I took a day off work last week and braved the crowds for a touch of Christmas food shopping. So, in a howling gale, we headed for Morrisons, the supermarket formerly known as Safeway."Nuts?" I ask, brandishing a large assorted pack of my favourite Christmas treat.
"No nuts," replies the fragrant Mrs Duck.
"What? WHAT?"
"No nuts. Too much trouble."
"WHAT?!"
"We never eat them. There's always nuts left over in March. No nuts."
I have never had trouble with nuts, ever, and the March leftovers can be used as weapons, so I fail to see her logic.
Granted, there was a slight controversy in my youth when, short of funds, my sister got a handful of walnuts as a Christmas present, but that's hardly reason to issue a fatwa against the consumption of a small bag of mixed nuts in the Duck household.
"Too much trouble? Christmas isn't Christmas without nuts. Did not King Eric, the fourth wise man of orient are, bring our Lord and Saviour a bowl of mixed nuts in that lowly Bethlehem manger? Did not Joseph pig out on all the walnuts, leaving the Virgin Mary with nothing but Brazils filled with ferro-concrete?"
"No. No he did not. No nuts."
Time to Be A Man. Time to Stand Up For My Nuts.
"If we don't have nuts this Christmas" - strikes a dramatic pose, gets his toes run over by an old lady's shopping trolley - "then - ouchouchouch - OUR MARRIAGE IS OVER"
"Look love," said the old lady to the lady wife whilst running over my foot again, "Don't blow your marriage on a load of nuts. Just get him a packet of Brazils an' we can all go home."
Relent, she did not.
Forty-one years, and my first nut-less Christmas. I cannot, however, let bitterness overwhelm me. Even when she's munching away at her TWO jars of olives.
I am not bitter. Not given my history of urinating into jars.
Thanks to the nice people at Post of the Week for making me ...err... Post of the Week.
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