Last Minute Christmas Chaos
It took a sweet little old lady who barely spoke a word of English to remind me that Christmas isn’t all bad. Whether you are a Christmas lover or hater it’s an extremely stressful time of year. I am more in the hater camp and resent that I have to spend some of my holiday time in queues. Aucklanders spend enough of their lives waiting around in traffic during the working week. The supermarket and shopping mall become a cesspool of stressed out, strung out people who look likely to snap at a moment’s notice. It is supposed to be a time of giving and generosity, but on Christmas Eve, shopping is my least favourite task imaginable. I hadn’t left myself much choice however as I tend to operate on a last minute, or not at all, basis and I was on a mission to get shortbread, mascarpone and strawberries. I had to go to three separate stores and line up in three incredibly long queues to buy the items individually, due to stock being depleted by the hoards of last minuters. I