Hold the figgy pudding

Monday, December 24, 2007
Bangor

I’ve just returned from walking to and from the midnight service at St. Comgall’s, so technically it’s Christmas Day, but since I haven’t been to bed yet I’m still counting it as Christmas Eve. We're getting a hard frost tonight - lawns and hedges were turning eerily whitish under the light of the streetlights as I hoofed it home.

The house smells like Christmas, all cinnamony and sagey, from the sausage/onion/celery/mushroom dressing that I made a day ahead of time and the Snickerdoodle cookies that Reed and I baked this afternoon. Reed really got into rolling the dough into balls and putting them in the cinnamon sugar; then he made a few modifications on the last ones, putting the sugar on the inside of the cookie which he then named “sugar pockets.” When I was a child I always put Snickerdoodles out for Santa on Christmas Eve and I continue this tradition today – although I can’t tell Reed what’s going on because for some reason this year he decided that he wanted the arrival of Christmas day to be a surprise.

That means he didn’t want to do the Advent calendar, because opening up the little windows every day would mean he would know how many days left till Christmas. We can’t tell him it’s Christmas Eve, or give a hint that tonight was a midnight service at church. We’ve almost given it away a few times but fortunately he hasn’t been paying much attention, because to spoil this for him would be a huge disappointment – the kind that would elicit a long round of despairing sobs from him, and that he would bring up over and over again over the next few years, the way he does other memorable distressing moments.

This morning I fetched last minute groceries and picked up the ducks from the butcher that I’ll be slow-roasting in a honey-orange glaze. I also splashed out on a small plastic jar of goose fat “for the perfect roast potatoes,” having been assured by several celebrity chefs on t.v. in the last few weeks – including Jamie Oliver, the newest object of my celeb affections - that goose fat is the only way to go. Since the potatoes we cooked at Verderonne in duck fat were stupendous I’m inclined to believe them. The lines – or queues as they call them in Britain – were amazingly long at the butchers’ downtown. I waited half an hour, along with lots of other cheerfully waiting folks, for my turn. In America a line that long might have been full of grouches, complaining about the slow service. For all I know the line at the other butchers was grouchy – but mine, at least, was not. This afternoon I also parboiled the potatoes and carrots that tomorrow will be roasted in the goose fat. The potatoes here are floury rather than waxy, and judging by television and newspaper hype getting the roast potatoes right on Christmas Day is my most pressing holiday mission – maybe not even as important as the roast bird. The most common bird for Christmas is turkey, which took over for goose when battery (confined) poultry farming made turkey cheaper. But since we just had turkey a few weeks ago we’re doing something different. We’re skipping the mince pie and Christmas pudding since we don’t really care much for either one; Reed chose lemon cake from the list of possibilities.

We hemmed and hawed about getting a tree, since they’re rather expensive at 30 pounds sterling, and we don’t have a car. We tried convincing him that lights on an outdoor tree would be acceptable. I even appealed to his sense of environmental justice by pointing out that by just doing a tree outside would mean we wouldn’t have to kill a tree. Normally I don’t use such strong language but I was pulling no punches. Still, he begged for a real tree, and last Monday I set out downtown determined to find one, and get it home in a taxi. The plan was foiled when the taxi company said they wouldn’t do it. But the produce shop on High Street which is also dealing in Christmas trees said he’d deliver it for us. So I paid him part of the money, and a few hours later, he dropped it off on the doorstep and I paid him the rest.

Then I couldn’t find a Christmas tree stand, but, ever resourceful, I found a plastic bucket and some big rocks that worked just great as a stand. I had to rearrange some of the furniture in the front room to make room for the tree – I thought I’d gotten a smallish one but not really – and then Reed promptly got to work decorating it. He spent several hours on the project non-stop, carefully distributing the glittery ornaments evenly. I helped with the colored lights and the garlands and he did everything else.

We finished the Baileys last night – one night too soon!