IT’S that time of year again: Christmas. It’s coming. Indeed it’s already here … in the shops. To be candid, Christmas coming early is almost as predictable annually as columnists complaining about Christmas coming early.

But it has to be done. We must marshal the forces of decency and order to call out supermarkets displaying Xmas fare months before the controversial celebration. Everybody says it’s ridiculous, but the ostensibly cloth-eared stores persist in discombobulating the lieges, not least the little children, who have a poor concept of time.

The point is that, even in the recent heatwave, some shameless punters must have been buying the mince pies, crackers, giant jars of Quality Street, or – ken – Celebrations, mulled wine, Buck’s fizz, Advocaat, cocaine, baubles, ribbons and wrapping paper. Otherwise, the profit-hungry chains wouldn’t be selling them.

Who are these people? Let’s identify them so that we may point and laugh. 

Well, according to top experts, it’s the financially astute spreading costs before future price rises, or lost souls still trying to make up for the muted Christmases of lockdown, or those who just can’t get the feeling of cheer early enough.

Though I’ve some sympathy with the last named, none of these excuses is good enough, and arrests should be made.

Evidently, then, as regards Christmas coming too early, it takes two to engage in lewd rhythmic gyrations. 

But that doesn’t mean we should stop exerting moral pressure on greedy stores exploiting the sad and deranged.

Nowadays, decent ratepayers take photies of the offending merchandise, and name and shame the stores online. Trouble is they’re nearly all at it: Tesco, Asda, Waitrose, Sainsbury’s, Morrisons, John Lewis and Selfridges have all been caught red-coated by the Christmas police, of which I am the PR department.

In other Christmas news this week, John Lewis has swapped the UK agency that made its family-friendly Christmas ads for a French outfit called Megaforce, best known for making a “depraved” video featuring violence, sex, drugs and torture to promote a song called Bitch Better Have My Money by someone called Rihanna (no surname apparently).

Somehow, this jolly ditty has passed me by. Nor indeed, as someone who participates in life as little as possible, have I seen any of the John Lewis adverts. However, the company says the old, reportedly heartwarming ads were “too safe”. 

Presumably, it now wants to sex them up.

Who will save Christmas from these people, with their premature ejaculations of merchandise and their presentation of decent ratepayers as “bitches” buying book tokens? We need an alliance of elves and men to save our once wholesome and righteous festival from John Lewis, Tesco and other grubby forces of Mordor. 

I say “we”. Personally, as someone shunned by Santa, I have come to detest Christmas. But, if we must have it, let there at least be less of it.


Dear reader …

HERE’S another conundrum of modern life: how to start and sign off emails or indeed letters, if these are still a thing.

In the old days of order and decency, you began with “Dear Mr Buttockhead” (if you knew the name) or “Dear Sir/Madam” (if you didn’t know the name). You ended respectively with “Yours faithfully” or “Yours sincerely”. You’d have thought “faithfully” might have been better suited to a friend and “sincerely” to someone you didn’t know personally or to an organisation, assuring them that your intentions were honourable, but let it pass.

Today, people with computers send communications by email, in which they end messages variously, including “Kind regards” or “Many thanks”. I confess I do the same myself, probably because an email by its nature feels less formal.

“Regards” is generally reserved for business matters – maybe booking a holiday or contacting a criminal lawyer – where you have a name. But I find “best” or “kind regards” a conundrum. Both sound insincere. “Warm regards” sounds ridiculous, unless the person has scored you some cash. “Carnal regards” is acceptable, depending on the nature of the business.

It says here that young persons sign off with “Cheers”, “Ta” or “Speak soon”. But even I use the first named with friends and the last with those I intend avoiding. An estimated 92.34% of this column traditionally involves castigating the failings of others. But, in this instance, I cannot castigate. A friend and I end our email communications with a variation of “Toodle-pip”: pipply-toods, dittly-poops and so forth. It is most amusing. No, it is.

I’ve just remembered the hook for this lecture or homily. It is that, according to research commissioned by Barclay LifeSkills, “Yours sincerely/faithfully/truly” will be extinct within 10 of your Earth years. They are seen as too old-fashioned, formal or boring. Same goes for “Dear”.
This is grim news. At least these were rules of sorts. As in so much of life now, there are no rules. Like most natural rebels, when I see rules I want them broken and, when they are broken, I want order restored.

Accordingly, it only remains for me now to sign off this epistle to you in the most appropriate way I know. Lippy-poodles,