Yesterday, like most of the last 20 or more, we spent on our own. We have no immediate family — no parents left and we’re both only children. Our very elderly neighbour, who Noreen often pops in to see, is unfortunately in hospital. All our other friends were (rightly) engrossed in the bosoms of their families.
This was good as it meant we could do exactly as we pleased, so we made it up as we went along … starting with getting up late and fiddling about for the rest of the morning while drinking tea.
A light lunch of smoked salmon sandwiches and a large gin & tonic (for me), Bacardi & coke (for Noreen).
After lunch we sat and opened presents — mostly books and booze. In fact enough booze to float a battleship. This was accompanied by playing “hunt the kibble” amongst the discarded wrapping paper with the two youngest cats. Then we spent a merry hour organising the discarded paper for recycling.
For many years we’ve had Christmas Dinner in the evening, and so it was this year. Roast crown of turkey.** Garlic roast potatoes; roast Jerusalem artichokes; steamed sprouts. Sausage, sage & onion stuffing. Shallot sauce. Washed down with the obligatory bottle of Bollinger. Naturally enough the cats assisted with the turkey!
We never have Christmas Pudding these days as Noreen isn’t keen and we’d just as soon have a good stuff of the main course. However I have bought a couple of individual Christmas Puds this year as I quite like it; I shall enjoy them over the coming days — I’ve even been known to eat Christmas Pud for breakfast. In fact Christmas Pudding was a bit of a family tradition when I was a kid. My mother used to make her own, and always made several: one for Christmas, one for New Year, one for my birthday in January, one for my father’s birthday in March and sometimes one for Easter!
After Christmas Dinner we sat about doing very little and sampling some of the new spirits and liqueurs until it was time to clear up and head for bed.
So yes, we had a day doing exactly as we wanted, ie. eat, drink and be idle. Not a minute of television was watched, nor radio listened to. And the phone didn’t even ring.
Isn’t that how holidays should be? Relaxing.

** Turkey Crown. If you like turkey (we do, but not every year) this is a good wheeze which takes about 5 minutes with a good knife and some kitchen scissors. Buy the size of bird you usually would; this saves you from weeks of eating up turkey. We buy a whole small-ish bird from our good butcher who specialises in free-range, humanely reared meat. (I then butcher the bird: remove the legs; then the wings; now cut horizontally through the ribcage and remove the spine. (If you need a video of how to do this, have a hunt on YouTube; different butchers have slightly different methods.) This leaves you with just the breast (crown), on the bone, which will be about half the weight of the bird and so cook faster; roast according to your favourite method. Bag the legs, wings, spine and put them in the freezer for use during the year.