Peak Christmas

We have already reached Peak Beard. A recent large scale market research survey in Shoreditch and Peckham (actually me walking around a bit) showed that the percentage of hipsters with facial hair akin to a large Laburnum is not increasing, year on year. It may even be in slight decline.

We are certainly at Peak Bitcoin. This crypto-whatsit was valued at $300 twelve months ago, and is now priced at $12,000. History students with a good memory of the South Sea Bubble will know that bubbles burst; and the Bitcoin bubble is on the edge of a loud explosion. (By the way, there’s a free bottle of Prosecco for the first person to explain to me, clearly, what a Bitcoin is).

We are nowhere near Peak Meghan. We are barely in the foothills of a high mountain of Meghan madness, and we’ll be climbing towards Peak Meghan around the time of the wedding. But even then we won’t be near the summit: there should be at least two cute royal babies to admire before we can contemplate Peak Meghan poking through the clouds.

But I suspect we are at Peak Christmas. I already observe marginally fewer garish decorations in shops, and in people’s homes. The High Street seems a bit less manic. Some people are deciding that helping a charity over Christmas will be more rewarding than watching repeats of old TV comedies they didn’t want to watch the first time, while struggling to digest enough food to sustain a family for a fortnight. When I talk to friends, a few are coming out and admitting that they don’t even like Christmas that much.

Interestingly, the big retailers, like John Lewis, are doing ever more lavish Christmas ads, seemingly with production budgets which would match ‘Blade Runner’. But large corporations tend to lag a bit behind public taste – if you don’t believe me, think about M&S women’s clothing for a moment. So I take the fact that the big retailers are behaving as if this is the biggest Christmas ever as incontrovertible evidence that it isn’t.

And I, for one, don’t mind. There’s a limit to how much forced jollity I can handle. There’s a limit to how much turkey (a bland and over-rated bird) I can enjoy. There’s a limit to how many TV repeats I can endure this side of sanity. Even family is best experienced in regular rather than extra large doses. So if we’ve hit Peak Christmas, I’m not complaining. I might even privately admit to being quite pleased.