Conspicuous Consumption

The excesses of the season have got to all the inhabitants of Axis Towers. While I have lost my voice completely following a couple too many dry sherries, the Axis have taken on a slight crazed glint in the eye and the ability to prick up their ears at the slightest rustling of what may be wrapping paper within a two-hundred-yard radius. They then charge over any old ladies and dogs smaller than a racehorse in order to lay their sticky little mitts on a PRESENT, no matter what it is - the virtue is in the getting.

I find watching this spectacle fairly dispiriting, so was happy to let the boys go to Daddio for Christmas Day so I didn't have to watch their inner Gordon Geckos manifest over huge piles of Playmobil. I managed to slow their present-opening here at Axis Towers so that there was not too much screaming, and I had hoped that this signalled an end to the consumerism, but no.

As I was recovering from a night of extremely bad behaviour on the Balchinator's sofa, the telephone rang. It was a somewhat exasperated Daddio, apparently calling from some kind of witches' coven judging by the background noise of incessant demonic laughter. When I'd calmed him down, he finally spilled what the problem was. 'Your eldest son is hatching EVIL and GREEDY naughty boy plans!' It transpired the Pie, proud recipient of his first wobbly tooth, was planning to lie in wait for the tooth fairy, kidnap her when she arrived by tying her up with his tape measure, and hold her to ransom for as many gold coins as he could get. He also stated an intention to marry someone who does not want children so he can accumulate as much treasure as possible for himself. Daddio was speechless at this mercenary streak in our previously loving and considerate boy.

I was too, and was about to demand the Pie come to the phone to be firmly admonished and booked in to Basic Human Decency 101 at Sunday school when I stopped, and thought. He's a bright lad. He's seen this before, and now he's decided to do it. He's seen what happens when you don't, when you stop and consider other people before seeing to your own needs, and he's obviously decided that the prevailing attitude - 'I want that, I'm having it, I don't care about you' - is the only way to get ahead.

He's wrong, right? Right? I'm going to tell him he's wrong, but how many times is the opposite view demonstrated to him over the course of the year, the month, the week, the day, even? How many times do I do it? Do we all eventually succumb to this?

One of my New Year's resolutions was going to be to stop letting people upset me so much. I'm a sensitive soul at heart and I'd decided I was going to be a little bit more selfish and tell everyone to kindly cock off if they were going to behave badly. But now, I find I have to reconsider. I don't want them to be selfish, arrogant little jerks. I want them to be nice to people and for people to be nice to them in return.

Niceness, however, can be a big front for utter bonkersness. Recently, someone asked me for my phone number, and if I would like to go out on a date. Shocked, but not unpleased, I conceded. At about 4am the phone rang and there was a voicemail. The next day, I listened to it with my friend. Instead of the pleasant and complimentary chap I had given my number to, there was a very, very drunk woman, with some giggling in the background. 'Hello. I have your number on my phone. I was just wondering if your last name was Hands and if you would like a good fisting. Give me a ring. Bye...'.

Well, I wasn't going to stand for that. Time for revenge...