Giving up more like, a little like my partied out liver. The mass marketplace of Christmas lures “ mainly “ guilty parents into a feeding frenzy of panicked purchasing. How much is too much? What happened to the reasonableness gland that allows us to disappoint the little people when they want everything they see? And where the hell are we going to put it all?

I was hoping to introduce a one in, one out” warehousing system in our house but since three quarters of our family are closet hoarders, it was never going to fly. Actually not just closet but wardrobe, playroom, every flat surface, most of the floor hoarders would be more accurate.

When the great day finally arrives (normally about 4am in the morning with small children doped up on natural amphetamines and promising in their non lying voices that Santa has definitely been down the chimney) carefully wrapped presents are viciously exposed before being dumped in an ever steepening pile after the most cursory examination. The pile of packing screams global warming” and the small children scream That’s mine“.

Ours are actually quite well behaved now to be fair. But that’s because their mum has made the point that larcenous possession, inappropriate behaviour and a lack of gratitude will be met by confiscation and the sharpened rolling pin.

And once we’ve emptied shops of toys and bank accounts of money, there’s still the tricky dilemma of what to buy for each other. We’ve tried many of the standard approaches; buy nothing, set a limit, wait until they see something they like and random internet purchasing. None of it has been terribly successful but as a bloke you’re basically buggered from the start.

Buy something practical and you’re accused of a lack of romanticism and while I accept wallpaper paste AND a decorators apron may lack a certain Parisian edge, it’s exactly what we needed. Or buy jewelry/clothes/other expensive shit you don’t understand and it’ll be the wrong size/wrong colour/wrong make or a combination of all three.

What’s left? Novelty sex toys and/or jigsaws. The entrepreneur that patents the sex toy jigsaw is going to make a killing. Until then, I can throughly recommend a length trawl of ebay to find some of these horrors. All of these children’s toys have been banned because of the threat of death by just opening the box.

Me? Nice of you to ask, I’d quite like one of these.

You could argue that with a barn full of bikes, there is neither physical room or marketing niche to fit another one in. This is clearly a flawed argument; I need my full suspension bike, I need my cross country hardtail and I need my little jump bike. See how I easy refute your line of reasoning? I have a feeling that a longer game may have to be played with my long suffering wife.

Still worth a shot eh? Maybe with one of those Lawn Darts�”:)