The Morning after Bling Night

So we enter the official period of Secular Advent with our Community Christmas lights emphatically lit up.

Now we just have the minor problem of jacking Drayton's cottage back up to ground level.

And, of course, rounding up all the killer penguins that were so unexpectedly released yesterday. But in a refreshing change to modern attitudes to these sorts of alien killer-beasts we won't be hunting them down and wiping them out. Oh no. We shall be introducing them to an effective process of reconciliation, recognising that they are not so much evil as badly programmed. I'd better crank up the "Ode to Joy".

Bling

OK. It's now less than 3 months till Christmas. So already the cries have begun. "Can we put the bling up now it's dark in the evenings?"

To which my answer is, as it always is, "no". Although on this occasion "no" can be interpreted as "not yet" - as at some point it will be late enough in the year for us to put the bling up.

For the time being I'd point out that the Weatherpeople say it's going to be an Indian summer. So please can all Beaker people set to chopping wood, and putting all loose objectsd away safely. We may not be certain when the gales and blizzards will strike but we can be sure they're just around the corner.

Bling

That's a fantastic display of bling we've got up now. The reindeer look superb, the penguins are dancing, the icicles are dangling and the illuminated wind chimes are binging out an Amin⁶ chord, leaving the rabbits in the Orchard ever so slightly on edge the whole time as they wait for it to resolve.

There are some that say we've put it all up a little early. But I say yah phooey.

It's cold. It's dark. And we've got one bunch of politicians telling us how harsh the cuts will be because it makes them look hard, and in four years time they can say they got us through it. And the other bunch of politicians telling us how harsh the cuts will be to show us how nice they are, and nasty the other lot are. And if politicians or churchpeople or anybody else says anything about anything, a bunch of joyless jobsworths analyse every word to see who they can find that they can claim might have been offended.

So I say let port-soaked Tories say stupid stuff. That's what they're there for. Let Socialists wear duffel coats and wave the red flag and hate the rich. That's what they're meant to be for. Let's let a thousand tea lights blaze and a million blue LEDs flare into the cloudless frozen skies. Let's bling in the new.

But can we leave that giant illuminated Snowman till tomorrow? If we light it early we're missing the whole point of Advent.

Bling went the strings of my heart

After yet more grumbling and demands I've agreed to lay out this year's pre-Yule timetable. Subject, as ever, to the promised alternative energy supplies that the Grimleys have so kindly agreed to erect. I'm hoping that this isn't going to be like their arrangements of five years ago, when the power that was allegedly coming from the heat sink in the duckpond turned out actually to be an illegal tap into the high-tension lines.

So: from 1-27 November we will be celebrating "Lesser Bling". Some rather tasteful lighting that could be confused for general atmospheric lighting of the type that you see outside pubs even in the summer months. "Greater Bling" starts thereafter until Winter Solstice, and will be the familiar National-Grid-melting combination of dancing penguins, illuminated Father Christmases and exploding reindeer.

The astute of you will have noticed that this brings 1 and 2 November into the period of "Lesser Bling". I will be issuing the All Saint's related arrangements next week.

Advent Calendar 6 - The light blingeth in the darkness

Well done to Hnaef for finally getting some lights going on the Executive Assistant Archdruid's House.  If you look very carefully you can see Hnaef on his treadmill keeping the power flowing.

Advent Calendar 1 - Bling Night

On the occasion of Bling Night, all Beaker Folk traditionally gather to celebrate the forthcoming Yule, and fight against their terror of encroaching darkness, by lighting the Great House, Moot House and surrounding outbuildings with as much bling as the National Grid will sustain.
This has not always been without its problems.  A few years ago, we discovered that the lights had been DI'ed into the overhead cables without the benefit of a substation.  Another occasion, I fell through the thatch in the Moot House while dealing with an overdose of illegal bling.  Took me weeks to have all the straw removed.  And on another we had a near miss when a pilot mistook Big Meadow for the runway of Luton Airport.
But this year we thought we had it sussed.  Mara and Kara, our twin air-heads, convinced me that they had installed enough sustainable energy sources to enable us to enjoy the lights without costing the earth, in either sense.  OK, we're down one Moot House at the moment, but even that has its upside, as the insurance payout has come through and is surprisingly generous.
And it looked lovely when it was all up.  The illuminated inflatable George Hamilton, the illuminated inflatable penguins, the inflatable giraffes (we weren't sure about those, to be honest), the illuminated inflatable Santas and polar bears and dwarf helpers.  The inflatable Katie Price we were less keen on, so we explained we weren't going to pay her to switch them on and she went away again. But there were strings of white lights, chains of coloured lights, blue LED icicles and everything else we could possibly want to celebrate the birth of a homeless 1st century Jewish child.  And behind it all, gently revelling in its obvious immense delivery power, the giant screen of photovoltaic cells that were delivering the green electricity.

