I'll have to leave my account of my voyage along the coast of Japan of so many years ago for a bit as I've been a bit preoccupied over the last few days in gathering the various bits of ammunition you need for my annual Christmas card assault on the post office. OK, I know it's a bit early to be in full Christmas mode, but I've just got to get on with at least the overseas lot to be in time, or so they tell me. Actually it's sod's law: if you think you'll save money by sending the cards by sea they in fact send them by air and they're far too early, but if you dally then 10-to-1 they'll be late. You can't win.
I've got the cards (with the usual nautical flavour) and amended last year's stick-on label list by deleting the sadly deceased, the people whose cards were returned last Christmas with remarks such as "Not at this address" or "Return to sender", and those I've managed to fall out with during the last 12 months. Very few seem to get added - perhaps I'm too old to get any new friends.... The one thing I haven't got yet are the stamps. This is firstly because they are now so expensive that I'll need to discuss overdraft terms with my bank manager first, and secondly because the suggestion has been made that I enclose a typed Christmas letter this year giving all the family news. You know the kind of thing. "Little Frederick won the top scholarship to Eton in September and Fiona continues to represent England at beach volley-ball following her gold medal at the last Olympics..." Have you noticed how brilliant other people's offspring always are? It's quite sickening.
Anyway, if I do decide to go down this particular route, the additional weight of the said letters will make the postal bill even more astronomical.
Although I have to admit quite a high proportion of people who send cards to me enclose letters, I've resisted sending Christmas letters up to now. This is why.
In the first place I'm too disorganised to get them done in time, and this isn't helped by the fact that my printer seems to have packed up. Secondly have I really done anything so exciting that all my friends and relations can't wait to read about it? Well, of course, as avid readers of this blog may recall, I did run in the Angkor Wat Half Marathon last year; but that's nearly a year ago now. That's another of the problems - that race was actually before last Christmas, but run after I sent my 2013 cards. So it's pretty historic now. Of course, if you have a large family you can fill up the page (most people seem to write about an A4 page) with their doings. "Dad's turnip won first prize at the local fete in July" or "Mavis and Bert are planning to come over to England in February - they hope to come and see you when they're back in the old country." The trouble with this is on the one hand you wrack your brains trying to remember who on earth Mavis and Bert are, and do you want to see them anyway?
Anyway I haven't got any kids to my knowledge, and even if I had I don't suppose they would get up to anything too exciting. While penning that, it suddenly occurs to me that you rarely read any bad news in these letters. I've never seen, for example: "Despite trying to turn over a new leaf, regrettably Ernestine will be enjoying her Xmas in prison yet again, this time for fraud, embezzlement and working for a large bank." Perhaps this kind of news isn't regarded as suitable for the season of goodwill.
You get other problems when trying to compose a letter which suits all recipients. You would baffle your friends in America, for example, by mentioning the test match, but perhaps a bigger problem is that not all the addressees know all (or any of) your relatives or other people you might like to mention. I receive one letter each year from an old colleague from the Japan days who can't even agree on his own name: we all knew him as Paul, but it turns out that the folk in his home always called him John. So he has to sign his Christmas letters "John/Paul."
As you can see, in short I'm not totally convinced that I'll be changing the habits of a lifetime and penning a letter for Christmas 2014.
I've got the cards (with the usual nautical flavour) and amended last year's stick-on label list by deleting the sadly deceased, the people whose cards were returned last Christmas with remarks such as "Not at this address" or "Return to sender", and those I've managed to fall out with during the last 12 months. Very few seem to get added - perhaps I'm too old to get any new friends.... The one thing I haven't got yet are the stamps. This is firstly because they are now so expensive that I'll need to discuss overdraft terms with my bank manager first, and secondly because the suggestion has been made that I enclose a typed Christmas letter this year giving all the family news. You know the kind of thing. "Little Frederick won the top scholarship to Eton in September and Fiona continues to represent England at beach volley-ball following her gold medal at the last Olympics..." Have you noticed how brilliant other people's offspring always are? It's quite sickening.
Anyway, if I do decide to go down this particular route, the additional weight of the said letters will make the postal bill even more astronomical.
Although I have to admit quite a high proportion of people who send cards to me enclose letters, I've resisted sending Christmas letters up to now. This is why.
In the first place I'm too disorganised to get them done in time, and this isn't helped by the fact that my printer seems to have packed up. Secondly have I really done anything so exciting that all my friends and relations can't wait to read about it? Well, of course, as avid readers of this blog may recall, I did run in the Angkor Wat Half Marathon last year; but that's nearly a year ago now. That's another of the problems - that race was actually before last Christmas, but run after I sent my 2013 cards. So it's pretty historic now. Of course, if you have a large family you can fill up the page (most people seem to write about an A4 page) with their doings. "Dad's turnip won first prize at the local fete in July" or "Mavis and Bert are planning to come over to England in February - they hope to come and see you when they're back in the old country." The trouble with this is on the one hand you wrack your brains trying to remember who on earth Mavis and Bert are, and do you want to see them anyway?
Anyway I haven't got any kids to my knowledge, and even if I had I don't suppose they would get up to anything too exciting. While penning that, it suddenly occurs to me that you rarely read any bad news in these letters. I've never seen, for example: "Despite trying to turn over a new leaf, regrettably Ernestine will be enjoying her Xmas in prison yet again, this time for fraud, embezzlement and working for a large bank." Perhaps this kind of news isn't regarded as suitable for the season of goodwill.
You get other problems when trying to compose a letter which suits all recipients. You would baffle your friends in America, for example, by mentioning the test match, but perhaps a bigger problem is that not all the addressees know all (or any of) your relatives or other people you might like to mention. I receive one letter each year from an old colleague from the Japan days who can't even agree on his own name: we all knew him as Paul, but it turns out that the folk in his home always called him John. So he has to sign his Christmas letters "John/Paul."
As you can see, in short I'm not totally convinced that I'll be changing the habits of a lifetime and penning a letter for Christmas 2014.
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