What's your 'pet hate' at Christmas?

[bigbaubleeyes]

Mine are: tacky xmas lights on the front of houses and in gardens - where there has been clearly no thought into the overall presentation.

Secondly people who do food shopping in excesive numbers - i.e. its okay to have two people there when you doing a big shop but why 3 or 4 they just add to the congestion of a busy supermarket. I am refering to older childrena and adults - NOT young children who clearly can't be left alone at home.

and.... these people who stop in the middle of an exit to talk - move to one side (this annoys me all year not just at xmas).

I could possibly add tescos to this for selling me mince pies last nite that have a 'best before' date today - but then again ive used this as an excuse to stuff in two whilst typing this!

Oh yes,Turkey! Soooooooo slovenly.
I would cut my throat sooner than let a can of aerosol cream cross my threshold.

although we've never had one I can see the appeal of a turkey crown - a couple of times we've cut the legs off our turkey and fozen them - only to find them in the freezer months later and chuck them

Turkey - our local club turned pub left its lights up all year - we live a reasonable way out of town and its always advertising some 18 to 30 type night as if it was in the middle of the main bar/cubbing area in town - its soooooo phoneix nights we laff at something new everytime we go past!!!!!......

Actually, have you ever studied those Christmas hampers you can buy. They cost about £800, but it's just masses of tins - spam, tinned peaches, a meat pie (how can you put a meat pie in a tin??) and shortbread. How is that Christamassy? Who buys them? Do you get up Christams morning and think mmmmm Spam sandwiches today then!

Yes TG.Then bulked out with loads of cellophane.

who exactly acually likes spam???

A Christmas Day hamper - £225; just £5 a week if you order now!

Turkey - my mam used to get them (we didn't have a great deal so it was her way of saving I guess) but your're absolutley right and she never had anywhere to put all the frozen stuff from the 'meat hamper' and you weren't allowed to touch anything 'ITS FOR CHRISTMAS'.

LOL Hula - do people still actually get these? That just looks such an obvious rip to me - maybe its like the smugness of 'well i've got everything covered, i've ordered a hamper!'

(bless better not show mam this thread!)

I guess they must! I like the way this is broken down into the three meals. Don't even have to meal plan ahead.

Bacon and eggs for breakfast, with tea, juice and toast. Oh and some Bucks Fizz. have to remember own bread though!

Dinner is soup, turkey roast and mince pies, with chocolates to finish. And wine to go with it.

And the evening is obviously the buffet

No planning needed!

Men doing the shopping is a new phenomenon to me. There were loads of men in the supermarket this morning, mostly old men (these can be split into two categories, those who have decided to cook this year and alcoholic vagrant types) and younger men with small children in tow (recipe for disaster). Was asked by an older man from the "cooking this year" category why we don't have "green cherries" in this country as he needs them for a recipe, errrr, do I look like I work in ASDA, no I just want to some flaked almonds!!!

Oooh and rather large American woman with her husband who went rather slowly round the aisles droning on about what they were and weren't going to eat.

You lot are really grouchy today

Where´s your Christmas spirit?

Re: the shops being only closed for 2 days therefore why do people need to do a massive shop???

Well - I agree that the shops aren't shut for long but the point is that I actually don't want to have to go the shops again over Christmas - hence why I'm doing such a big shop now....is that so bad??

1 billion christmas cards are sent in the UK each year - and only 58 million of them are recycled.
83 square kilometres of wrapping paper is ripped from presents.
8 million christamas trees are bought each year - and 1.2 million are recycled
30 - 40% of all festive food is wasted.

What a waste!

No, Hula, there is no wine to go with the lunch
it's Piat bloody Dor!!!!

quite right GB, what a blooming waste, makes me proud to be Bah Humbug

ooo - we eat all our festive food - and we recycle all our cards and wrapping paper too - oh and we've got an artifical tree that we'll keep until it starts falling to pieces

Handbag - amazes me too! The supermarkets are always packed about 4 days before christmas. I was behind a woman the other day they had two trolleys piled high and their bill came to over £250something! Gobsmacked! Mine came to £16ish my last minute tin of sweets, cranberry sauce and secret choc truffle stash......

Mum asked me what I'd got in for New Years lunch? What the hell is she on about? I'll buy that the week in between won't I? Good grief. People are mad, bonkers etc etc.

Can I own up to a "turkey crown" in my fridge - there's only three of us and DS is only just 3 - we won't get through anything bigger.

My pet hates are overcrowded shops. DH went to pick up the hated turkey crown (again) this morning and said it was manic out there. As far as I am concerned whatever we haven't got now we'll go without. The bloody shops will be open again by Tuesday.

re massive shop: we have 4 houseguests for 3 days, so we needed to do a weeks worth of shopping today which will only last us over the festive season

lucky for me dh went solo and brought home the bacon ... aong other things

Rudolphauntmabel - think you might have mis-ready my message - I actually said that I am one of those people who DOES a big shop (last night at 9pm in fact) purely because I really do not want to visit the shops again unless it's an emergency!!

Whats the problem with turkey crowns - never had one?

Turkey crown? Bah, what about all the waste on the bone?
I have a boneless turkey breast joint lovingly prepared by my local butcher, complete with bacon and herb butter!

no waste chez Enid

men in supermarkets has to be my number one bugbear

What I hate most about Christmas is the thought of what it could have been if my family weren't such a grabbing grasping miserable joyless greedy bunch of freeloading fatbags. It's the cruelty and the inevitability of it that gets me...every year I get all sentimental and spiritual about the carols and the Christmas story, and the scent of pine needles and cinnamon, candlelight, the inviting glint of tinsel, the romance of the Christmas lights in dark streets...it's all so beautiful and pushes all those ancient magical-thinking buttons inside me... And every bloody year I have to watch it all turn to sh*t as my family takes a metaphorical blowtorch to my fantasy... within about an hour it's flatulence, indigestion, teenagers bickering over an unhappy game of draughts in one corner, somebody hogging all the brandy in another, somebody stinking up the toilet, somebody else queuing to be next, mum prowling about "offering" to do the washing up and trying to find something to be a victim of. Hundreds of pounds worth of broken and discarded presents everywhere, finally in context and looking like the tat they really are. And dh fast asleep amid a pile of empty beer bottles, even though we discussed how stressful it was going to be, and he promised he wouldn't get pissed and bail out this year....

they won't go until they get some
they won't go until they get some
they won't go until they get some

AAAAAARRRRGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Old men in supermarkets, who are not shopping but having a trip out with their wives, yes.

Modern reconstructed males in a supermarket, doing the shopping whilst their other halves are sipping white wine and polishing off the odd choc, fine.