18 ways the middle classes have ruined Christmas

Panettone

The best Christmas was probably the third one, I reckon. The first – in what, 0AD? 4BC? – was essentially just a birth party, and quite a stressful one at that. Mary surely didn’t even want any visitors, apart from maybe the bloke who brought gold.

The second was likely about establishing a few basic traditions: nativity re-enactments; gift-giving, advent candles; the understanding that Feely Uncle Alan should be safe if he’s put at the head of the table; Wizzard releasing I Wish It Could Be Christmas Every Day for the first time.

So by the third they’d have been in full festive swing. Things would have been established but still novel. Fun, but not overly organised. As for every Christmas after that? Progressively worse, I think we can all agree. Especially when the middle classes got their Arc’teryx mittens on it. Christmas is increasingly unrecognisable. Here, let us count the ways.

1. Michael Bublé

Off to a solid start. Inarguable, this one. But see also: every other Christmas cash-in album, TV concert or one-off duet by celebrites who ought to know better. The trend didn’t start with Bublé, not by a long stretch. But then nor did fascism start with Adolf Hitler. Sorry to mention him so early on. Bublé, I mean.

2. Advent calendars filled with increasingly absurd things

Chocolate ones were bad enough, as has been beautifully expressed before. But 24 miniature bottles of premixed Negroni, one for every morning on your commute? A special Pomeranian puppy calendar, one behind every window, so that by the actual holiday it’s touch and go whether the last dog will even be alive? A bit of Tesla every day, until you have enough to build a real one come Boxing Day morning? Enough. The budget’s blown by December 1.

3. Christmas tree skirts

Your Nordmann Fir is not a demure Regency maiden. It will not scandalise the neighbourhood if its ankles are bared. It is not Winnie the Pooh, nude from the waist down but oddly unaware of it, if it is decorated up top but doesn’t have a little gown covering its base and roots. It’s a tree, Sebastian. Get a hold of yourself.

4. Elf on a Shelf

The cursed elf – CreativeCoach / Stockimo / Alamy

No, no, no, no, no. No.

No.

5. ‘Christmas-flavoured’ food

Christmas is not a flavour, I’m afraid to inform you. Usually it just means immense quantities of nutmeg and/or orange, or else the same product as it normally is, only in a red and white wrapper. Speaking of…

6. ‘Combination’ food

Heston (not the service station) has a lot to answer for in turning Christmas into a time of year for supermarkets to go absolutely insane with their flavour combinations. Just because it’s the birthday party for a guy who could turn water into wine and make a few loaves and fishes feed a wedding is not an excuse to try the impossible in the kitchen.

Three-cheese pastry with pear and fig mincemeat pies were one thing. Banana and bacon trifle was another. But Waitrose’s range this year allegedly includes “Myrrh-flavoured popping candy cane snowglobe explosions”, “Aled Jones-infused sugar-powdered stocking sprouts”, and “Goose-in-a-calling-bird-in-a-French-hen-in-a-turtle-dove-in-a-partridge, served in a pear tree.”

*I made those up. Sorry, Waitrose.

**Actually I haven’t checked. They might be real.

7. Resurrecting obscure Christmas carols, just to show you’ve heard of them

Oh we’re doing “Hodie Christus natus est”, Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck’s rarely-heard 1619 Gregorian chant, instead of “all the usual oversung rubbish”? What do you want, a special Christmas medal for being a carol hipster? Hark! The Herald Angels Sing may be the Mr Brightside of the genre, but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

8. The great annual garden centre takeover

All I came in for was some bird feed and secateurs, so why am I suddenly in an immersive recreation of the 2003 Will Ferrell comedy Elf, complete with all the usual staff (and even the koi carp from the back?) in full costume and entirely unable to help, as I’m ushered gently towards meeting Father Christmas in a grotto set up where the compost’s usually sold? There isn’t even any bird feed on sale; it’s just Christmas stuff. How has this happened?

9. Saying ‘Happy Christmas’ instead of ‘Merry Christmas’

You have no right to imply I’m happy. Merry maybe, but that’s only because of the port. This scourge is imported from America, I feel sure of it.

10. Dogs in Christmas outfits

Festive fun or animal cruelty?

We hear a lot about how XL Bully dogs should be destroyed and their owners prosecuted, but not nearly enough about how whippets in Christmas onesies should be rehomed and their owners hurled into the sea, along with the rest of the dog’s winter wardrobe.

11. Saying ‘Of course, Saint Nicholas was actually from modern day Turkey’

This doesn’t seem wholly relevant to the Christmas party discussion about the Middle East conflict, Nile.

12. ‘Luxury’ crackers

Paper hat that breaks the moment you clench your jaw; miniature set of screwdrivers; party popper; and a joke no funnier than, “Why did Santa install seatbelts on his sleigh? Because of elf and safety.” Any more decadent than that is a waste of time. Most of it lands in the cranberry sauce anyway. What if you took grandad’s remaining eye out with a flying caviar tin, then how would you feel?

13. Matching festive pyjama sets for the entire family

“Hello, is that social services? Yes, sorry to call on Christmas morning but I’d like to report a cult.”

14. Panettone, generally

Are you a cake or a bread, pal? While you make your mind up, I’ll be over here buying another chocolate yule log instead.

15. Christmas adverts

Let us be honest: the only two good Christmas adverts are the original Holidays Are Coming from Coca-Cola, and the 2007 Tesco ad featuring the Spice Girls hiding from one another. Oh and the entire Aldi Kevin the Carrot saga.

16. Christmas round-up letters

If we wanted to know what you’ve done this year, we’d have kept in touch during the year. Desist.

17. Fake German winter markets in Britain

The effort is nice. The thought, from beleaguered local councils, is appreciated. But there’s just something about drinking gluhwein in a rainy commuter belt car park while Gemma Collins and Darren Day’s version of Baby It’s Cold Outside blares from a food van encased in the livery of an Alpine hut while your children do their best not to get abducted that just doesn’t scream “authentic charm.”

18. Appallingly cynical articles that simply need to lighten up

What, like the LED Bambi figurines on your lawn? Fair enough. Merry Christmas.

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