Coming back five days before Christmas from Jerusalem to the winter wonderland of Sussex, the season seemed twice restored to its lost, proper place - religious and snowy. So what a dreary letdown to turn on the commercial TV channels and see the monstrous hordes of celebrities who for some reason believe that we will take their overpaid, under-worked word that whatever they’re pushing will in some way make our Christmas complete. And what an un-Christian desire this awoke in me to shovel snow - preferably yellow - down their ever-open gobs until they gave it a rest…
Instead of the Nativity, we have the unholy trinity of the Virgin Myleene, Little Baby Jamie and that shambling fool James Nesbit as the one no one’s interested in, to make up the numbers. The Morrison’s advert is annoying, as one person after another who I don’t care about, or recognize, tells me exactly what they want from their ‘fresh’ Yuletide scoff. (Funnily enough, no one mentions wanting fresh e-coli, which Morrison’s famously handed out free to their loyal customers awhile back.) And the one I do recognize, Denise van Outen, immediately makes me think ‘Come off it - you were shagging Gary Glitter when you were 17 and he was 50. Please don’t pretend you like ‘fresh meat’!’
Generally, the only cheer-making TV ad development of recent years is that Jennifer Saunders is now paired with the gorgeous Joanna Lumley rather than the gorging Dawn French. As a long-time French-hater, I’m pleased beyond belief that we no longer have to stomach the sight of Dawnie scarfing up chocolate oranges by the score every Chrimbo. I suppose she’s been disappeared from our seasonal screens because she eventually came to be seen as a rather depressing Ghost of Christmas Dinners past, present and future - a terrible warning of what will happen to us all if we don’t exercise restraint whenever the brandy butter comes our way.
And as for that fat-tongued fool Jamie Oliver’s Christmas ads for Sainsbury’s, I positively hug myself with glee when recalling that he was heckled to within an inch of his life when he filmed in picturesque Hebden Bridge. Rightly so for peddling Sainsbury’s in a place where small shops are, for once, the genuine lifeblood of a place as opposed to the usual dives where you can buy a rusty tin of cling peaches for a fiver if you’re lucky.
We often hear celebrities moaning about being bothered and harassed by the public - ‘civilians’, as that witless skank Liz Hurley once called us. But from where I was sitting this Christmas, it looked very much the other way round.
