Realistic Christmas clichés you can aim to achieve this festive holiday…
- Placing a big woolly stocking at the end of your bed and being genuinely surprised and delighted when you find it stuff full of goodies in the morning, even if you are 23.
- Getting your dad to dress up in a full Santa costume and waddle around the house dispensing presents, or if the old mans getting on in years, get in that damn suit yourself!
- Another easy cliché to achieve is smothering a Christmas pudding with brandy and setting it on fire! It looks even more spectacular than you could possibly hope.

Unrealistic Christmas clichés you haven’t got a snowball’s chance in hell of achieving this festive holiday…
- Answering the door to a handful of smiley, carol singing kids; seriously, when has that ever happened to you?
- Spending Christmas Day afternoon with all the locals scamps building snowmen in the park – in fact, any snow related Christmas clichés are completely unrealistic, including sledging and snowball fights, unless you want to try with the muddy slush we get?
- Picture perfect family harmony with smiles all round, ie. no fighting over the remote, the last pig-in-blanket or arguing who spilt the gravy.
- A cracker dispensing a funny joke or rewarding your tugging ability with something actually useful; those little sets of screwdrivers come around less often than Hailey’s Comet.

New Christmas clichés for the 21st century you will achieve whether you want to or not this festive holiday…
- Checking what time Die Hard will be on telly and then falling asleep, pissed before the first terrorist has even been offed (the one who falls down the stairs).
- Eating so much stilton, roasties and port that you get a rash on your arm and the next wonder if it’s possible to fatally overdose on cheese.
- Getting some cheap brand set of body wash from an elderly relative. Over the years I have received enough to construct a small outbuilding.
- Attending the obligatory work Christmas party that descends into little more than a car crash of pent-up sexual energy and free alcohol and comes to an undignified crescendo in the stationary cupboard.

Sam Butler & Matt Whittle