THE YULETIDE BLOG

Ahh, Christmas - that special time of year when the entire Christian world enthusiastically sets about attempting to attain the physical dimensions of a Lancashire sow by ingesting the caloric equivalent of a well-cooked-and-seasoned 2-year-old child (the other, other white meat) in one day. Bless Coca Cola and the poultry farming mafia for making it the event it now is.

Here in London, the full-time whistle has finally blown on the panic-stricken sale-mongering of the big retailers, leaving the streets largely empty and the population largely underwhelmed. Contrary to first (slightly desperate) predictions, there wasn't any snow on Christmas Day to distract everyone from their ballooning mortgage debts and smaller-than-usual pressies. It was nippy, but the sun shone for most of Christmas Day and today, Boxing Day. Someone must've known I'd decided to walk from my place in London Bridge up to Hackney and back and taken pity on my naive optimism.

Apart from the disgraceful bleating and pleading from M&S, Harrods, Tescos, Woolies and co., the lead-up to Christmas here seemed rather un-eventful. It was like the news and current affairs seemed to slow down in direct proportion to the number of residents bleeding out to warmer climates to escape the red-and-white Christmas saturation of every aspect of English life. Maybe it was just me, but London seemed almost quiet. Ye gods.

So, after finishing early at work, Christmas Eve saw me kicking back in the early afternoon before my Chrissie phone calls to home, sipping on a tall, ice-choked glass of Cap'n Morgan and coke, nibbling on my Tescos Christmas pudding (which bore a striking resemblance to Winston Churchill), with the flat to myself after my housemate scrambled away to Bermuda, immersing myself in the amazingly-satisfying tv smorgasbord on offer.

Embarassingly, a small, persistent, Clark-Griswald-like corner of my being relishes Christmas and all its trappings. So being able to flick through what seemed like every single Christmas movie ever made at my leisure was like sneaking a guilty little treat from the fridge of someone you're housesitting for. Forbiddenlicious.

There was also a plethora of other stonkingly-good-but-embarassing stuff on, like both versions of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, the Dr Who Christmas Special, music channels with The Top 50 (insert phrase here) Songs of All Time, you name it. There was even a Christmas panto starring Ronnie Corbett, which I had to watch for 5 minutes just to remember how truly awful panto is (Ohhh no it isn't! Ohhh yes it is! Ohhh no it isn't! Sheesh. Some wine with that cheese?).

Christmas Day I trekked over to my friend's place in Hackney, a good hour's walk (no public transport, and taxis were asking for your first unborn child and a weekly percentage of your salary). Great stuff with the empty footpaths though, loved it - an empty London when the sun's out is a sight to see. Zhera and Mark cooked up a storm of mouthwatering canapes and roasted goodness while I dutifully quaffed the wines I'd bought over and joined in on eye-wateringly-bad Moulin Rouge duets. Oh, and started off like an absolute demon at Jenga before turning to water in the final two rounds. Finished up with swollen bellies and magic cocktails that seemed to empty almost as quickly as they were filled. Great Xmas Day all round.

Now, for New Years' Eve........ is it illegal to do nothing for New Years Eve if you're in London? Someone the other day suggested with a straight face that here in Londinium they quietly drag such fun-dodgers away and they re-appear on Jan 1st "re-Neducated". Bah. Bollocks to that. You can stick your 30pound taxi fares and 50 pound cover charges right up your London Eye as far as I'm concerned. Ahem.

Hope you've all had a suitably calorie-saturated Chrissie - let me know if you're doing anything utterly mind-blowing to bring in the New Year. Maybe I'll be inspired to try and break my run of 4 rubbish-to-average NYE's in a row.

CROYDON IN THE NEWS

Well who would’ve thought Croydon was such a wild’n’crazy place? There’s been two, count ‘em, TWO national-news-worthy events here in Costa del Croydon in the last 7 days. And they don't even involve murders (Croydon's having a break from those this week, apparently - something about it being too cold to hold a knife for too long, or something). The locals must be in a veritable frenzy of excitement at getting their rooftops on the box in relation to something other than mugshots……ummmm........

