Well, it's the big day again. If you've got kids you are
probably looking for batteries, thrashing around with wrapping
paper and wondering how you are going to get through the next 24
hours without blowing your top. You probably won't get a chance to
look at this website... but if you do, and would like to know what
dodgy presents - and life-changing gifts - have been dished out by
Santa to Community Care's team (a long shot I know), here
goes...
Mark Ivory
Best: Chemistry set when I was eight or
thereabouts (it would have to be something like that, wouldn’t it).
My sister poisoned herself on the copper sulphate – nice blue
crystals she thought were sweets. Dad always thought I’d done it on
purpose.
Worst: Demis Roussos LP my nan bought me when I
was 14.
Mike Broad
Worst: This year, because my wife and I are
taking an anti-consumerist stand! It’ll be miserable.
Best: Last year, when the kids stayed in bed
until 7.16am, which in my house qualifies as a lie in.
Mike McNabb
It was the best of presents and the worst of presents. I was
eight and the proud recipient of my first hamster, imaginatively
named Hammie. They say a dog is not just for Christmas; but Hammie
certainly was. He soon developed wet tail, a highly contagious
bacterial infection which rendered his life obsolete come the new
year. It was my first bereavement. My parents then presented me
with Hammie 2, starting ominously to sound like a trilogy. It was.
Hammie 2 fell victim to wet tail after a few weeks and my third
Hammie, Hammie 3 would you believe, was next to arrive. All these
Christmas presents and we were in February with a birthday to
follow in March. Which was just as well as Hammie 3 - predictably -
didn’t even make it to the spring equinox. By now I had honed my
skills in dead hamster disposal (chuck 'em in the bin) and another
one would soon arrive. It did and lasted three years, that’s about
420 in human years. A happy ending.
Maria Ahmed
Best: A bagpuss mouse that sang : "we will fix
it, we will make it..."
Worst: Primark tights that laddered the minute
I put them on.
Lauren Revans
Best: A second-hand, old-fashioned single lens
reflex camera – it was a total surprise and made me do the
photography course I’d been planning to do for years so I could
learn how to use it.
Worst: I received a raw pig's trotter from a
colleague in one of my previous jobs for my secret santa present
one year. What can I say - I am a vegetarian and he had a sick
sense of humour!?
Adam McCulloch
Best: Papillon, the first proper adult book I
got. It's about the true adventures of the French convict Henri
Charriere in South America. Superb, and not a bad film either.
Worst: A plastic fire engine bought for me
by an aunt. I was 12 and the fire engine was clearly for
a three-year-old. I kept thinking there must be more to it than met
the eye. There wasn't.
Caroline Lovell
Best: Last December, I was stone-broke. I was
doing a full-time job during the week and then every Saturday I
would work from 8am to 8pm on the reception of a post-production
company in London. The 6am starts followed by a 12-hour shift sat
on my bottom doing zero, slowly drained the life out of me. But on
the last Saturday before Christmas, someone at work passed me an
envelope with my name scribbled on the front. Inside, the owners of
the company had put £100 in crisp £10 notes as a Christmas present.
I finally had a bit of cash that I could spend all on me, me, me
rather than bills, bills, bills!
Worst: When I was about seven years old, we
(meaning the Lovell children) decided to secretly open up the
presents that Granny Margaret had given to my dad before she flew
out to Australia for Christmas and New Year. After hours of hunting
we finally found them hidden in a chest of drawers in my parents’
room. It was my older sister’s turn first; a camera. Then my
younger brother; another winner: a remote control racing car. Then
it was my turn with my twin sister; two identical black and
white-striped shirts! Let’s just say they were returned and
exchanged after the 25 December.
Anabel Unity Sale
My best Christmas present: In the 1980s my eldest brother bought
me some very fashionable navy leather, slouch side zip boots. He'd
wrapped each foot separately but I'd already spotted where they
were under the Christmas tree. I felt like an extra from a Duran
Duran video strutting around in them.
Worst Christmas present: An all-in-one red
fleece zip-up dressing gown that make me sweat like a hot water
bottle from my Mother. Yuck. I was aged 27. Not really, I was
12.
Amy Taylor
Best: I got a Sindy TV study when I was about
eight. It had interchangeable backdrops for different types of
programmes such as the weather forecast or a Wheel of Fortune-type
show. I used to like doing the weather forecast best and sticking
the stickers (which came with it) on a map of the UK to illustrate
when a cold front was coming in.
Worst: An outfit consisting of red cord
trousers, a red lumberjack shirt, red jumper and red braces from
Mothercare my late grandma bought me for the festive season when I
was about 10. It wouldn’t have been so bad but she brought a
matching outfit for my brother in blue and forced us to wear them
out together and he thought it was hilarious to ping my braces.
Gary Brigden
Best: When I was 11 I received my first
computer when Santa delivered a Commodore 64. It was the first
computer in the house and amazed us. Looking back now, the
outstanding graphic were little more than blocks, but even so, it
was great.
Worst: The Official Review of the 2003 Rugby
Union World Cup on DVD from my father in law. As a rugby league
fan, and staunch anti-rugby union man, the present was never
watched.