Only at Christmas will I combine three toppings
Christmas allows us all to do things we’d never usually get away with or even want to do at any other time of year. A great caller on the radio show dropped into the conversation the small detail that he had over 40 mince pies in the house as they were his favourite thing and he didn’t want to run out.
He even confessed that he’d eaten six the previous day and had more coming from an internet purchase, arriving that afternoon.
He was panic buying even though no-one else was.
For me, it’s the only time of the year when I slowly make my way through Christmas pudding (no-one else really likes it in my household) and it microwaves well.
It can go from stone cold to hotter than Venus in under 15 seconds.
I will, if the items are available, eat Christmas pudding with something known as ‘The Newman Triple’.
This is a heady combination of custard, cream and ice cream. It’s unnecessary.
It’s over the top. It’s delicious. I’m not sure when or how the triple appeared but even as I write this, I find myself looking forward to it.
At no other time would I even consider it.
Let alone have all these dessert items in one location.
Something else I have gone over the top for this Christmas are bars of scented candle wax that you put on the top of an oil burner.
It may be an age and stage moment for me, I’m not sure.
It could simply be something to suppress the long winter – and often constant wet dog smell in our house.
Something started me on this journey and now I’m an addict.
In the street market near where I live, there is a stall that sells every imaginable smell you can think of in the form of wax bars.
Plus, the fella who runs it, is one of the kindest market traders I’ve ever met.
He uses kindness to hypnotise the general public and it works like a charm.
He has over one hundred aroma combinations and groups of people gather in impressive numbers to sniff the samples.
Simply listening to the reactions is quite fun.
‘Oh, I love that and it smells like sponge cake!’
So far, I’ve bought ‘winter’, somehow it does smell like winter, a combination of smoky cinnamon fruit?
I bought ‘gingerbread latte’, I know, get me.
Gently filling the house with the idea that we now live our lives in Costa coffee.
‘Christmas Tree’, a lovely pine smell that I put on in the front room because my tree is dying at speed.
It tricks the mind and the senses into believing that the oversized leaning tree of Pisa is still alive.
The list of aromas goes on and on.
Incredibly, they also sell one called ‘alien’ which somehow does smell like you're in a room on another planet having been abducted.
I’m not sure why you’d want that aroma journey but I’m tempted.
Maybe it will come in handy for that point in the holiday when it all gets too much.
When the custard, cream and ice cream start to weigh heavy.
When the thought of more mincemeat is no longer a thrill.
When the turkey comes round again and this time in a curry form.
At that point, it might be nice to snap off a corner of wax-smelling 'alien' and have a short break in another world.
They sell one called ‘alien’ which does smell like you're in a room on another planet having been abducted