On the 4th day before Christmas... the Christmas number one is announced
Well, what do you know? The 2003 Christmasnumber one is Mad World by Gary Jules. Excellent! I was championing this audio jewel on diamond geezer as far back as October last year, noting "Somebody release it please - it could be huge." I'm well chuffed finally to have been proved correct. This spine-tingling Tears For Fears cover version first came to public attention over the closing credits of the film Donnie Darko and has been track 1 on my mp3 player ever since, but the song remained resolutely unreleased until this week. Gary has just beaten The Darkness into second place and (ha!) those bland Pop Idols into fifth. It's also the second time a cover version of a 1982 New Romantic classic has topped the charts at Christmas (see also Only You by the Flying Pickets in 1983). Mad.
To celebrate this rare triumph of taste over tat, here's the diamond geezerChristmas Number Ones Lyrics Quiz. Can you identify these Christmas number one records from their lyrics? Every Christmas number one from the last thirty years (1973-2003) appears once on the list. (Why not annoy the family and print out the quiz for use over Christmas?)
All answers now in the comments box, or by clicking on the question numbers.
1) any way the wind blows 2) a ray of hope flickers in the sky 3) look for a rainbow in every storm 4) no dark sarcasm in the classroom 5) the reddest rose I'll always bring you 6) what about sunrise? what about rain? 7) do the fairies keep him sober for a day 8) it'll be cold so cold without you to hold 9) digging and mixing, having so much fun 10) it's the season, love and understanding 11) with logs on the fire and gifts on the tree 12) nights when we sang like a heavenly choir 13) I want a man not a boy who thinks he can 14) the beat of the drum goes round and round 15) long time ago in bethlehem so the holy bible say 16) bittersweet memories, that is all I'm taking with me 17) throw your arms around the world at Christmas time 18) five years later on you've got the world at your feet 19) she always is a friend to you and she's a friend to me 20) I believe in angels, something good in everything I see 21) have you ever seen a girl for whom your soul you'd give 22) the dreams in which I’m dying are the best I’ve ever had 23) wonder if you'll understand it's just the touch of your hand 24) candlelight and soul forever, dream of you and me together 25) little things I should have said and done I never took the time 26) now we have been through the harvest winter has truly begun 27) I'd like to go back one time on a roller coaster ride when life was just a game 28) don't you know we've come too far now just to go and try to throw it all away 29) although he's unconventional in hue his philosophy of life will steer him through 30) we drop into a quiet little place and have a drink or two and then I go and spoil it all
On the 5th day before Christmas... it's the last posting date for first class mail
It's your last chance today to send a small piece of folded cardboard to somebody you've not communicated with since last Christmas. Better hurry then, because the last collection round your way is probably at noon-ish. Miss the deadline and your festive greeting will be stockpiled in a huge warehouse until mid-January, by which time the intended recipient will no doubt have crossed you off their Christmas card list for good.
It was Sir Henry Cole who sent the world's first Christmas card exactly 160 years ago, using the new Penny Post. Sir Henry thought his friends would appreciate a three-panelled card depicting a smiling family bearing the inscription 'A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to You'. He did not, so far as we know, send them pictures of an obese Santa stuck down a chimney, a robin smothered in glitter or Homer Simpson pretending to be a reindeer. As a reward for his good taste, Sir Henry went on to become the first director of the Victoria and Albert Museum.
The Royal Mail now moves over a billion Christmas cards each December. That's because there's still nothing to beat receiving a real card through the post rather than some feeble virtual greeting, not least because it's very hard to cover your mantelpiece with emails. And the annual Christmas card tally remains the indisputable annual barometer of your popularity and social standing. If you receive more cards than you send, your place in society is assured. However, send out more than you receive and the level of your insignificance is made explicitly clear. (Note to self: sent 67, received 23, give up now).
Each year friendships are extended by the exchange of Christmas cards. People we once knew, echoes of former lives, their continuing existence is confirmed by the arrival of a small envelope. If you're really lucky there's one of those thrilling "What a year it's been..." family newsletters tucked inside, full of births, holidays and operation scars. This means that you never have to pick up the phone and ring the other person because you know that everything you'll ever need to know will be safely documented in next year's missive. Of course, the other person's card always arrives the day after you sent yours, so the brief scribbled note inside your card (Congratulations!) can only react to last year's news (I became a grandfather...) rather than the latest bombshell (my wife left me and the doctor had some very bad news...).
