Getting things boxed off!

Yesterday, Christmas Day, I decided not to run, thinking that I had too many things to do. The family was coming round for Christmas dinner and there was stuff to be organised in the kitchen. Amazingly, by midday all was under control and we were able to go out for a Christmas Day walk before the gang arrived en masse. Typically the sun, which had been showing its face quite nicely until then, went behind a cloud as soon as we stepped out of the door and remained there until not long after we arrived back home.

Lots of food and drink was consumed. Presents were exchanged. Everyone seemed content with their lot. Nobody was nasty to anyone. No Christmas Day squabbles in our house. We even managed an after dinner quiz which passed off most amicably, probably because there were no prizes.

Today, Boxing Day, I looked out and found that the white stuff had come back. The weatherman had predicted that the rain clouds sweeping across the country would shed their load as snow above a certain northerly line across the country. I thought it was further north than we are but clearly this was not so. As it appeared to be fairly dry at that point, I donned my running gear and headed out. Time to run off some of yesterday’s excesses. Five minutes up the road the sleet started to fall! So it goes! 

Boxing Day! One explanation I came across for the name says that traditionally this was the day that the servants in big houses received their Christmas Box, a present of some kind to compensate for having had to work on Christmas Day perhaps. But I expect they also had to work on Boxing Day. What compensation was there for that?

In our house we should call it un-boxing day: the day for taking presents out of boxes and finding a new home for them. Among the things to unbox is a fancy teapot, purchased by our daughter to replace the one which refuses to pour well and which traps the teabags in the spout! There is also the standing desk, purchased for Phil from IKEA so that he can work at the computer standing up if he so chooses. We were astounded to find that this piece of furniture required a screwdriver instead of the usual Allen key!

 Standing desk erected, my job now is to strip the remaining meat off the turkey crown we attacked yesterday (how do people manage an entire enormous turkey?) and decide what fancy dishes to concoct.

It’s conceivable that some of it might end up in a box in the freezer!