Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire
As Christmas creeps ever closer, I suppose that I should start thinking about decorating this column with little festive pictures. Or drawing snow on the top of the title to emphasise the ‘Christmas Spirit’. Well, bah humbug to all that nonsense.
We compers know that Christmas is invariably the busiest time of the year for our hobby, and having to juggle all of the extra competitions along with the other pressures that December brings can be a nightmare. OK, so there are presents to wrap, the family to see, and a turkey twice the size of your oven to attempt to cook. But what about the fact that the shops are absolutely packed with people getting in the way of precious entry forms and buying up all of those special competition packs without even noticing (tut tut)? The checkout queues, meaning even more dirty looks than usual when you ask for all of those separate receipts? The daily advent competitions? The postal delays at this time of year? We compers certainly see things from a different perspective… until the last December entry has been posted off, anyway. Then we can finally settle down to enjoy the fun with everyone else – although after 2003’s comping crop, this year’s festivities are likely to include copious amounts of Pot Noodle, coffee and cheese (I’ll leave it up to you to decide in exactly what context!).
It’s a pity that the busiest time of the year for our hobby is also the busiest time of the year for most people generally. It makes December one big, mad rush, and in many ways detracts from the fun.
There is a school of thought that tells us to make a real effort to enter comps this time of year, simply because ‘normal’ people (and the more disorganised compers!) don’t have the time or inclination. I think that this is true to some extent, but ultimately I think that the benefits are minimal. While the quantity of entries may indeed decrease, the quality certainly does not as the more serious compers step up their efforts in response to the perceived ‘better chance’. But there’s no harm in trying to be more organised at this time of the year to at least give yourself a fighting chance of entering as many comps as possible. Buy your qualifiers early, before the mad rush in the shops, and plan ahead to beat the Christmas post and the delays it inevitably brings. One particularly important rule at this time of the year is to buy your on-pack qualifiers as soon as you see them. This is always a good idea anyway, but is absolutely essential at Christmas when stock disappears from shelves very, very fast. Seasonal lines, alcohol and confectionery especially should be bought as soon as they are seen – stores might not stock the product at all after Christmas!
Over the last couple of years, the good old “Christmas” competition has seemed to go out of fashion. But happily it has returned with a vengeance this year, with a few Christmas themed tiebreakers already out in October when I’m writing this. So it seems a good idea (to help get us all into the Christmas spirit, if nothing else) to remind everyone of the festive chestnuts that do the rounds at this time of year.
Whatever your views on chestnuts for the other eleven months, in December everything is somehow different. As the entire country slides into one big tacky Christmas cliché in the name of tradition, it only seems polite to join in the jollity. Time pressures too make a Christmas chestnut somehow more acceptable. And given that Christmas is based on custom and habit for most of us, it seems only reasonable to make blowing the dust off of your “Bumper Book of Christmas Chestnuts” every year one of those family customs without which Christmas wouldn’t be complete. Some Christmas slogans may make you groan, then again so does that huge pudding after Christmas lunch that nobody can eat year after year… but you can imagine the uproar if ever it failed to appear. Christmas is all about familiarity and tradition, and there’s no reason why your Christmas tiebreakers shouldn’t follow suit – even with a heavy dose of irony and with tongue very firmly in cheek (or so you can claim, anyway)!
So, stuff the turkey and hang the holly, yule sleigh the judges in your quest for santa-rrific prizes that’ll give you Claus for celebration. Every one’s a cracker. Like Mistletoe and wine, the product that you’re praising is always number one at Christmas time. And of course, you bought it at a supermarket where prices are never ding dong merrily on high. The stable prices and star value makes their store the inn place to go, for festive good cheer they never reign dear, and it goes without sleighing that they tend their flocks but never fleece them. Yule love their prices (which, incidentally, sleigh you and even make Scrooge smile), and it’s the very store where Santa always does his stocking up. Wise men travel there from afar too; indeed only a turkey would shop anywhere else. Sauces and gravy undoubtedly offer the condiments of the season, and with that stuffing there’s no present like the thyme. The product about which you are enthusing invariably carries the most distinguished label on the festive table, is a great Christmas box (poles apart from ties and socks) and, hark those herald angels sing, at Christmas time it’s just the thing! In fact, you’re plum chuffed about it – and would be plum duffed without it.
I could go on, but don’t want to snow you under. I’m sure you get the idea, but if you would rather not join the doubtless hundreds of others piled on the chestnut bandwagon (or should that be sleigh?) as it teeters along its slippery path, then there’s plenty of scope for you to adapt one of these clichés and make it your own. Even easier if your name is Carol, Holly, Ivy or Noel – praise the comping gods at this time of the year if you are so blessed! It’s all in a good Claus, after all.
An unashamed Christmas slogan works best when the judges too are in the festive spirit, so it’s best to use them in competitions that will be judged before the big day. I can think of nothing worse than having to judge thousands of jolly seasonal slogans on a cold, wet Monday in February, so always take the closing and notification dates into account when deciding how thick to pile on the festive cheer. And then sit back and wait for those Christmas prizes to start rolling in… a ritual which itself is another unique quirk in a comper’s calendar. A sure sign of Easter in a comping household is when the postman turns up with all of the hampers, crackers and decorations won in Christmas competitions. But that’s another story, and frankly who cares? A prize is a prize, after all!
Have fun with your Christmas comps, may your jingles ring the judges’ bells, and all your tiebreakers be crackers. And good luck not just in the forthcoming festive frenzy but in 2004 too. May I be one of the first to wish you a Merry Christmas (just in case all of the extra comps next month mean that there’s no room for my column!), and may Santa bring you everything you wish for. With lots of postcards, envelopes and stamps thrown in for good measure. Season’s greetings, and at this time of the year always remember…
Comping is for life, not just for Christmas!
Smid x
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