So let's all remember Sir Henry Cole this Christmas because it's thanks to him that we remember everyone else. Although I suspect there'd be a whole load more forests still standing if he'd never bothered.
Congratulations, you are the 50000th visitor to this website... ...and number 50000 arrived from here, about half an hour ago. Fifty thousand visitors eh? Thank you all for coming, thank you all for reading, and thanks to all those of you who link here. Must be a good time for my semi-regular 'league table' of top linking blogs, ordered by volume of visitors clicking here from there:
It's disappointing that three of the top 10 have stopped blogging, two veryrecently, but reassuring to see some fine new entries creeping into the top 20 (at 15, 18 and 19). A special hello to the blogs that appear in the list because their owners have been making regular daily visits here for months and months - thanks, much appreciated. And, if you're interested, here's how the chart continues: 21222324252627282930. Point, click, and read. (No call girls knowingly featured)
On the 6th day before Christmas... the Blue Peter Advent Crown is almost fully lit
5.00 Jaunty version of 'Barnacle Bill' complete with snowflakes, distant sleighbells and disturbingly moden graphics. 5.01 Hello and welcome to a very special pre-Christmas edition of Blue Peter. Later in the show GrinningBoy1 will be telling you all about what pandas do at Christmas, and OverexcitedGirl2 will be jumping off a flying sleigh without a parachute. But first... 5.02 Oh look, our Bring and Buy sale totaliser is still flashing less than halfway up the totaliser. Never mind, we always hit our target in time for the first show of the New Year. In the meantime please keep selling your old tat for our appeal, and you might want to start saving up your stamps and silver paper for next Christmas just in case. 5.05 Here's a lovely decoration you can make out of an old cereal packet, three plastic lemonade bottles and some pipecleaners, except that somehow the ones you make at home never look quite as good as ours do they? 5.09 And don't forget to save all the excess glitter on some newspaper so that you can reuse it again next year. 5.10 Look at all the lovely Christmas cards you've sent us this year. We're going to pretend they're all artistic masterpieces, particularly this one obviously drawn by 5-year-old Tim's Dad. 5.12 Here's GrinningBoy2 with one of those stories of days gone by that ValerieSingleton always used to do so much better. 5.17 And you can read more about this dull Victorian woman in our latest Blue Peter annual. Why not try to collect the full set? 5.18 Now I'm going to light the third candle on our Advent crown. If you're going to make one, do remember not to use those infammable plastic coathangers won't you? We've put the instructions on our website, just to try to make this 1950s design appear somehow modern and trendy. 5.20 Here are lots of boring objects from an exhibition in a London museum that you can get into free if you're a Blue Peter badge winner, although we realise that's a fat lot of good if you live in Kilmarnock. 5.23 Don't forget to join us next week when we'll be singing our favourite Blue Peter carol (odd years Hark The Herald, even years O Come All Ye Faithful) accompanied by the near-death Chalk Farm Salvation Army Band, trying to look enthusiastic as we open a few miserable presents round a Christmas cake made of dog food. 5.24 Credits roll over cute shot of Kari and Oke the cats, yawning.
Congratulations to the winners of the Guardian's second British blog awards:
Best design: The Big Smoker - designed by two London non-smokers, includes both stuff and things.
Best use of photography: NYCLondon.com - a showcase of sharp black and white snaps.
Under 18: A Teenager Blogs - about life and Leeds and gigs and footie and life and and crisps.
Best specialist: The Diary of Samuel Pepys - unfortunately Mr Pepys is unable to be here to claim his award.
Best written: belle de jour - the diary of a London callgirl, it's BlogWorld's very own red light district.
Judges' Award: LinkMachineGo - an impressive list of webby links, with an emphasis on the comic.
Expect a heateddebate...
On the 7th day before Christmas... here's the Underground Christmas story
1 One day, while Mary was still slepping, the Angel of the Lord visited her. Mary fell to her Neasden looked up. The Angel told her she Woodford have a baby who'd be Wapping important. 2 Mary-lebone and husband Joseph had to go Upney to Bethlehem, also known as Park Royal David's White City. Mary on a BlackHorse Rode because she was Leyton in her pregnancy. 3 There was no Morden room anywhere down the Old Street, but one innkeeper Maida Valeable the stable round the back. Baby Jesus was Holborn there surrounded by Barking animals. 4 High in the Hillingdons, abiding in the Southfields, there were Shepherds Bush watching over their flocks by night. And lo the Angel of the Lord came upon them, so they got off their Arsenal and walked the Mile End into Bethlehem to see the baby. 5 There came three Blackfriars from Dagenham East, following a star. They brought gifts of Golders Green, Farringdon and Moorgate. On the way they stopped off at a Mansion House to meet Kings Cross Herod. 6 Herod couldn't StanMore of this. It was enough to Turnham Green with anger. "Kill, Burn the children!" he cried. But baby Jesus and his parents had already escaped Northwood, far beyond Zone 6.
