Done and dusted? No need to be so smug
With 41 days until “it”, the BBC has announced that
18 per cent of Britons had completed their festive shopping by the end of October, long before the hysteria over Black Friday or Cyber Monday. What is more, 11 per cent made a start in September, back when everyone was still running around in flip-flops.
Who are these freaks? I’ll tell you who Christmas preppers are: they’re the same smug b------- who book up all holidays, restaurant tables and theatre tickets months in advance, meaning that the rest of us are left with lives built around distinctly gamma experiences.
While we spontaneous types might actually enjoy these activities because they are something we actively want to do right here, right now, life-preppers suck the joy out of everything by lumpenly lining up experiences long before their, or anybody else’s brains can compute. I
particularly resent those schemers who book their bums on to theatre seats months in advance, meaning that the West End has become a place in which big names do banal things to facilitate ghastly one-upmanship.
“Have you got tickets to see Jon Snow in Dr Faustus?” demanded a fellow dinner party guest a while ago, referring to Game of Thrones’s
Kit Harington, before adding: “It’s a play.” (I told her that, in fact, I used to teach Marlowe… Sometimes preppers get what they deserve.)
Of course, one wants thespians to flourish. However, it pains me that – in the city in which Shakespeare made his name – one can’t simply announce: “I know, I’d like to catch me some Bard,” without calculations such as: “Oh no, wait, it’s sold out because it’s got thingy from Casualty
– we’ll have to wait until they head off to do panto.”
So, no, joy-suckers, we don’t want your thoughtlessly stockpiled presents, chosen solely to get the operation done and dusted – just as we’d rather not endure the dregs of your summer holiday options because you booked back in 2002.