If you’re reading this, you’ll realise that my Christmas letter has gone digital this year. It’s still the same 2,000 words of self-referential drivel, but now it’s illustrated with photographs and most importantly, it’s saved me a lot of printing.
As I write, our house could be described as being in a state of accidental chaos. Furniture and belongings are scattered randomly across the wrong rooms because we had to completely empty one room after a minor flood in September. A shower unit in the upper floor developed a leak and by the time we noticed, the water had so damaged the ceiling so that that it needed minimal persuasion for it to fall down.
To add more drama, I then discovered a huge wasp’s nest tucked away in the eaves! It was vacant at the time so it was easy to remove it in one piece, but I’m glad I didn’t know it was there when it was tenanted, and I’m quite sure the occasional guests who slept just a few feet from it would share that sentiment. It was beautifully made, like a papier mache sculpture which could’ve been shortlisted for the Turner Prize.
Fast forward to today (late November): the shower’s been replaced, the ceiling repaired, and we’re now working up the emotional strength needed for some pre-Christmas painting. And then we’ll be back to where we were ten weeks ago.
Over the summer I finally fitted a gate in the back garden – a far bigger triumph than it sounds, because it’s a proper field gate. It’s been on my to-do list since 2012, when I planted a hedge with a gate-sized gap in it and then spent the next decade ignoring it until eventually it reached the top of the priority list.
I’m proud to say that it’s completely stock-proof… for farm animals. Sadly, deer aren’t farm animals, and they continue to treat the garden like an all-you-can-eat salad bar. I thought I’d foxed them this year by installing some temporary six-foot netting, but they still found a way in. I’m not certain how, but I’m sure they didn’t jump over and I’m confident they didn’t burrow under, so I think they must’ve pushed through the hedge. So a winter job is to improve the fortifications through some subtle hedge-laying.
In a continuing bid to appear vaguely modern, I bought a new phone in January. I didn’t want one, but Android made a change to something and in doing so, degraded the battery on my Google phone to such an extent that they offered a £100 incentive for me to buy a new one. That went remarkably smoothly, as did my recent switch from O2 to Lebara. The phone is basically the same as before but shinier, and the new provider feels exactly like the old one so it seems like this is just change for change’s sake – technology’s favourite pursuit. [I need to change the subject: my grumpiness is showing!]
Geraldine and I recently joined a quiz team with some friends where phones are (quite rightly) outlawed. We never come close to winning – not even in a generous, “well done for trying” sort of way – but it’s good fun, and we are a sufficiently diverse group that one of us can usually offer some kind of answer. It’s generally wrong, but at least we say it with confidence. I’m not bad on sciency things, but don’t ask me anything about sport, mythology or films. And it seems I’m pretty good with acronyms, getting LASER and SCUBA correct last week, but none of us could get UNESCO, despite knowing what the organisation did.
This year several things conspired to remind us that we’re getting old. In April I began drawing my state pension and received my bus pass whilst in June Geraldine threw a dance party to celebrate a significant birthday. The party was great! We hired the local Community Hall and dance teacher Shirley came to put Geraldine’s friends through a gruelling workout. I didn’t take part, sensibly choosing to take non-dancing partners on a walk around the village returning 90 minutes later to be greeted by twenty glowing and smiley-faced dancers, all reaching for their water bottles.
Geraldine dances several times a week and she loves it, but she hasn’t converted me to the pastime. My hobby is still cycling, and specifically, cycling in new areas. My desire to pedal through all 48 English ceremonial counties came tantalisingly close this year. I now have just two left – Norfolk and City of London (yes, it is a county!) – but these will need to wait until 2026. This year, I ticked off a further eight counties, six of them on a 530-mile tour of the Southeast in June. (If you’re really bored over Christmas, you can read the account of that trip here.)
In May I enjoyed a week cycling in Mallorca with eleven friends, but the weather was a bit iffy and on the last afternoon the torrential rain was proper ‘build-an-ark’ stuff – so wet that it ruined my bike camera, providing a watertight reason to replace it.
Good thing I did replace the camera. A few weeks later near Southport, the camera captured a motorist driving appallingly. Lancashire Constabulary have a facility whereby video footage of a motoring offence can be submitted, so I sent a file to them in June. Unknown to me, a motorist had witnessed the same incident and sent off their own dashcam footage. Last month, I heard that the case is going to court and the driver is likely to lose his licence. I don’t expect to be called to court, but there’s a chance.
Early in the year, Geraldine and I watched a TV programme featuring the gardens at Drummond Castle in Perthshire and were so impressed that we booked a holiday specifically to visit them. On the way, we stopped in Lockerbie to visit the Garden of Remembrance and pay our respects to the victims of the Pan Am Flight 103 disaster.
We stayed two nights in Stirling and two in Inveraray, but the second part of the trip was underwhelming (if I’m being polite) since the weather was miserable even by Scottish standards. This was brought home to me when, whilst sheltering from the rain in the Cruachan hydroelectric power station (which was fascinating), we were told that “we are importing a substantial amount of solar energy just now”. I looked out at the drizzle and wondered how, before realising that most of the UK was basking in beautiful sunshine.
When we first arrived at the hotel in Stirling, we parked in a car park at the rear and everything was fine until I walked out of the front door and looked up the street… to see the hotel I thought I’d booked 100 yards away. I’d found my preferred hotel online and then somehow I managed to book a different one on the same street. (I refer you to the earlier paragraph on getting old). It didn’t really matter since both hotels were of a similar standard, but sadly, that standard was much lower than we expected – or paid for.
