Happy Christmas from Mac!!

Every year a few kind friends send me Christmas Cards.  I don't deserve them because I never send Cards and never have.  Instead all of you get a page or two of this drivel. One of the advantages of "this drivel" is of course that even if you become outraged and cross me off your Christmas Card list - you will still get "this drivel".  Call it my gift to you.
 

These days  - I get to help my Mum with her Christmas Cards.  Which means I now understand what they are for.  Its a way of letting people know that you are not dead.
 

Let me explain.  I have never sent a Christmas card in my life.  (I'm pretty sure about that.)  Its also worrying because most of you never send me a card (understandably) as it means that following my Mothers rules - you are all dead.  Definitely.  This is despite my seeing you post on some social media website only two hours ago or running into you in town only last week.
 

So if you send me a card at Christmas - don't stop - as your life may be in peril if you do.  Don't blame me.  You need to talk to my Mum.
 

As I don't send Christmas Cards - am I actually alive?  Probably.  It depends on the time of day.
 

Much like many of you - some of my bits don't really work anymore.  Joints are often suspect.  Bending is an uncertain venture - having got down you are never all that sure you will get up again.  I hear strange rumbling sounds late in the night which can be quite worrying.  I'm sure its not the trains...    
 

And strangely I am quite fit.  I am probably fitter than I have been since my early twenties. I walk between four and ten miles a day.  Every day.  Weekends no longer exist.  Or is that weekdays?  I weigh about half a stone less than I did when I was eighteen.  Sometimes I even get through the whole day without an after lunch nap.
 

A few weeks ago I saw an elderly man sitting on a bench.  Standing either side of him were a young couple.  They looked very concerned.  Perhaps they did not realise that he now needed a rest en route to the shops and could not make the whole distance in one go?   Just as I reached them he started to move.  Not upwards.  Not at first.  He leant forwards.  It looked like he was going to pitch nose first into the pavement - then very slowly the legs pushed him up - back still bent. 
 

"Its all a question of balance." He said.  His escorts looked worried but I think he rather enjoyed it.
 

There you go.
 

Happy Christmas. (Of course, you have to ask what has Santa ever done for me....but.....)
 

Hope you are not dead and are well balanced, and that Santa does something for you. 
 

Mac
 

p.s. Next years Crimbo Web page will be written entirely in Latin.