December 17th 1903: The WrightBrothers make the first ever (powered, manned, heavier-than-air, controlled) flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. Orville is the world's first aeronaut in a short flight lasting just 12 seconds and covering 37 metres. (A century later, this is still further than Concorde will ever fly again.) 1903: North-west Essex is full of prettyvillages, where only birds fly. Several of the pretty villages are suddenlydoomed. 1909: Louis Bleriot becomes the first asylum seeker to sneak into England by flying across the Channel. 1914: The Great War is the first to be fought in the air as well as on the ground. Alas, war is now looking up. 1927: Charles Lindbergh makes the first ever flight across the Atlantic, and discovers jetlag. 1938: AmeliaEarheart disappears mysteriously on her last round-the-world-flight (well, it would be, wouldn't it?). 1944: Global conflict inspires the invention of rocket technology. Some good may come of this, but not yet. 1957: The Boeing 707 enters service. EasyJet reserve first refusal on the ageing aircraft in 40 years time. 1961: Yuri Gagarin becomes the first person to see how pretty the Earth looks from space. 1969: The Boeing 747 makes possible mass passenger transit. Majorca is in big trouble, but doesn't realise yet. 1969: Man lands on Moon. Man takes photos. Man picks up a few rocks. Man drives around a bit. Man buggers off home again. 1976: Concorde makes its first commercial flight. Joan Collins and David Frost arm-wrestle for the front first class seat. 1981: The Space Shuttle Columbia ushers in a new age of less-than-thrilling going-nowhere accident-prone space travel. 1995: Deep Vein Thrombosis is invented in a laboratory by far-sighted lawyers. 2003: Pioneer 10 sends its final message back to the Earth from 7¾ billion miles away, heading for the stars. We've come a long way in 100 years.
On the 9th day before Christmas... the shops are full of people buying rubbish
There comes a day whe you finally have to grit your teeth, knuckle down and head to the shops to buy stuff for Christmas. Yesterday I succumbed, even though it meant squandering 4% of my annual leave entitlement merely to avoid the weekend crush. And so I spent the afternoon trawling the West End, trying desperately to find some presents that other people might find borderline acceptable. I no doubt failed, but other people do always seem to prefer being bought something to being bought nothing, even if that something is rubbish. And there's certainly plenty of rubbish around to be bought, all stuff that you'd never ever buy for yourself, and you'd never dare buy for anyone else unless it was Christmas.
Oxford Street was full of of other people who weren't working, all seeking that elusive perfect Christmas gift. I pity the someone somewhere who's going to wake up to a fake Rolex on the 25th, or the DVD of some film that ITV's screening on Boxing Day, or one of those tiny 'gift' books with three words on each of fifty pages. Shoppers bustled by, some with the full set of designer carrier bags, others with only a bemused frown. Stores prayed that some of the passers-by would stop, come inside and part with large amounts of money. A couple of policemen mopped up a pool of blood from the road where an inattentive shopper had wandered into the path of some unexpected traffic. In Berwick Street market the sprouts were almost as big as the fake glass baubles. Christmas approached, inexorably, just 125 shopping hours to go.
A brand new Tesco Metro store had just opened, part way down Dean Street on the way into Soho (see eye-catching poster adverts here). This was launch day so management were standing outside offering free mince pies and red wine to passers by in a vain attempt to make the store look busy. A row of bored till operators sat at the checkouts with nothing to do but gawp (they'd be more than welcome at my local Tesco which appears to be five times the size but with half the staff). I had a '£3 off champagne' coupon thrust into my hand (the chilled bubbly section is noticeably larger than the area selling milk), but declined to use it. Wouldn't have been much use to the closest residents either, those who live in the local shop doorways.
But yes, in the end I did manage to buy my family some presents that hopefully aren't rubbish. I hope they've managed the same, because I'll need at least one present to read/play/devour on Christmas afternoon to get me safely through the third screening of my niece's new Barbie Swan Lake video. And apologies to the rest of the family - while I was in Tesco I did buy Mum that CD. All rubbish is relative, it seems.
On the 4th day before Christmas...
100 (clickable) years of flight
