Merry Christmas!
Lawrence children have always been really good at Christmas, following the no-noise-before-7.00am curfew and the we-all-gather-together-for-presents rules. After all it is quite nice to see others open their parcels of socks, activity books and jars of olives. It all went a bit wrong today.
Chateau Lawrence, Desa Park City Branch, is a three storey place, Lexi and I at the top floor, children on the middle and Christmas on the ground. Before going to bed, and just after a very pleasant skype session with mates in a Wolverhampton pub, Lexi I ensured that Santa had delivered a pillow case of small goodies to each sprog and then we retired to bed. At 0345 I woke up to the sounds of noise coming from the lowest levels and had to set out to investigate. I found a sprog bedroom full of paper and chaos, sans children. Further investigation found three children with yet more paper all over the lounge floor and presents all opened. Not a good start to the day. After stern words from me children were dispatched back to bed, tails between legs.
The punishment that Lexi and I have meted out for the children’s nocturnal adventures is to put all except three presents away and draw up a good behaviour chart. Once each sprog completes good behaviour they can select one of their presents at a time. Cruel and horrible? Not as cruel and horrible as giving all their presents to charity as I was tempted to do at 0345. For me the joy of Christmas is gathering as a group and giving presents to people. All that was rather spoiled this year.
Something that wasn’t spoiled, despite everyone being shattered for some reason, was our Christmas Dinner. The stitches in my right hand prevented me from doing too much cooking so the plan to roast a turkey at home got shelved in favour of buying a ready cooked best from Amelios of Desa Park City. The deal was a 4 to 5kg beast plus veg, potatoes and sauces all for RM198. Given that a frozen turkey was RM150 it was a bit of a no-brainer. So I booked the bird for 1300 along with four portions of their excellent tomato soup.
At 1215 I took my Dad to the nearby coffee shop and guzzled large flagons of coffee, for social and staying awake reasons, and we presented ourselves ready for turkey collection prompt at 1300. Harold Pinter knew the power of the pause and the importance of the unsaid, his plays are full of both and after presenting my receipt for the bird just such a pause happened. The cashier checked the order book, ours was one of two orders, paused again, asked us to wait for a moment and then collected the manager. Things were not looking good. The manager then checked the order book again, nothing appeared to have changed in the order book in the thirty seconds that had passed and then the manager sighed. “We have made a mistake,” he said. He went on “We thought you wanted the turkey for three o’clock.” So dad and I stood there for a moment feeling like a couple of prize turkeys indeed. The manager was very apologetic, presented us with complimentary ice-creams and then offered to deliver a turkey to us at 1500.
So Christmas Dinner became a staged affair. Tomato soup at 1330, turkey at 1545 (the delivery arrived promptly at 1530) and then pudding at 1900 during “It’s A Wonderful Life.” Dieticians will probably be pleased with our staggered dining, although I would much rather have planned such a stagger.
Merry Christmas!