The “one week to go” klaxon sounded yesterday and heralded our second and therefore now annual traditional trip to the Tron pantomime.
I’ve eaten several M&S Turkey Feast sandwiches through this month, but unusually for me I hadn’t been feeling very Christmassy at all until yesterday. A work trip to sunny Coatbridge meant a quick dash into Asda for lunch as my meeting ran on, and there were the local primary school kids singing carols. Secret Santa arrived while I was out, I managed to leave work a little early and I felt the start of just a little Christmas spirit starting to build. My Radio Times is sitting next to me waiting for me to have a proper flick through so surely Christmas can’t be far away.
The panto was excellent - it was a very Glaswegian take on Cinderella with an all female cast with all the good bits of panto (singing along, shouting ‘Oh no she isn’t’ etc, laughing until you cry) and none of the bad (some creepy kids TV ‘personality’ making inappropriate and/or outdated jokes at an audience member’s expense). My favourite bit was probably right at the end when I looked along our row and saw my friends singing along with All I Want for Christmas is You as the cast took their final bows. It’s a small theatre with live music as part of the production and we’ll definitely be back next year.
So. I’ve done the Tron panto.
I have one more proper day left in the office, and then I have the whole Christmas week off this year. I’ll play a Facebook live concert on Christmas Eve (details at the bottom of this post) and at the Balmoral on Christmas Day to share some Christmas music with others, but here are a few of the other ways I’ll be celebrating this year.
Eating - I spoke about the importance of food in my celebrations yesterday. Smoked salmon, crackers, pigs in blankets and mince pies are the absolute essentials.
Drinking gin! A couple of weeks after our wedding, we finally got up to Pixel Spirits in Ballachulish to use our gin school voucher we’d bought in April at the Gintyre festival in Campbeltown. We spent a day learning how to distil our own gin, including choosing what to flavour it with. We went for a Christmassy mix of secret ingredients including frankincense, and we were astonished by just how much we enjoyed the day and how good our gin was. We spent the next day walking in Glencoe, and precariously dangled from a path to get some pine needles for a garnish.
Reading - I have a copy of Training for Uphill Athletes by Kilian Jornet, Steve House and Scott Johnston that I can’t wait to read. I’ve had my eye on the Elton John book for a while, and then I saw Flea from the Red Hot Chili Peppers has written one as well and that sounds good too. There’s a Bruce Lee book that I’ve wanted to read for ages so I’m hopeful of getting through that one too.
Watching lots of TV – my Christmas essentials include musicals (High Society, Sound of Music, Mary Poppins, and my favourite Thoroughly Modern Millie which is rarely on), selected costume dramas (I see the Colin Firth/Jennifer Ehle version of Pride and Prejudice is on which I’m excited about despite having the DVD), as much Harry Potter as possible, and slightly bizarrely the film Babe is an important part of my Christmas. I’ll howl like a baby but that’s all part of it.
I have a lot of research to do to see if and how I can make a Fringe show happen next year, so thanks to Glasgow harpist and Fringe veteran Sophie Rocks, I’ve lots of good stuff to think about for that. While I’m off work, I want to spend some serious time investigating.
All of those things (apart from the Balmoral) involve wearing pyjamas which is wonderful (and another important part of Christmas for me), but I also need some fresh air in amongst all that, and so I’ll be out running starting to build my fitness back up for next year, and something I’m really looking forward to is our second annual and therefore traditional Christmas hill day.
Last year three of us spent a cold but stunning afternoon walking up Conic Hill - a tiny hill by our normal standards, and one that two of us have run past on numerous occasions but we had never diverted off the West Highland Way to climb up to the top. We decided that was the day for us and we were totally spoiled with a cloud inversion over Loch Lomond, a stunning winter sunset and an excellent lunch in the pub afterwards. This year we’re planning to be the other side of the Loch for some more new hills.
The clouds behind us are actually hiding Loch Lomond beneath them. Such a special day with two of my panto buddies.
Lastly, a reminder that at 9pm on Christmas Eve I’ll be live-streaming a short cosy Christmas concert via Facebook.
The link to all the information is here - I hope to ‘see’ you there!
