It is now obligatory, on visiting a Christmas market, to pronounce it ‘hell’, ‘hellish’ and that Beelzebub himself was operating the churro stall. Here are some key differences worth noting:A distinct lack of torture
Every vision of hell involves torture of the medieval kind. At a Christmas market the pain is limited to crowds, aching feet and paying 25 quid for a fucking candle. The distinction between this and having a hot poker thrust up your arse is pronounced. If you sincerely can’t tell, have a think about your grasp on reality and sexual options.You can’t get out of going to hell with a lame excuse
Flu, a decorator coming round, needing to plump the cushions; there are plenty of believable excuses for not going to a Christmas market. You can’t fib your way out of hell. Medieval theologians would really have fucked up on the ‘terrifying threat’ aspect if you could just excuse yourself because you’re expecting an Ocado delivery.90 minutes is not eternity
An hour and a half at a Christmas market – nobody has ever lasted longer – isn’t comparable with infinity. It may feel like that, as you trail behind your partner while she searches for a present for her sister and the same brownie stall seems to roll past again and again, but that’s an illusion caused by how boring and repetitive it is.No ironic punishments for sins
Satan loves irony. He’s always making gluttons eat tables of delicious food until they burst, or fornicators bone each other raw. At a Christmas market the only irony is you wasting your hard-earned money on shit. It isn’t a cuttingly ironic to blow a day’s earnings on hand-knitted Austrian bedsocks. It’s just stupid.Christmas markets have no confusing system of morality
Hell is where bad people go, but also good people who aren’t Christians, despite a supposedly loving God giving you no rational reason to believe in him. The confusion engendered by a Christmas market is on a much smaller scale, such as wondering how they can charge £12 for a portion of chips in instant gravy and call it ‘poutine’.No demons
Christmas markets feature no demons whatsoever. Admittedly this is just as well, because grudgingly handing over £18 for two hot chocolates lightly graced by Baileys is bad enough. What cackling demons would charge to pour hot lead into your stomach through a long funnel doesn’t bear thinking about.Hell has no unexpected wins
Hell is a daily grind of being torn limb from limb, stints in the lake of fire and flaming pitchfork violations. There really isn’t a hidden upside. However going to a Christmas market can prove worthwhile, like when your wife decides a wooden cuckoo clock is what she’s always craved and it’s £80 so that’s your shopping done. Nice one.
Of course.
Of course. (The Man and I have a running joke about traditional long case clocks which comes close to cuckoo clocks)
ReplyDeleteBig difference, in my eyes! I love a grandfather clock; not so much one with a bloody cuckoo popping out of it... Jx
DeleteMy lands...that reminds me of my youth. My grandmother had a huge German hand craved cuckoo clock, it was actually very ornate... With two birds that popped out, and the chords had pinecone weights at the end you pulled to keep it in time.
DeleteIt is a very German thing to have. Jx
DeleteOMG Maddie my parents had the same clock! See comment below! Holy crap we are cuckoo clock twins.
DeleteYou have my sympathies. Jx
DeleteI'd LOVE a long-case! Cuckoo? No bloody way, although I have seen some very nice ones...then the effect was ruined by a clacky cuckoo!
ReplyDeleteIndeed. The horror! Jx
DeleteMy parents had a vile Black Forest cuckoo clock with twin iron pinecones hung on long, long chairs for...I dunno, winding or something. As a wee child the loud ticking and the startling chimes -not to mention the ridiculous thingies popping in and out - drove me to distraction, and so I reefed baxk and forth on the pinecones until the bitch broke for good. For all my parents ever knew it just passed away, as things do.
ReplyDeleteHehehehe.
Kill the cuckoo!! Jx
DeleteI bought a cuckoo clock from Debenhams closing down sale, it's white in finest melamine. I was forced to enter Menkind today at the York Designer Outlet just to get away from the piped music, Stevie Nicks "singing" Silent Night, after a few minutes I made Carmen go outside the shop to make sure the noise had stopped. It was awful.
ReplyDeleteI think I'd run for the hills at Stevie Nicks "singing" Silent Night as well!
DeleteRoll on Boxing Day, when all that fucking sleigh-bell crap ends... Jx
Did you think that this post would turn out to be all about cuckoo clocks?!!!
ReplyDeleteI always wanted one.
Sx
It's an interesting twist... Jx
DeleteI don't know how I feel about cuckoo clocks, but I did think that the last difference said "Hell has no unexpected wine". If that was really the case, then Hell is more hellish than I could ever imagine!
ReplyDeleteI hope it has gin. Jx
DeleteFor the love of Clock !
ReplyDeleteThis is the first time I have ever disagreed with the Mash.
Christmas Markets, German or otherwise are anathema.
I'm not a fan, either. Mulled wine and gingerbread men? You can keep 'em. Jx
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