I told you Father Christmas is real

I think it was the cheese that started it. It might have been something else, but I think it was the cheese.

A modest lump of cheddar that cost £2 a year or so ago now seems to be £4.50. That's when I first noticed how much normal everyday food has been rising in price. Meat too, rice more than meat, fish more than rice, flour a bit less but with a knock-on effect on bread and the butter to go on the bread is also significantly pricier. Even the cheaper options in these lines have been hit with shin of beef, that most glorious casseroling cut, today fetching the price of 2006 rump steak. Those of us who grew up knowing what can be done with middle neck of lamb, pig liver and cheap minced beef are having a degree of fun dredging recipes from the backs of our minds. Retrenchment is definitely the order of the day.

Retrenchment was also the order sent out from the recession bunker at FatBigot Towers prior to the festive season. It was decreed a happy coincidence that presents and parsimony start with the same letter, adults were limited to one gift for any other adult and a strict price cap. No limits applied to purchases for the younger generation, that would be wholly wrong. Fortunately I received everything I wanted, including an electronic cigarette.

Back in October the subject to the electronic cigarette adorned these pages and received interesting comments. Since then I resisted the temptation to buy one myself, not least because the number on offer required a degree of decisiveness unknown to my dithering mind. By inviting a Yuletide gift of same it was unnecessary to make a choice, thereby adding a much needed downward influence on my blood pressure. It was one thing using it for the occasional puff around the house over the last few days but that could not really test the utility of the item, it was necessary to eat out and put it through its paces in a harsh restaurant environment. Today being a day of bitter cold, the like of which always seems to come just after Christmas, it had to be a warming curry, so off I waddled e-ciggy in pocket and breathless in anticipation of a vital and exciting experiment.

The curry was no experiment, it was taken at a tried and trusted establishment and proved excellent as usual. With permission of the proprietor the e-ciggy was allowed free rein. Should it be shallow drags or deep? Long or short? Frequent or occasional? All options were explored and the device passed with flying colours. Long deep drags, just as with a real ciggy, proved highly beneficial and spared me the need to venture into the freezing Islington air. Mr Holborn's experience of queaziness, as reported in a comment in October, was not repeated nor was there any sign of a sore throat or an urge to have a real one to make up for a perceived deficiency in the electronic alternative. Altogether a thoroughly pleasing experiment.

One thought I had while enjoying the envious stares of those who had to brave the bitter cold to get their fix between starter and main course was that it must be thoroughly bad for them to go from a warm restaurant to a truly freezing pavement and back again in about five minutes. Could it be that the smoking ban causes more illness and greater cost to the NHS through forcing people to be exposed to inclement weather?

Both the recession itself and the government's hapless efforts to fight it bite hard on the resources of retired folk who thought careful and ample provision had been made for their old age. Many investments have fallen substantially and the return on savings is now negative due to low interest rates and tax. Retrenchment might have to take second place to a return to the world of work. The greatest obstacle so far has been the thought that a day of paperwork would be impossible without a constant supply of Camel Lights to oil the braincells. Contrary to popular belief many barristers spend little time in court but weeks on end battling with problems on paper. Now that my e-ciggy has proved up to the challenge of a lamb vindaloo hopes are high that it will allow a return to work should that prove necessary. Deep joy, as the late Professor Stanley Unwin used to say.

Father Christmas is real

So here we are, it's Christmas Eve again, and an air of expectation abounds. I am not going to say anything about how quickly years pass as one gets older, still less am I going to say that last Christmas seems like yesterday, true though both statements would be. What I am going to say and do say is that Father Christmas is alive and well. To me he will never be Santa Claus because he was Father Christmas when I was a little boy. That's it, issue closed, Father Christmas he is and he is real. I know he's real because I see his influence every year.

What is Christmas? The answers to that question provide proof that Father Christmas exists.

For some Christmas is a celebration of the birth of the most significant figure in their religion, a real man who was not just a human being but the Son of God. It is the second most significant celebration in their calendar, Easter being the most important, yet they do not put up trees and decorate their homes for Easter as they do for Christmas. Despite it being of secondary importance to their religious beliefs Christmas seems to have a little something extra.

