News Flash! Xmas Eve Extended!

It appears that Santa’s elf negotiators have failed in their attempts to exclude the big fella from having to ‘sign in‘, using the appropriate Australian state or territory health department QR codes, prior to entering the thousands of premises where he is expected to leave presents (and that’s excluding all those on the ‘naughty list’). 

Seemingly the various Aussie state and territory governments are not willing to relax their terms of entry into premises, and discussions have come to a grinding halt. Consequently the union of Santa and Elves Xmas workers (SEX) is reportedly coming close to strike action. What’s more they're going all out for SEX. 

Furthermore, five of the six white boomers (the large albino kangaroos that Santa uses to pull his slay-full of goodies on the big night while traversing Australia) have reportedly come down with ’foot 'n mouth’, a condition previously thought to be exclusively suffered by our Aussie politicians. 

Then there’s Santa’s sciatica, which has been acting up again, and threatens to severely impede his normally swift descent down and back up all those chimneys. 

The bottom line is that Xmas Eve is likely to be extended through to December 26 or 27, unless the following RAPs (remedial action plans) can be implemented:

• Pass the reins down to the ‘baby boomers’. Under normal circumstances this might work, but, with only a few days to go until Xmas Eve, there's just not enough time for a different generation of kangaroos to learn the ropes. Also, the elf roo wranglers are a fussy lot and, furthermore, tend to demand overtime and other extortionately expensive conditions for working under stress and duress.  Yep, we desperately need a Jeep Wrangler.
• Have Santa stay in the sled.  The idea would be to commandeer elf assistance to do all the chimney work, but this would mean having to forego the union job descriptions for both elves and Santa. I guess we'd ideally need a couple of non-union renegade elf workers and hope that there are no union HR inspectors out and about on Xmas Eve.  These renegade elves would, of course, also need to be nimble, light and, most of all, inexpensive.  Anyone seen a Jeep Renegade or two?
• Ignore the QR code scanning.  This might just work, as who in any government position will be working on Xmas Eve? Nobody would ever find out.

But the biggest problem is that all three RAPs would need to be fully implemented in parallel if lengthy delays in delivery times (DDT) are to be avoided, irrespective of the fact that DDT has been banned worldwide for some time now.

Unfortunately the matter of whether or not we can make these RAPs work and hence maintain a realistic schedule, pales in significance next to retail  politics and the need for profit at all costs.  It appears certain that the word has already spread throughout most of the retail sector, which recycles all the toys that the elves make for special Xmas deliveries.  These include all the kids toys, the heavy duty big boys toys, and of course, the would-be ladies toy-boys.

As usual, there won't be many big boys toys delivered on Xmas Eve, as everyone knows that the most popular gifts, purchased at the last minute for the mature mere male, are handkerchieves and socks (hankies and hosiery). 

The major Aussie department stores, such as David Jones and Myer, are already advising that, due to the rumours of a delivery strike and extended Christmas Eve, they've already had a run on handkerchieves and socks and they're all sold out.  It follows that, for many men this year, there won't be any hanky panky, or indeed Ho, Ho Hose, until well into the New Year.

Never mind, fellas, there's always the re-runs of National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, Elf and Home Alone to look forward to.  Then there's all the Xmas Carols, although I understand that, due to the big accident on the M1 last night, involving truckloads of alphabet soup packets, there'll be No-Els this year.

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When not researching the weird or the wonderful, the comical or the cultured, the sinful or the serious, I chase my creative side, the results of which can be seen as selected photographs of my travels on my website at:

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The author of the above, Ken Boddie, besides being a sometime poet and occasional writer, is an enthusiastic photographer, rarely leisure-travelling without his Canon, and loves to interact with other like-minded people with diverse interests.

Ken's three day work week (part time commitment) as a consulting engineer allows him to follow his photography interests, and to plan trips to an ever increasing list of countries and places of scenic beauty and cultural diversity.