Most nights i have to drive to the Sorting Office in the early evening. Living where we do, this mainly means a drive through middle class surburbia of a 1930’s sort – and perfectly nice it is too.
Except at this time of year. For reasons only known to the perpetrators, during the months of November, December and January some kind of luminous leprosy takes over, manifesting itself in ever more excruciating eruptions of blow up Winnie the Poohs in Santa hats, sitting on honey pots roughly the size of Minis, rampaging, psychedelic reindeer careering across rooftops and more icicles cunningly desplayed by delicate use of tasteful white light curtains, hanging in ragged edges around delightful little 1940’s middle of a city, ex-DC cottages than one can reasonably shake a star covered stick at.
It’s a kind of multicoloured mayhem worthy of a landing strip in Lapland.
AND IT WON’T DO!
last year, i think i saw the first house glowing with some 4000 lightbulbs in early November. Granted, following my campaign of Scrooge-like glares through the wondow, they’ve held off this year so far, but i full expect to see them sneak a cheery little Santa up on to the roof soon. Anytime before December 15th is TOO EARLY.
So i am alerting all my fellow bloggers to DEFCOM1 – Decoration Alert. And to help you on your way, i have prepared a little token for you, to display on your blog the minute you see your first “I can do Xmas for a 1/6 of the Year” electrically enhanced dwelling.
Enjoy.
(Bah humbug! and apologies to owners of Blow Up Pooh Bears :))
The first one has gone up tonight. We drove past a house in the “rich” end where everyone trys to be first/best etc (ooh such playground behaviour) Six blokes were up on the roof strategically placing obsure things along the top and front of the house, will keep you posted on whether or not they actually switch the lights on.
pmsl – very funny 😀
But I LOVE Christmas and have actually been looking out for the first decorations with eager anticipation!
There’s a house just up from the garage that’s had them up for a week already 😉
There is a house in our old styreet that has been lit up since 1st November 🙂
I started planning mine yesterday.
oh dear – we have some on our house!! Butthey are part of the village lights, and don’t get switched on till december – do we count???
Nah – but you might have to wear a badge 🙂 I’ll make you a special “lady of the decorated castle” one 🙂
You should try living on the Council estate 😉
Almost every house gets covered – its too gross for words!
We saw our first (on the estate) last week, icicle lights hanging and lit!
There’s a shop near us with them up, does that count? They include a huge blow up FC, a huge blow up Bugs Bunny FC and a huge blow up snowman. And fake snow sprayed all over the windows.
Absolutely it counts – you too can have a badge 😉
Lin – right opposite us is a (very nice, i’d like to live there) ex council estate that was the first to be put up after the war. pboro is 50% post war estates. I love them because they are massive houses with nice gardens and wide streets – but yes, it does glow rather!!!!!!
okay, so do I qualify? our town lights have been up for 2 weeks now, some are lit, some are waiting for the “big switch on”. And it’s Jingle Tills all the way in most shops on town…. Then tehre’s the house a few miles from here who, in true “red neck” style NEVER take there’s down. Sad.
The only rule of the PatchofPuddles Blog Badges is that if you think you qualify, you do 😉
My post should have read ‘You should try living on the Council estate we live on! Dont Quite know where my brain was when I wrote that! A lot of houses here also have musical accompaniments (sp?)so not only is it very bright, its also very noisy, lol! – Have to say that the kids love it though!
We also have lovely wide roads and big gardens, but our house is teeny tiny (they were originally built pre war for the city’s poorest inhabitants who I guess didn’t have much to fill the rooms, poor souls)
giggle! In our village there are only 3 kids (ours) so we don’t get the outside decorations, although in the near by villages they are sprouting up. I’d better confess to putting up the christmas at the resquest of the children! Does that make me badge worthy?
Amanda… already?????
Yes – i think that warrants a badge. Now you just need a blog 😉
Horrors anyway have just dropped Amelie off and the offending house has snuck them in over night – blow up snowmen this year!
Yep, after the 15th in our house too (Abbie’s birthday) and all down before Jan 3rd (Anna’s birthday).
Merry, trying to send you an email but my email is all down so if you’re online later, sign in to yahoo, won’t you, and I’ll try and IM instead.
I love Christmas lights (Dani assures me we do NOT need any more new ones this year) but agree that it is too early yet.
I think any time before December is too soon. We won’t put any decs up until about the 15th at the earliest.
Much as I love Christmas I felt quite faint in BHS the other day at the sheer scale of the orgy of consumption that is the festive season these days. The noise of singing Santas and snowmen was hideous. I pity the shop workers these days.
I think if you see any “moving” lights (like a santa climbing a ladder, or reindeer “running” across the sky etc) you should get double points. That isn’t such a difficult feat in P’boro though 😛
I do love them near Christmas – we always do a couple of evening drives to go round and look at them, some of the villages have some beautiful ones. But November is too soon! We’ve still got two birthdays to get through before Christmas!
Oh so do i, absolutely. We always perambulate to see them too! But i just like to see them at a time when they make me smile, not roll my eyes 🙂
I was pondering the upsurge in house decorations last winter and wondered if it’s a kind of primal ‘driving away the darkness by lighting up our bit of the night’ thing. In which case perhaps it is appropriate to put them up as soon as the clocks change. 😉