Merry Christmas once again to one and all. Another festive season already over, in one single day, and what a sweat many of you broke into for that???? How's the blood pressure and stress levels then?
Once again everyone's broke or should I say "as always" everyone's broke. (Speak for yourself I hear some of you hiss! No, actually, I want to speak on behalf of the masses. If you're ashamed of admitting to being broke then that's your problem).
It's not that we were not broke before the festive season anyway, rubbing salt into the wounds, but this time, after Christmas, not having money has a sort of festive, surreal good feel about it. It certainly beats jumping in front of a moving truck of wildebeast even though my bank balance has several minus signs after an insurmountable amount of zeros, I'm still feeling quite groovy. Or maybe this is the calm before the storm. The "I'm in denial stage" until the baliffs try to knock down my front door to steal my television which is not worth the electricity it pulls and anything else they think as valuable. Believe me, they'd be hard put to find anything of any real value unless they want to disconnect my gas and electricity. But I am sure the reality of the situation will hit home, if it comes to the Baliffs but until then, I'm groovy and been thinking about Santa and his Reindeers and how much money Santa has spent making children around the world happy!!! Delusional or what!.
Being broke just after Christmas is almost a cool thing would you not say? because we can justify reasons for being broke. We can blame it on a plethora of things from buying expensive presents because Auntie Winterbottom or Grandpa Dotty will not have anything other than Ted Baker - otherwise the whinging and complaining will never stop and it will not do their street cred any good to receive anything from Primark's Dolce and Gablanka range.
Then there's the crazy almost desperate will to buy everything that is stocked in Tesco's ....sorry I mean Harrods... just incase a famine occurs during the holiday period. It doesn't matter that most people will quite easily put on an extra stone by eating breakfast alone. The fact of the matter is that "it's the season to be jolly, trah, la, la, la la" and all that. So, there's food to buy for breakfast which is a feast in itself. Then there's brunch and then elevensess. By now one's waistline has already exceeded all limits and gravity has started to play havoc with the buttocks, spreading them out into an unusually uncomfortable horizontal and downward position. Then lunch suddenly appears, subtly enticing us to eat until our guts explode. So there's the starter, the main course, the salad, the option of 5 or 6 desserts. Then there's the after dinner mints, the fruit, copious amounts of various alcoholic beverages and, yes finally the mince pies and Christmas Cake and then the traditional Gateaux. If you are not suffering from an insane amount of stale and petrid wind by now - you will do on the morrow.
So why does being broke after Christmas not mean having the morbid, sour faced, I'm going to die effect on people, even though statistics quote that most people are depressed after Christmas, which I think is more to do with spending Christmas on ones own rather than being broke.
Well look at things this way. When you sit down and analyse what you spent your hard earned cash on - actually most of the time you've not earned your spend because it's on the credit card, so you don't even own the money you have just spent and got yourself into debt with... anyways. When you look at happy smiles on the faces of your family, the oohs and the ahhs of appreciation. When you look at all the designer labels and tags on everything down to the wrapping paper which cost most than a week's travelcard, surely you can pat yourself on your back and say, "Geezer, you did the Debt thing, it in style, nuff designer labels on that credit card - down with the credit crunch." (Can you imagine how distressed you'd really be if you got into debt by shoppiing at Primark or Littlewoods and have nothing to show for it other than a £100 receipt for a load of cheap stuff that has been made in sweat shops?).
So next time you receive a red letter demanding money for an unpaid bill. Next time you feel like doing a bit of window shopping, retail therapy - then think big.
So enjoy the last few days of the year - and remember the New Year sales are looming large around the horizon!! To be or not to be - TEMPTED. That is the question.
WISHING YOU A DYNAMIC NEW YEAR
