Is this the least festive Christmas

[bumptybum]

Just that really. It seems so to me. Towns near me in an affluent part of Surrey have few to no decorations. The streets in the towns have the bare minimum. The mall has decorations hanging down from the ceiling and that’s it. The shops in the mall have nothing indicating Christmas. I’m not hearing Christmas music everywhere. It just seems so flat. I’s it the economy? Are retailers just not spending on decorations? Even in my house I just put up a tree. No swags or garlands. My friend said she’s only put up a table top tree for the first time ever.

Not like that here! Our village has loads of lights, I went into nearest city at the weekend and it was very busy, lots of Christmas lights and decorations. Doesn’t seem any different to usual to me.

Are you feeling a bit down about Christmas at all? I often find our perception is shaped by how we are feeling about it generally, rather than the other way round like might first appear.

The budget was the worse ever for negative hype and that seems to have depressed Xmas spirit along with the hype over the flu

Lots of councils have no money so they have cut back on the decorations.

I don’t tend to notice the town decorations seeing as they are up for months they are just the norm, nothing special.

We have a tree but that’s it, I just prefer to spend time and money elsewhere than loads of decorations.

Christmas is massive here like always, city centre has a winter wonderland and Christmas markets. Lights everywhere and shops have been heaving for weeks. Only complaints I’ve seen have been on MN

It's like that where I am too, remarkably quiet. Minimum city and shop decorations and, unless I'm going suddenly deaf, not as much Christmas music in the shops this year either.
Others I know have commented on this also.
A lot of people generally don't have as much money to spend this year, shops don't seem as busy, so yeah I've found it definitely low-key this year too.

It’s been festive in my city. Loads of parents took their children to a Christmas production at the theatre yesterday , and the museum was doing a free family activity. I’ve been listening to Chris Rea nonstop this week.

Our town has wonderful lights up in lots of streets and in the main square. There has been a brass band playing in the town every Sat afternoon this December. Several thousand people visited the square for the free carol concert. The markets have opened late evenings and on Sunday when they're normally closed and it's been busy. The library has been full with Christmas themed arts and crafts groups. The Christmas lights tractor run could be heard all over the town. It's felt very festive this year.

Also Surrey. I agree @bumptybum. Perhaps because Surrey County Council is broke and the 12 Boroughs are at sea pending the implementation of the two new unitary authorities.

I'm definitely not feeling Christmassy this year; I don't think it's just me not feeling it, but it could be just my social group. It feels more like a covid Christmas than a normal one somehow... inspite of my efforts to do Christmassy things.

I think it could be in part as most of my work friends have had an awful time this year (threatened and voluntary redundancies, huge workloads, and skeleton staff left to try and keep things going) and are exhausted so we didn't have any Christmas do at work, noone decorated their offices etc, more people are working from home whenever they can, and the year just kind of petered out. My workplace is the major employer in our town so the huge job losses threatened could have a really big impact on the whole community.

But I've also not got (or had) any plans or meet ups with non-work friends either, and none of them have instigated anything. We have no tree, or wreath, and very minimal decorations up, and I've failed to give the house an extra deep clean and tidy in advance, so the decorations we do have don't look as impressive as there is stuff everywhere (also related to crappy work situation).

Hoping the festive mood kicks in a bit soon, DH and I have a smorgasboard in front of Christmassy TV planned for the evening. Even the treat food I've stocked up on isn't looking appealing right now though. I think I might just curl up under a blanket and go to sleep for a bit and hope the world looks a bit better when I wake up...