc. (Non-parents might just have read that and thought, Biker Mice From Mars???, but sadly Biker Mice From Mars are a thing, and while he’s written his list and proven himself unable to spell pirates, football or hot wheels, he’s nailed Biker Mice From Mars perfectly.) He’s also looking for a figure of Dr Who’s clueless cousin, Dr How. “What’s happening Doctor?” “How the **** should I know.”
 
Of course, they didn’t make a duplicate of their lists, and since they think the babysitter posted them, I can’t now take a duplicate and give it to them, so that they can crosscheck the lists against what they receive on Christmas morning. That might seem like the kind of thing that Gordon Brown will do with his kids, but when One of Two stands looking distraught at six a.m. on the morning of the 25th, clutching nothing but school shoes, pencils, work books and a bottle of vitamins, it’d be handy to be able to show her what she wrote.
 
Last year Two of Two asked Santa for a toy bat. Where are we going to find a toy bat, we thought, and then went off and made no actual effort to find a toy bat. The week before Christmas we were out without the spawn, strolling contentedly through the local shopping mall, when a ray of light suddenly shone on a toy bat sitting on a shelf on a toy stand on the floor below us. We felt some strange sense of elation at being able to get an item from the list that we hadn’t thought likely. It wasn’t that big a deal, but it was nice.
 
Christmas morning Two of Two opened up the toy bat, took one look at it and, as he threw it into the corner never to touch it again, he said, ‘Why did Santa get me a bat?’
 
We should have kept the stupid list. Not that it would have made any difference to the amount of playing time used on the toy bat.
 
And so Christmas is in full swing, slightly later than normal this year. The kids are practicing carols at home, Silent Night is being butchered on a regular basis, and Bing Crosby is already crooning his way through meal times.
 
‘Tis the season to be jolly…apparently. Pass the coffee and the pumpkin pie.