Calm Down, It's Only a Religious Festival...

...is exactly what I wanted to shout at people today. I had the misfortune to get caught up in the madness which seems to grip people on the last working day before Christmas. Whilst I was still trying to work, it seemed that the rest of the population had finished at midday and were now clogging any road that looked like it might lead to a shopping centre or supermarket. Finding myself gridlocked, Micheal Winner's wise words came to me. However, instead of imploring my fellow citizens to "calm down", I instead satisfied myself with shouting "wanker", "arsehole" and "What the fuck's wrong with you, do you want a man with a red flag walking in front of you?" as I tried to make my way through traffic. Of course, by the time I did finish work and tried to do some shopping myself, I found that the supermarket shelves had been stripped bare, as if by locusts.

But just why do people go mad like this? It's the same every year - the country suddenly finds itself in the grip of a shopping frenzy. Reason flies out of the window as motorists battle for parking spaces and pensioners fight to the death over the last farmhouse loaf in Tesco. For God's sake, most of the shops will be open until at least five o'clock on Christmas Eve, and most of them will be open again on Boxing Day! I wouldn't mind, but this madness also extends to non-shopping activities. Just try going out to the pub for a pint at this time of year - you can't get near the bar for drunks who don't ever go out for a drink at any other time of year. They seem determined to pack their entire annual alcohol consumption into one evening. Then puke it up again five minutes after leaving the pub. That's the trouble. Everybody gets so uptight about Christmas they end up not enjoying it, despite all their frenzied preparations. So, just calm down everyone!