Advent Calendar Day 7

Window #7

Stopping at Marks and Spencer to pick up some dinner, I discovered the Christmas Radio Times is already on the news stands. This is an important event in the life of the country because Christmas is celebrated by eating and drinking, and watching special TV shows. Once the Radio Times is available, we can block out the TV schedule and plan other events accordingly. As the strap line says, "It just wouldn't be the same without Radio Times!"


This year's 6:00 pm Christmas Day Dr Who will feature Michael Gambon as Scrooge; The Royle Family will be back too at 9:00 pm, but up against Agatha Christie's Poirot. Of course the BBC i-player and similar on-line repeats for other networks makes the world a simpler place for compromise. I am very excited about an update to the wonderful 1970s series Upstairs Downstairs which begins on Boxing Day with episodes on the following two nights.  Keeley Hawes and Ed Stoppard move into the Eaton Square house in the 1930s after the Bellamy's sell up. I haven't had time to look much farther than that yet.

Much of today was devoted to making shopping lists and placing orders for food deliveries for our regular Christmas parties. It's also time for another fruit cake to use up the ends of dried fruits and nuts that have collected since last year. It was a bit of a shock to discover that Christmas Cakes (baked) and Christmas Puddings (steamed) would be classified as dreaded fruit cakes in the States.  Last year I made a fruit bread that was quite good from the dried fruit and nut leftovers, so this year I will try a cake recipe, but I am not ambitious enough to have started it three weeks ago on Stir-Up Sunday so the fruits can macerate for days and the alcohol soaked cake can ripen for weeks.

By the way, another local holiday obsession is what pop single will be the best selling Christmas Number One this year. At the moment I have no idea who the contenders are, but undoubtedly they have something to do with Pop Idols and X-Factors.