This Xmas did not come together too well. In fact it was a disaster of Titanic proportions! Here's how it panned out:
18 December : Dear wife comes down with the flu. Stays off school. School is half-full anyway due to disgusting virus.(Ergo, snotty kids equal snotty class teacher).
20 December: Wife returns to classroom coughing and spluttering. Don't know why she bothered--few kids left.
21 December: Wife exhausted and sick but stays at school to collect salary (magnanimous gesture).
22 December: Darling husband (moi), develops tight chest, runny nose and streaming eyes. Holds on for salary and in case school needs him. School closes at twelve after concert punctuated by coughing, snotty noses and feverish children dropping like flies. Husband and wife retire to bed (It isa fact that two people in their late fifties do not require-or desire- physical contact, while blowing their noses at ten second intervals!)
23 December: An attempt is made on the Xmas summit. We go shopping and manage to purchase some items for our adult children and ourselves. Wife buys nothing for me and I buy her a book I wanted to read.
24 December: There is a sense of panic in our home. We try one final assault on the mall.There is no pudding, no Xmas crackers and my wife buys me a pair of shoes. I am asked to complete a competition form and find it difficult convincing the salesperson that I cannot see the form due to streaming red eyes and over-active nasal excretions. Our baby of the family, the 18 year old who knows more about life than a Nobel prize winner, is thoroughly disgusted when his mother and father actually stagger to a taxi (no alcohol consumed for over a week), and collapse in a heap clutching a tenth of the shopping list in two bags---and beg to be driven home.
25 December: Miraculously my wife puts together a ham, a turkey and vegetables---and makes her own Xmas pudding. We eat early, toast another Xmas and retire to bed at 2:00pm. 18 year old ignores us as his gifts were purchased well in advance. Something uncanny there.
Good King Wenceslas would have been extremely proud of us. Have a good Xmas week JU writers and roll on New Year!