0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.
Some years ago, just before Xmas, my Mrs insisted that the oven should be cleaned before the Turkey and so on were cooked.Eeee how I hate that job!!! But 'she who must be obeyed' got her way.A couple of days later, 't oven was ignited and 't Turkey prepared. But 't oven was not performing too well. Turning it off and letting it cool for a while (always a good prelude to this) I stuck my head in and realised that some residue of the oven cleaner was clogging the gas jets.I stuck a magnetic rechargeable torch on the inside back panel, so I could see what I was doing, and with some hot water cleaned this residue from the manifold.With 't oven now working properly, in went 't Turkey and we sat down for a well deserved coffee break. After about an hour, I noticed it was snowing..... BLACK SNOW...... INSIDE THE HOUSE. 'Strange', I thought and began to investigate this previously unknown phenomena as the Mrs looked around the room in amazement. It appeared to be issuing from the kitchen, more precisely the vents of the oven."OH!!! BUGGER!!!" I exclaimed."What? What?" Enquired 'er indoors "What is it?" She further enquired."I've left the *^*^ing torch in the ^*^*ing oven!!!"
I remember, at last, been trying to squeeze this out of the old grey matter for ages.Oberhamersbach.
The last Xmas event I have to tell you about is last year’s fateful episode.Firstly I must point out that a couple of years ago, ‘er indoors booked us on a November Egyptian holiday. A 7 day Nile cruise followed by 7 days at a Red Sea resort. Less than a week before we were due to depart on this adventure, the tour operator went down the plughole. After a frantic search I managed to re-book us with a similar holiday with another tour operator. Fortunately the original operator was ATOL bonded, so we got our money back.And so to Xmas 2007. Once again, ‘er indoors booked us for a Christmas Holiday, this time the destination was to be the picturesque town of Schwarzwald in Germany’s Black Forest.‘Wunderbar!’, I thought, not only a great place to spend Xmas, but also a good opportunity for me to play with my new (as it was then) Nikon. I haven’t been to that part of the world for nigh on 30 years. We would be enjoying four days of German hospitality, not to mention bier and festive nosh, in a small family run hotel. After the previous year’s fiasco at the Indian restaurant, this was indeed something to look forward to.I had my clothes ready, in the spare bedroom, to pack into a small suitcase and had persuaded the Mrs to go easy on her choice of attire to take with us. Indeed so successful had I been in this, that she had narrowed it down to just one mammoth sized trunk instead of the usual 40 ft. Container.Dawn broke on the penultimate day before our departure. I arose from my slumber and put on the kettle. It didn’t fit, so I put on a dressing gown instead and used the kettle to boil some water for a cup of tea.I turned on the radio just in time to hear ‘.... tour operator has gone into liquidation with some 40,000 booked holidays, many of which were Christmas and New Year breaks due to start today and tomorrow. A spokesman for ABTA said......” I turned off the radio and turned on the BBC 24hr news on TV.Yep, ‘er indoors had booked another winner. The tour operator had just gone down the swanny, leaving us with nowt in t’ cupboard for Xmas. When I told the Mrs, she shot down the stairs and watched the news in disbelief. After a string of expletives, she picked up the Sunday paper and started searching for alternative arrangements. “PUT THAT DOWN!” I demanded, “You’ve already put the kybosh on two tour operators, you’re sending any more to Davy Jones’s locker.”We and our daughter and her husband, who were to be joining us in our Black Forest excursion, spent the rest of the day franticly buzzing around packed supermarkets trying to stock up on Xmas fare and spent the holiday at our daughter’s home in Newport Pagnell, a nice little town, but hardly a substitute for the Black Forest.Again, we got our money back, this time through the ABTA bond. But I couldn’t help but feel sorry for those poor hoteliers who had stocked up for their Xmas guests. Around 8,000 Xmas & New Year breaks went tits-up.
I remember when I was in New Zealand for Christmas some years ago. We were staying north of Aukland and the temperature was in the 90sF. On Christmas eve we went to a pub with an outdoor bar and there was a singer performing Christmas songs. I thought it somewhat ironic that we were sitting around in our shorts in the late evening with the crooner singing "I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas"CHristmas dinner on the beach was nice, though.
Quote from: DoctorBeaver on 16/12/2008 18:33:27I remember when I was in New Zealand for Christmas some years ago. We were staying north of Aukland and the temperature was in the 90sF. On Christmas eve we went to a pub with an outdoor bar and there was a singer performing Christmas songs. I thought it somewhat ironic that we were sitting around in our shorts in the late evening with the crooner singing "I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas"CHristmas dinner on the beach was nice, though. Lol..Lol.. that is cool..I bet it was nice... what did you all eat at the beach?