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Christmas in Cardiac City

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Nobody has ever captured the spirit of Christmas quite as well as the great American philosopher, Tom Lehrer. Take, for instance, his immortal words, "Hark the Herald Tribune sings, Advertising wondrous things"; or, "God rest ye merry merchants, May ye make the yuletide pay!"; and who could forget, "Angels we have heard on high, Tell us to go out and BUY!"

The annual Christmas spending spree is again upon us. Once more, the city streets of Ireland are crowded with grim-faced mothers seeking this year’s ultimate toy. And once more, a chorus of whining voices fills the air with pitiful cries of, "Can we go home now?", or, "I need to go potty again!"

Yes, the fathers of Ireland have been dragged along to help with the Christmas shopping.

It’s all sheer madness, of course - especially when you consider the dark clouds of recession looming above the global economy. And so, for the benefit of anyone in Ireland who is in danger of being swept up in this annual mass psychosis, I offer two rock-solid reasons why they should henceforth and immediately forsake the pre-Christmas shopping frenzy:

1. It is time to conserve your resources for the harsh economic times to come.

2. It will allow ME to get MY Christmas shopping done without resorting to the use of an AK-47.

In case anyone has missed the point I’m trying to make, let me put it this way: the words "Christmas shopping" have much the same effect on my nervous system as the words "root canal" have on the nervous systems of just about every other living soul on the planet. Need I say more?

And in case you think I’m exaggerating the trauma and stress associated with Christmas shopping, (in other words, if you’re my wife), consider this news item: Blanchardstown Shopping Centre near Dublin has just announced that it has acquired, "...four automatic external defibrillators along with eight staff trained to use them". (Which begs the question: if the four defibrillators are automatic, how come you need eight trained staff to use them?)

And you thought "Shop till you drop" was just a slogan on a T-shirt.

As anyone who regularly watches ER will be aware, a defibrillator is a device used by doctors to apply electric shocks to hearts that have ceased to function. Personally, I find a January credit card statement more than adequate for the job.

(Actually, as anyone who regularly watches ER will be aware, the real shocks are generated by the tangled relationships of the medical staff, usually revealed across the operating table as a comatose patient is defibrillated back to consciousness:

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