So we've a lovely display of Yule lights.  The best you could ever hope for.  They flash, they chase each other across the roof.  George Hamilton's suntan changes from a light fawn colour to the deepest mahogany and back over a five minute period.  Santa shouts "Ho Ho Ho" and the snowmen do a little dance.  As long as the sun's out.
Now, I blame myself, obviously.  Knowing Mara and Kara's reputations.  I should have checked.  I should have asked where they were storing the electricity ready for the evening's bling.  I should have realised they had just plugged the solar panels straight into the lights.  But there's nothing for it.  Once we're sure everyone's gone to bed, we're just going to have to connect it all up to the overhead cables again.

In the meantime, many are taking the opportunity this year to mark the month with an Advent calendar.
In a similar spirit, the image at the top of this post is our photo of the Great House after we switched the Bling on this evening.  I hope it will give you many moments of quiet, contemplative post-modernism as you look at it and try to spot Hnaef lighting a tea-light in one of the corners.

Bling

I've been pestered by many Beaker People to allow an early introduction of Christmas Bling.  As you remember, in previous years we have had a number of disagreements over the correct date for the lighting of Bling - sometimes people have tried to light up their LED Santas as early as November 1st.  However some might regard late September as a little early.

Not this year.  Since we know there's not gonna be a Christmas, you go ahead.  The sooner the better.  I like a bit of bling for the end of the World.

Advent Moon

As we prepare for this evening's Advent Moon celebration, can we try and do something about the light pollution the community's currently kicking out? Even with clear skies last night we could barely see the moon, let alone any stars.

For a start - the bling that's appeared on the Great House. The illuminated Gibbon Moon is probably acceptable. After all, it is a figure of reverence to the Gibbon Moon people. It's also one of the best-sellers in the Luton Airport outlet. Some of this is probably down to the fact that it's so large and brightly-lit, passengers in planes going into Luton can actually see it. The Santa, LED icicles, "Singing Ringing Tree" and the illuminated twenty-foot Alan Carr (why? why?) on the other hand, less so.

Then there's the new shopping outlet in the car park. I don't remember giving permission for "World of Wicker", and it's taking up a lot of space which would otherwise be used for parking 4x4s. But the thing that's really causing the trouble is that it appears to be a 24 hour traditional Beaker Christmas Tree Lights shop. Walking around it yesterday, I didn't even see any wicker. So it may be breaking the Trade Descriptions Act as well.

All in all, it appears that the approach to Yule this year is getting rather commercial.

Let us remember this time of Advent as a time for introspection. For self-examination. For considering what we will do when held to account at the end of time (by the Moon Gibbon, if that is in keeping with your beliefs). A time for lighting a candle in the darkness and considering the frailty of life. A time for donning our hi-viz in liturgical Advent orange, and heading out into the orchard to consider the beauty of the full moon. So it better be dark by full moon, or Hnaef's coming round with the wire-cutters.

Santa

It is generally recognised that, although he was later identified with Saint Nicholas, Father Christmas/Yule/Winter is based upon a pre-Christian (and therefore probably Beaker) fertility god. Therefore the character we now know as "Santa" should in no way be dissed (as my niece Alysia said the other week).
Therefore - could whoever inflated that twelve-foot Santa please remove it from the roof of the cow shed. Also I'm pretty sure that tapping the power supply straight from the mains like that is bothi dangerous and illegal.
This outbreak of festive bling must stop. It's tacky, it's tasteless, it's burning up the planet - and it's not even December yet.