The ghost of Christmas Past

 We've had a pretty quiet Christmas. Apart from the festive cards and the occasional box of Thornton's chocolate coated ginger, there's not much evidence at Cyber Mansions to indicate the season of feasting and family feuds.
It suits us just fine.

Of course, there was a time when the idea of such a seemingly dull and boring apology for a Christmas, without turkey and all the trimmings would have been unthinkable.

Probably the most extraordinary Christmas meal I've ever had was when I was sharing a house with some friends, back in the 1970s.
A couple of my friends had formed the nucleus of a band and over a number of months, they'd gradually accumulated the remaining musicians and sundry road-crew that were going to propel us all to the rock and roll lifestyle we so obviously deserved. We had rented a farm-workers cottage in the middle of an orchard in Worcestershire and when the number of people had become too big for the house, had put a couple of caravans in the back garden for extra living space.
The band rehearsed in a barn at the nearby farm.
We didn't have a lot of money, and until the band were gig-fit there was no real prospect of income from that quarter. For a lot of the time we lived there, most of us didn't have proper jobs. There was usually at least one person earning, but a lot of the work was casual stuff on the farm so we were always running on a ridiculously tight budget.

During that December, most of us had decided that although we could have scuttled back to our respective families for Christmas dinner, if not the whole festive season, it would be much better to have Christmas 'at home' together.

I can't remember if it had snowed that Christmas Day, but I have a vague memory of there being snow on the ground on the night we "acquired" our Christmas tree from a nearby wood.
The tree had been decorated by our bass player and it had pride of place in the living room; decked out in red and gold cardboard astrological symbols, it was bit unorthodox to those of us that were brought up with tinsel and fairylights, but it was the closest thing to normal festive decoration that we had.
There was an open fire, with an enormous log sullenly smouldering away, with just the occasional burst of more enthusiastic flame. Above the fireplace, the chimney breast was covered by a large temporary mural that I had drawn, with merry, seasonal caricatures of each of the housemates.
The crowning glory of the decorations, however, was created by the drummer.
He had connected up various coloured lights and electrical appliances to an industrial cam-operated, multiple switch. These were strategically placed around the room and activated by a concealed pressure pad under one of the sofa cushions. When somebody sat on the sofa, a sequence of bulbs lit up across the room as a concealed vacuum cleaner whirred into life, an electric fan set all the tree ornaments dancing and a pair of disco turntables burst into life both playing The Move's "Blackberry Way" slightly out of step with each other.
I'm not sure if it was awfully Christmassy, but it did have a sort of weird, magical quality.

As lunch-time came closer, and the smell of roasting turkey wafted through the house, we hauled a pair of trestle tables into the living room, and set out the cutlery, glasses and crackers.
And then the food was served. It was a magnificent feast.

OK, there was a small problem with the wine.
We'd bought a couple of bottles of wine, but we hadn't got a corkscrew. We couldn't normally afford to buy beer, let alone bottles of wine, so it's hardly surprising that nobody had even thought about how to open it. We rummaged through the kitchen drawers to no avail. It was hopeless, we hadn't even got a Swiss Army Knife.
We sat, scowling at the bottles...
Then someone had a brainwave

A quick visit to the tool shed produced a suitable bottle opener.
There can't be many Christmas meals where the sound of festive cheer is interrupted by the gutteral whine of a Black and Decker electric drill.

Incidentally, this was also the only time I'd seen somebody ensure that the Christmas pudding caught fire when the brandy was poured onto it, by giving it encouragement with a gas blowlamp.

Happy New Year Everyone!