This time last year on 22 December I found myself, as usual on that date, trapped uncomfortably somewhere between bone-aching lethargy and blind panic.
Illustration by David Foldvari. I suspect a lot of you may be in that awful place right now because suddenly, it's 22 December again and, damn Santa's beard, your Christmas[1] present shopping is not even begun. You've put it off and put it off and now there's nothing for it but to head out sometime in the next 48 hours to push through the zomboid hordes in pursuit of some truly mundane, tedious, mass-produced stuff.
This year I have spared myself that sorry charade. I have made an effort. Indeed, I have made a superhuman effort. I sit here now with every present bought. More importantly, I have made interesting, unexpected choices designed to thrill, delight, or, at the very least, that contain some element of thought-provoking originality.
When you leave yourself just one rushed hour in a heaving department store to do all your Christmas shopping the quality of the gifts can't help but suffer. Perfume for your granny? Genius, that'll go nicely with the other 43 bottles she's guiltily stashed in her old coal bunker. Box set of Gavin and Stacey for your auntie? Good call, because she's only seen every single episode seven times on the telly. Spanner set for your brother-in-law? Just the job, because nut tops will always need tightening and you can never, ever second-guess a nut top's width.
Come on!
You'd be better off going up to them all on Christmas Day, springing their gobs open by pressing the hinges either side of their jaws and then stuffing a 20-quid note down their gullets.
Meanwhile, behold my finely honed generosities.
For my Uncle Eric, a keen gardener, instead of the usual trowel or stone badger I have bought the seed of the rare umbarada plant. Flowering in late spring it gives forth iridescent, rainbow-hued blooms some three feet across. It emits a fragrance so beautiful that it reduces you to tears and its stem, when boiled up and taken in tea form, induces a non-addictive euphoria that can be described as nothing less than smashing.
For my nephew Daniel, a commited neu thrash death metal bassist, instead of the customary aftershave I have booked a three-day session with a Japanese Buddhist master who will awaken in him the realisation that suffering can become the means of tremendous growth. The master will also be giving the lad some tips on how to get the best sound out of a fretless five-string.
No tasteful vase or latest Lynda La Plante for the love of my life. Instead, on Christmas Day I've hired a 20-piece orchestra to set up in the front garden. In full evening dress I shall sing Nat King Cole's The Very Thought of You to her on bended knee and, as I do so, a flock of specially trained, brightly coloured hummingbirds will dart around my head, their hums perfectly pitched to the music.
There's more: I've booked a bungee jump from the Clifton Suspension Bridge for my dear old Mum. She'll relish the challenge! And marvel at its unexpectedness! To my maritime-inclined Dad I shall present a scale model of the Mary Rose woven from the hair of two women I know called Mary and Rose. For a mate's doddery old dog I've even procured a robo-cat with adjustable speed settings ranging from "sedate amble" to "practically carked it".
The list goes on.
I'm looking forward to some truly effusive thank you letters.
But hold on there. Isn't the best kindness of all the kindness of strangers? Yes it is. And that's why I've gone to all the trouble of getting together a few pressies for people I've never even met.
For the members of our ruling Tory elite I've purchased stick-on plastic moulds taken from the bottom half of Bruce Forsyth's head. For, as we turn our thoughts at this time of year to the homeless, the penniless and the friendless, let us not forget the chinless. For the Chapman Brothers I've splashed out on a Beano album. (It feels to me like they might quite welcome a bit of a giggle). Oh, and I've got Boris Johnson a book on the Great Chain of Being. This is the medieval concept of a God-decreed, unbreakable hierarchy in which the best of humans – eg tubby mayors – sit around drinking gold, eating roast eagles and generally running things, while those belonging to the lower echelons, such as poor people, spend their entire lives gratefully emptying their superiors' latrines. I'm sure El Bumblero will be terrifically chuffed to have his world-view affirmed by the 12th century.
One Christmas present notion I did toy with involved offering Jeremy Kyle a sharp blow to the head. The thinking was that this would result in him experiencing the general slowness, confusion and emotional turmoil equivalent to that possessed by his average guest, thus making him eligible to interview himself on his own show. I thought it might rather be fun for all of us to watch him giving himself grief for not being able to understand things and, for him, it would be a valuable lesson on how it feels to be barked at in front of a million people by a trembly-legged toy poodle that needs its bottom wiped. Obviously, the plan falls at the first hurdle. He's just not going to accept a sharp blow to the head, is he? He's not stupid.
There is a downside to all of this of course. To organise these gifts has taken me most of the year during which I've had little or no time to devote to anything else, not even personal hygiene. It's also cost about three hundred grand. Consequently I've done no actual work, I'm deep in debt and I don't half niff.
But it's done, that's the main thing. And by my reckoning I've put in 20 years' worth of effort and money so I don't have to bother again till 2033. Result!
Meanwhile, if you're one of the tardy millions yet to brave the tat-laden shelves and you're starting to realise that if it's the thought that counts then it follows that it's the lack of thought that really doesn't count much at all, then there is always the 20-pound note gullet-stuffing option I mentioned earlier. After all, it's got to be preferable to some jars of chutney in a straw-lined wooden box or a pair of itchy gloves. Merry Christmas!
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