For others Christmas has no religious overtones but is still the main family party of the year. No doubt the timing of that party is a consequence of it being a major religious festival historically, yet the absence of any religious belief does not lead to Christmas being any less significant or exciting for most atheists and agnostics. They also decorate their homes, send cards and exchange gifts. An elderly neighbour of mine refuses to wish anyone a Merry Christmas because he is an avowed atheist, but he shakes hands and wishes the Compliments of the Season. And he means it, it is the season of goodwill for him just as it is for Christians.

What about our Jewish, Islamic and otherly religioned friends? There are a few rude and disrespectful ones who will not acknowledge that Christmas is an important time for almost everyone in this country, however their numbers are so small they can be ignored. The vast majority wish us a Merry Christmas. In the area around FatBigot Towers all the Turkish businesses decorate their shops and I know from talking to the people who own them and those who work in them that a great many also decorate their homes, invite guests, exchange presents and treat it as a special day even though they have their own significant religious festivals at other times of the year.

When we go out and about in mid to late December there is a lovely atmosphere. Wonderful trees and street decorations help to make it a special time of year. There must be something that draws us all together to celebrate and enjoy Christmas whether we are Christian or not. Something makes an octogenarian atheist wish the Compliments of the Season when for him there is nothing to separate this time of year from any other apart, perhaps, from the change of calendar a week later. Something makes people of non-Christian religious beliefs have Christmas dinners. Something gives us a tingle of excitement no matter how many Christmases we have lived through before.

I have no doubt there is something special that transcends religious and cultural differences and makes Christmas the most important festival of the year for almost everybody in this country. It cannot be explained by either religious or secular reasoning. It is an atmosphere, a pervading aroma, a feeling. Despite our differences something brings us together at Christmas and, most significantly, it creates unity between those with mutually exclusive views. That takes a great power. It cannot be Christ because he is a mere prophet to Jews and Moslem and is of no importance at all to those without a god and those of a different god. It cannot be the date because the 25th of December is neither Arthur nor Martha, it is not the winter solstice nor is it the change of the year. It is a mystical force that turns the latter part of December into the Season of Goodwill. The only mystical force to fit the bill is Father Christmas. He does it every year and I hope he will continue to do so.

Merry Christmas everyone.

The great Christmas tree caper

Today I went in search of a Christmas tree. On a trip to B&Q early in the week I saw some fine examples at just £10 but didn't have room in the car so decided to return today. Sadly the cupboard was bare, hundreds sold in just a few days. Fair enough, they were a great bargain. So to the garden centres I went. Lots of garden centres.

FatBigot Towers is a modest property with one fine quality, high ceilings. Not Buckingham Palace high although, at a touch under eleven feet, high by the standards of things generally. The great problem with trees is that they tend to get broader as they get taller and intrusion by branch can rather hamper festivities. A few years ago I discovered a particular type of tree for sale which benefited from height without excessive breadth and have managed to secure one of that type every Christmas since. It has stood in the bay window in the living room and provided a most suitable decorative adornment, providing seasonal pleasure both to those in the house and those lucky enough to pass by on the street. I can never remember the name, it's a something spruce but then most of them are, but I know it when I see it.

And that was today's difficulty. I couldn't see one anywhere. For anything between £50 and £80 I could have something suitably tall but too fat or suitably thin but too short. The same story was recounted everywhere "you're too late guv, we had a few but they went last week; I can do you a good price on a ..." by which time I was off and away to the next emporium more in hope than expectation. Over the length and breadth of north and east London I drove, no doubt causing the death of countless polar bears and a tribe of thin brown people in an African backwater. I was a man on a mission. There was a nice six-footer in Alexandra Palace at £75 and one of almost seven in Walthamstow for £60, experience proves such items to be less than satisfactory in the eyes of my regular Christmas guests, so eventually I gave up, determined to venture west and, if push came to shove, south tomorrow.

The return journey was spent in a state of muttering frustration until I happened upon a small and rather sad parade of shops in Stoke Newington. There, outside a modest general grocery store, stood a nine-foot nine beauty, their last remaining Christmas tree and, I knew at first glance, the answer to my prayers. It now stands in the window awaiting decoration and will be a splendid festive centrepiece.

And only twenty five quid.