Christmas lights and cats make a volatile festive mix

Last week, shamed by the sterling efforts of friends and neighbours whose festive displays light up both the street and social media, it was time to put the tree up chez Wobschall.

- Kate Wobschall

The plan was to deck the halls before son and heir returned from university; it would have been a Grinch flavoured letdown had he returned to an empty living room, given that he and his student pals had their tree up by the third week of November.

So I ventured into the garage to drag out the 6ft pretend spruce from wherever it was flung in the first week of January.

The tree itself isn’t difficult to assemble and it’s only a couple of years old. And it has the added bonus of only having a faint whiff of mould about it. Which is more than can be said for its predecessor.