Categories: uncategorized
Date: 10 November 2006 01:16:17
I realised something quite scary today. I took a photo recently of one of my housemates standing next to one of those singing Father Christmas things in our local supermarket, in the middle of their Christmas display. When I looked at the picture on my phone today, I realised the date it had been taken.
October 9th.
That's a whole eleven weeks before Christmas Day. Now, being the sort of sad person who likes to turn this stuff into statistics, I make it that (assuming that the display went up that day, Oct 9, and will remain up until trading ceases on Christmas Eve) the Christmas promotion runs for approximately 21% of the year. Christmas itself really boils down to just one day - therefore less than half of 1%.
So, over a fifth of the year devoted to persuading us we need to buy everything on earth to celebrate something that makes up just a few hours of our time.
I hate to sound like an old fart, but I remember the days when Christmas didn't start 'til December... it were nowt but fields round here... like taking bread to t'top oft' world... now you tell that to your young folk these days, they won't believe you etc...