Drummond Castle gardens were truly spectacular and the weather on that day was fine so we had a wonderful day out. Looking back, we enjoyed the Scottish trip but it was memorable for largely the wrong reasons.
I am still acting as the booking secretary for the Brindle Historical Society, a role I’ve undertaken since 2019, but this is my last year. I don’t dislike the job, but I feel that I’m becoming predictable with the speakers I’m bringing in so I want someone else to have a go. I’ve completed the 2026 programme, so whoever takes over will have all year to plan their own exciting line-up. I’ve also had an article about the society accepted for publication in the winter edition of Lancashire Archives magazine, but since the magazine is only published in hard copy, I can’t share it; you’ll just have to imagine how fascinating it is.
Geraldine and I remain in demand for cat- and dog-sitting, though we tend to job share. Gee mainly helps out Laurence with Maple, his golden retriever and I am in demand in Sheffield looking after Felix, Emily’s cat. I take the opportunity to combine cat-sitting with exploring new cycling routes, and when Gee is on Maple duty I often cycle over to Longridge for the day.
Laurence and Pip’s wedding plans are progressing well, with a venue booked for September 2026 and official invitations will soon be sent out. We spent a lovely day with Pip’s parents at Askham Hall near Penrith in October where we were shown around the venue and everyone was able to ask questions. Geraldine’s main concern were the plum trees by the path between the ceremony room and the accommodation. When we visited, squashed windfalls carpeted the paths – very undesirable for anyone walking along wearing a long white frock that brushed the floor. I need to remember to take a yard brush since I can guess who will be detailed to sweep the offending fruit from the paths on the big day.
We recently managed to off-load a substantial part of our loft contents to Emily and Laurence since they are now both settled in houses with lofts of their own. We filled a car and delivered toys and school books that we’ve stored for almost two decades. I learned that Emily also coveted my old hi-fi (or what’s left of it) so I set it up for her in Sheffield and gave her a crash course in the lost art of handling LPs. Sadly, I disposed of most of my record collection many years ago when vinyl was about as fashionable as drain cleaner. Now I see that it’s back in demand, with never a week passing without some singer on the Graham Norton show proudly brandishing their latest vinyl release. I gave Emily most of my remaining records, holding onto a few for nostalgic reasons but since I now have no record deck, amplifier or speakers, there is nothing I can do apart from hold them and read the sleeves like some wistful museum curator.
(As I write this, I’m in Sheffield on cat-sitting duty, writing Christmas cards and listening to old records. It’s nostalgia central here.)
In spring, I received a comment through my website from a lady in Canada who spotted the ‘Photos from 1967’ section. She’d grown up in Whittle-le-Woods in the early 60s before her family moved abroad, and before long we discovered we had a great deal in common and indeed we are related! Our grandparents were siblings making us second cousins. This revelation sparked a lovely ongoing correspondence with photos, family trees and a trove of shared memories.
In late May we caught up with a group of friends who went to school with Geraldine. We have always kept loosely in touch but since one of the couples lives in Jersey, we occasionally book some accommodation and spend a few days together. The ladies reminisce endlessly about their schooldays (we even had a full-throated rendition of the school song on one walk) but the blokes can’t reminisce, never having attended a girls’ grammar school. We all get on really well despite our varied backgrounds and we now talk about pensions and how much better things were when we were young. This year, we booked a couple of nights at the Falcon Manor hotel in Settle and enjoyed lovely walks and excellent food.
My letter wouldn’t be complete without updating you on some of the concerts I’ve seen. I’ve discovered a wonderful venue in Sheffield (well, it’s in Nether Edge, whose rather posh residents don’t consider themselves as Sheffielders). Café#9 is a coffee shop by day, but on many evenings it doubles as a bijou music venue. It’s only licenced to hold 40 making it my perfect sort of place. I went there in September whilst cat sitting (I travelled there using my bus pass, naturally) and Gee and I have booked to see one of our favourite singers there in February.
We haven’t abandoned our former favourite venue, the Settle Victoria Hall – we saw Plumhall there in the summer. They were performing a warm-up gig ahead of supporting Fairport Convention on the main stage at the Cropredy Festival.
I think my favourite concert of the year was seeing O’Hooley and Tidow at the Leeds City Varieties Music Hall. We splashed out on a £2 premium to get the best seats in the house – a box just above where Leonard Sachs once presided, if you remember The Good Old Days. This was the fourth time seeing them, each venue becoming progressively more grand as their fame increased. This was their So Long for Now tour, so it may be a while before we see them again. They played songs chronologically from their 15-year collaboration.
If you want to hear more about some of the gigs I’ve attended, you can click here, though I suspect most of you have quietly tuned out by now. In which case I’ll sign off and hope your Christmas is every bit as pleasant and calm as the TV adverts suggest. Wishing you happiness, warmth, and socks you’ll actually wear.
One reply on “2025 Christmas letter ”
I was just reading your Christmas letter, and I realized that one of the high points of my year- was finding out we were second cousins. And another one, was my son singing a Van Morrisson song “Moondance” at a very small drop-in-and- jam local jazz club. Now, I’ll have to remember all the other good things which tend to get overwhelmed by cussedness.. and yes, to the Turner Prize for the WASP nest! Make it bigger and it’s The Tate turbine hall for you next year. Also- I love the 5-barred gate! which is the strange route whereby I “found” you :). HAPPY CHRISTMAS and I am “post”ing actual mail across the pond too.