Christmas 2019

by Alan Cole · Friday, December 27th, 2019

Things aren’t quite so lively at Christmas as they used to be. I don’t think it’s the fact that Anna and I are getting older (and wiser) as we are just as excited as always (well, I am anyway!) but now that Morgan is a grumpy teenager things are just a little more laid back than they used to be. Christmas Eve was therefore fairly chilled. We couldn’t convince Anna to play Monopoly with us but we did have a family game of Rumikub. Otherwise we watched TV and chilled at home with some good food and the odd cocktail. We didn’t even stay up particularly late.

That said, ‘Santa’ was still creeping around the house at 4am to put presents under the tree and fill stockings with goodies. Anna and I were then up early and had to wait around for Morgan to stir. We gave up waiting in the end and woke him up so that we could have breakfast and start opening the presents. The Orchid that had been working up to flowering for weeks finally set forth a flower for Christmas Day as well.

Christmas Presents

As usual there were plenty of presents to go around and the odd surprise or two here and there. I had lots of things ready for my Kilimanjaro trek such as hiking socks and clothes, cash towards the various expenses, a custom made notebook with some helpful swahili phrases glued into it and of course Anna had already paid for my flights for me.

Anna had her usual cook book, After Eight mints, chocolates and jigsaw puzzle along with various items of clothing and a big bottle of Manx Gin (which was for me as well!). I got her an Apple Watch too which looks pretty cool to me (but then I am an Apple fanboy!)

Morgan was difficult to buy for this year as he didn’t really want anything. He had a NetFlix subscription, lots of cash, various items of SuperDry clothing (that I quite like), a new headset for his xBox and lots of other things including a gaming Guinness Book of World Records and a large poster of a flamingo! We have no idea why he wanted a framed picture of a flamingo but it was pretty much the only thing he had said he wanted so that’s what he got!

There were of course loads of other things for all of us such as chocolates, smellies, and various gadgets. There were plenty of family presents too, the weblog book, a 2020 personalised calendar, biscuits and in lieu of any lego to build a wooden Marble Run for us to construct.

With the presents opened there was time to chill for a bit before it was time to cook dinner.

Anna did most of this as usual but I think it was a little easier this year thanks to various ready prepared veggies from M&S. It was all delicious of course and the home made crackers were fun too. Lottery scratch cards in them made things a little exciting as there was always a chance for one of us to win a jackpot – we didn’t win anything at all of course but we could have!

The afternoon was spent with a stroll to a sunny beach, phone calls to family and chilling in the lounge playing with our new Christmas gifts.

We finally mustered enough appetite for some turkey sandwiches later in the day and ate far too many sweets and chocolates.

Boxing Day

Boxing Day was similarly chilled. I did manage a quick hour on the turbo trainer just to keep me sane and Anna and I went for a walk along the beach but other than that it was lounging about and eating too much. Not a bad thing really! I made a start on the marble run and then finished it off the next day. It was supposed to be something for Morgan and I to do together but Morgan wasn’t that interested. He did help for a while but I did most of it. It was good though. It was pretty complicated with loads of pieces but they all fitted together as instructed and the final product worked as well.