Event # 1: Croydon Councillor Quits After IRA Past Revealed

One of Croydon’s Tory Councillors quit in spectacular fashion last week after a punter at one of Council’s public hearings outed her as being an ex-IRA provisional. Apparently the smug gentleman in question referred to Councillor Maria Gatland by her maiden name mid-rant, then corrected himself by saying he was confused after reading a book she’d written under that name when she was a young’un (cue smirk from punter). Turns out Councillor Gatland was up to her neck in it with an IRA gun-smuggling crew in the ‘70’s and wrote a tell-all book after she broke up with one of the men in the crew and left the whole nail-bombs-‘n’-Guiness thing behind. She go bye-bye very quickly once that little doozy came out. Good to see the Tory Party maintains a strict policy of checking the CVs of all those applying for Party membership, ey?

Event #2: TeenyBoppers Riot At Croydon's Fairfield Hall

Any of you heard of “The X Factor”? If not, it’s basically yet another tv programme from the same cookie cutter as the rest of the “Australia ’s Got Emotionally-Challenged Teenaged Singers Who Can’t Write Their Own Material”-style "talent" shows. Anyhoo, The X Factor producers put on a live show at Croydon’s Fairfield Hall (across the road from my work building) Monday night, and we could hear the screaming of the crazy-eyed fans from the 18th floor at work (through double-glazing) when their favourite plucked'n'primped demi-gods turned up.

The X-Factor producers were out front whipping the crowd into a frenzy (they're not top of the pops in The Bill's books right now as a result), but Fairfield had sent out flyers suggesting the show was free when in reality tickets were needed. Management had also underestimated the power thousands of temporarily-insane young moppets could generate when stimulated by too much advertising, bland pop music, hormones and Red Bull, and kept the doors shut as the keening masses watched They Who Cannot Think For Themselves enter the building. Cue ugliness.

The underage mob got their first unwanted taste of what a Sepultura moshpit is like as large sections of their ranks turned into those zombies from 28 Days Later and tried to storm the barricades in a desperate attempt to keep their Objets du Lust in sight. The paltry handful of security guards on duty immediately got on the blower and ordered up some bacon ala kevlar, who, upon seeing the rabid Children of the Corn they were facing, immediately called in THEIR crowd control specialists. Much of the video footage shot by cameramen silly enough to get near the front of this puzzling mass of insanity looks strangely similar to scenes of starving Bangladeshis or Somalians at the UN food trucks – just with shinier hair, better clothes and more tears.

The damage: Epileptic fits, broken arms and ankles, stomach injuries, asthma attacks, panic attacks, lost berets, hurt feelings, smeared eyeshadow etc etc. A heavily pregnant woman had to be extricated from the tidal wave (one might ask what the hell she was doing there at all) suffering bruising and severe loss of dignity. A handful of screechers had to be taken to hospital suffering sundry broken nails and ruffled bouffants or thereabouts. Apparently some sections even Threw Down and got stuck right into a good old-fashioned, Barbies-and-lip-gloss-at-ten-paces brouhaha, as “feral girl-gangs” got Naomi Campbell on each other with their diamante-studded nails and Hello Kitty phones. Outstanding. If only I’d had the binoculars, I could’ve provided the BBC with a slap-by-slap commentary from my desk.

One thing of note I did see from my lofty perch was the giant, menacing secondary wave of uniform-clad local schoolgirls sweeping across the plaza at 4pm like a phalanx of blazer-wearing Berserkers to fling themselves bodily into the heaving pile of flesh and North Face overcoats that was the "line". They've been described by many in the crowd as being foaming-at-the-mouth wild animals and the cause of much of the trouble. Where's Jamie Oliver when you need him?

Rumours also abound that perhaps the X-Factor judges engineered the madness to dilute the bad press from a contestant's kinky s*x tape that's just been released (much to the delight of Clearasil-dodgers nationwide). A course of action which would be like trying to make up for a 20-vodka-shots-and-arrested Friday night by having a Saturday night doing lines of coke off a public toilet seat in Kings Cross. Probably not going to improve your situation.

News from me - not much. Certainly no inflammatory crowd-baiting or Mick-outing, that's for sure. Went out to yet another centuries-old pub and then a swanky new nightclub last Friday night for a friend's birthday, but sadly there were no papparazzi-worthy moments of hedonism or controversy to be had. I did, however, meet Shane Warne's Biggest Fan In The World - he was my taxi driver on the way home. I didn't get a word in edgewise. Not one.

Cold here, -2 degrees last night, and everyone's dog-miserable or sick or both, dagnabit - so give me the lowdown on some funny stuff that's been happening in your vicinity. Or I'll tell people you all belong to a cult that sacrifices cuddly kittens to Steve Urkel.

Hope you're well!