This one tip you must read before Christmas Day

I realised this is a tad early but, believe me, come Christmas Day you will be very glad your read this timely reminder, writes Frances Whiting.

Merry Christmas to you all. Now, I do realise this is a tad early, but not without good reason. I thought I’d give you a timely reminder to buy some AA batteries for whatever gadget/piece of equipment/remote-controlled toy/boat/aeroplane you have bought as a gift in the mistaken belief it will continue to be used all year around.

This remains one of the season’s particular mysteries; why, when they show absolutely no interest in these goods at any other time of year, on Christmas morning neighbourhoods around Australia are abuzz with the sounds of grown men who should know better flying their children’s remote-controlled aeroplanes into power lines.

But unless you buy those AAs, it could also be abuzz with the sounds of children sobbing and their mothers saying: “You had one job, Darrell, one.”

You had one job Darrell.

As I said, it’s one of the great Christmas Mysteries, along with glace fruit.

I have never in my entire life heard anybody say: “Geez, I’d kill for a glace cherry”, but come Christmas time, the shelves are positively bursting with them, alongside the glace pineapple, apricot and ginger which nobody will eat either.

I would also like to remind you all that if you have not bought any presents at all yet, it is probably time to get a wriggle on; either that, or to immediately implement the Secret Santa method of gift giving.

Now if your family is anything like mine – tight – Secret Santa is where you buy presents for just one, designated person, instead of everybody.

But choose that gift wisely. One Christmas my friend Susan, who had moved to the country, received a ride-on mower from her husband Mark, and on Christmas morning they had the following exchange.

Mark, beaming, leading a blindfolded Susan outside to a paddock, and uncovering her eyes: “Well, what do you think?”

Susan: “Of what?”

Mark: “Of your present.”

Susan: “Where is it?”

Mark: “There.”

Susan: “Where?”

Mark: “There.”

Susan: “Is it behind the ride-on mower?”

And lastly, a reminder not to promise children anything that you may not be able to deliver.

Don’t promise your children anything you can’t deliver.

When my son was a very little boy, all he wanted was a yellow, plastic trumpet, that was it.

I was thrilled (again tight) and thought it would be very easy to procure one.

I thought wrong.

I scoured the country looking for one until, increasingly frantic, and with December 25 looming, I put a call out to readers. And then they came, through the post, yellow trumpets from all corners of Australia – big ones, small ones, secondhand ones, knitted ones, even a real one, painted yellow.

And it reminded me then, as now, about what Christmas is, of course, really all about. Generosity of spirit. Wishing strangers well. Love.

And this Christmas, this particular Christmas, where so many of us are unable to be with the people we long for most, I wish you, from my family to yours, all of those things.

I wish you love, generosity of spirit and well wishes from strangers, tumbling through the post like a thousand yellow trumpets until we all meet again. Merry Christmas.