Reading Roars!

The Christmas decorations are up in Boots. Other retailers, I see, are also gearing up for their busiest and most profitable period.

And, of course, it’s October. Halloween has not passed. We have yet to light our sparklers and bonfires. For Christmas, lest we forget, is two months away. That’s one-sixth of the year away.

Christmas is largely a detestable and tedious affair. Bad music is regurgitated from the past, garish decorations are hung seemingly everywhere, and the nation succumbs to massive overspending. The festive season is ugly and bloated. So why do we do it, year after year after year? Are we really that sad?

I see two solutions. Either we streamline Christmas, trimming off the excess fat, or we stage it once every four years, like the World Cup and Olympic Games.

Bah humbug.

See also Wool worth avoiding on the Unusually Suspect blog.