Magic To Do

Saturday 14th
Magic To Do

I know what you’re thinking…how can he possibly keep up the high standard of writing he has delivered these first two days?

I will let you into a secret. I have had professional writers contacting me, begging, nay demanding, that I stop using the word ‘writing' to describe this drivel. But I feel duty bound to keep pushing forward.

Today finds me heading north, North East actually, deep into the Tory heartlands!

The plan is to stay overnight at a cheap hotel before heading even further North on Sunday to have lunch with Santa.


Perhaps I should add that I’m not travelling alone. Mrs B, Miss Twillets Senior and the younger and slightly taller 6yr old Miss Twillets Junior are also along for the ride.

It must be said that I’m quite famous for deploying bucket loads of humbug around this time of year. I even have Bah Humbug on my baubles…but the doctor gave me some cream and I think that’s cured it.

Since Polly Joan arrived, I have tried to be a little more open to the festivities. I don’t always succeed but I’m actually looking forward to this trip just to see Polly’s face when she meets Santa again. It’s become a sort of tradition, this trip to Alnwick.

How wonderful is that childish innocence that allows her to believe in Santa and the Tooth Fairy, (not Jesus as apparently that’s just a story). It is so refreshing in a world so full of cynicism.

I recall my own childhood, growing up in the flat wastelands of south Lincolnshire. Santa would visit and leave us one nice present plus he’d fill the sock we left hanging on the bedpost.

We weren’t always very happy with what he filled the sock with, on occasion it was just reindeer poop, but everything was put to good use in those days and we always had amazing rhubarb.

Life was much simpler back then, and cheaper.


You didn’t pay to go and see Santa at his grotto, you just went to bed and hoped he hadn’t forgotten where Lincolnshire was.

You did write a list, but you didn't post it (or email it), you set it on fire in the hearth allowing the message to magically make its way to the North Pole in a puff of smoke.

You didn’t ask for training shoes or a mobile phone because in my day there were no mobile phones, the phone could only move as far as the cable allowed!  And the only training shoes we had were plimsolls!

Considering the fact that my parents worked very hard and didn't have a lot of money, we had amazing Christmases. I had an amazing childhood.

And now I want Polly to have an amazing childhood - but expectations have changed.

The one thing that never changes though is that the best thing any child can have is their health and to be happy.

This has gotten very serious hasn’t it?

But the children of this word deserve to be thought about seriously, the children living in poverty not only in this country but all around the world.


It’s why Mrs B & I don’t send many Christmas cards but instead donate to Lincs2Nepal, a charity which helps to support and educate children. We even sponsor a little boy called Ayush.

I’m not sure what the Christmas traditions are in Nepal?

I am intrigued by Nepal. I’d love to go but I’m not sure about the toilets.

The tradition of the sky burial is something I always thought was brilliant - leaving the body of a deceased relative on a mountain top to be eaten by the birds.

I’d like to offer that service in Mansfield but we are a bit short of vultures and I think the two Blackbirds and the Robin in my garden might take a long time to get through a whole corpse.

Anyway, back to Santa…I guess the time will come when Polly will awaken from childhood innocence, but I hope we are giving her the chance to have a few happy childhood memories before that time comes.

Better start packing. Better check the weather. It can get very cold up North, not as cold as Nepal (or the penal colony on Rura Penthe) but cold enough that I might need an extra vest to protect my nipples from frost bite.

And having placed the image of my nipples in your head, I bid you a fond farewell until tomorrow.