Jokes new to this blog but not new

1. How much did Santa pay for his sleigh? Nothing – it was on the house
2. How did the bauble know that she was addicted to Christmas? She’d been hooked on Christmas trees all her life.
3. What do you call a blind reindeer? No-eye deer.
4. What do you call a blind reindeer with no legs? Still no-eye deer.
5. How did Scrooge win the football game? The Ghost of Christmas passed.
6. I have this incredible ability to predict what’s inside a wrapped present. It’s a gift.
7. The Christmas jumper my kids gave me last year kept picking up static electricity. I took it back and exchanged it for another one – free of charge.
8. I got a universal remote control for Christmas. This changes everything.
9. I bought my son a fridge for Christmas. I can’t wait to see his face light up when he opens it.
10. The only Christmas present that I got this year was a deck of sticky playing cards. I find that very hard to deal with.

(Did you know that Santa actually only had two reindeer? Rudolph and Olive (the other reindeer))

10 Christmas Traditions

1. Preaching several sermons on Christmas themes (various verses this year)

2. Singing most of the Christmas hymns in our hymn book

3. Watching the film Elf starring Will Ferrell (tonight I hope)

4. Watching University Challenge Christmas Special on TV

5. Reading the novel Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens (50 pages read so far)

6. Reading some Christmas detective fiction (A Dramatic Christmas this year)

7. Going through a book of devotions from December 1-24 or 25 (this year Joel Beeke and 31 readings)

8. Burning down an advent candle December 1-24 (a red one again this year, a bit too thin)

9. Going to see Kate Rusby and her band doing one of their Christmas concerts (really enjoyed that)

10. Listening to lots of Christmas music (I now have 671 items in my collection)

10 sorts of sweets mentioned by Dylan Thomas in A Child's Christmas in Wales

1. Hardboileds
2. toffee
3. fudge
4. and allsorts
5. crunches
6. cracknel
7. humbugs
8. glaciers
9. marzipan
10. and butterwelsh for the Welsh

Kate Rusby Christmas at the Cadogan Hall 2024

Great to be there once again to hear Kate Rusby sing the Christmas carols, etc. Two sessions at Cadogan Hall thus year. We caught the second. All the usual favourites - the brass boys, a session for the boys in the band (with the brass this time), lots of chat, dressing up at the end (honouring 40 years since Band Aid this time with jokes at the expense of Bananarama, The Police, Boy George, etc), three While Shepherds, etc. And home by 10.15 pm. We really enjoyed it. New album coming out in May.

Christmas Magic an EP by National Parks

 

Here is another excellent bit of Christmas music. So pleasant. This came out in 2023.

A Christmas Chorale Mary Hopkin Album

Since 2020 a 17 track album (12 tracks and five bonus numbers) by the Welsh folk singer, Mary Hopkin, has been available. It incudes three songs in Welsh and a number of acapella of items. Most of these are traditional pieces but some are modern, including Snowed Under by Mary herself. Her grown up children are alos involved in this album. There is arecording of Mary singing aged 12, which I didn't particularly enjoy myself. Two tracks from 1972 (Mary had a baby, Cherry Tree carol) are very good.

10 More Items Listed by Charles Dickens in A Christmas Carol

1. Red-hot chestnuts (he later describes great, round, pot-bellied baskets of chestnuts, shaped like the waistcoats of jolly old gentlemen, lolling at the doors, and tumbling out into the street in their apoplectic opulence.)
2. cherry-cheeked apples (he later speaks of Norfolk Biffins, squab and swarthy, setting off the yellow of the oranges and lemons, and, in the great compactness of their juicy persons, urgently entreating and beseeching to be carried home in paper bags, and eaten after dinner.)
3. juicy oranges
4. luscious pears (later he notes pears and apples clustered high in blooming pyramids)
5. immense twelfth-cakes (also known as twelfth night cake or king cake or three kings cake. It is associated in many countries with Epiphany, the celebration of the Twelfth Night after Christmas. Its form and ingredients are variable, but in most cases a fève or fava bean such as a figurine, often said to represent the Christ Child, is hidden inside. After the cake is cut, whoever gets the fève wins a prize. Modern fèves can be made of other materials, and can represent various objects and people.)
6. seething bowls of punch, that made the chamber dim with their delicious steam
7. holly
8. mistletoe
9. ivy
10. ruddy, brown-faced, broad-girthed Spanish onions, shining in the fatness of their growth like Spanish Friars, and winking from their shelves in wanton slyness at the girls as they went by, and glanced demurely at the hung-up mistletoe.

(He also mentions three other items - bunches of grapes, made, in the shopkeepers' benevolence, to dangle from conspicuous hooks that people's mouths might water gratis as they passed and piles of filberts [hazelnuts], mossy and brown, recalling, in their fragrance, ancient walks among the woods, and pleasant shufflings ankle deep through withered leaves and gold and silver fish in a bowl)