Twelfth Night

Tonight is Twelfth Night which traditionally signals the end of the Christmas celebration.  Here in the UK we don't do anything to mark this apart from making sure our Christmas decorations are taken down.  Leaving them up after tonight is supposed to cause bad luck (although I don't know why) so you can guess what I spent this evening doing.  And you know what?  It takes longer to take the damn things down than it did to put them up.

Still, my living room is back to normal and now all I have to worry about is where to store the decs until next year.  Up to now they've been in my parents' attic but now I have my own house, I suppose they'll have to go up in mine.  I know there's nothing in the attic because the builders cleared it out when they were doing work on the house (and there were enough old newspapers, magazines and books up there to burn for a week).

So I guess I'll be getting the ladder out of the shed this weekend, climbing up into the attic (hoping there aren't any birds up there - nothing is more annoying than being pooped on by a panicking bird) and seeing what can be stored where.

Meanwhile in Italy Befana is flying on her broomstick tonight, delivering sweets to all the children - now, remind me, why did I leave Italy?