12th night

I’ve always counted Twelfth Night as the 6 January but it might really be the 5th. But we should all be taking our Christmas decorations down now, and getting that tree out in the back garden to drop its needles there for a while as we wonder what to do with it (thank heaven for sheds!).

I always get quite a few Christmas cards with birds and wildlife on them – is this because of my friends’ taste or because they are thinking of my own interests, I sometimes wonder?

It took me a while to notice, bit slow on the uptake here, that the card from the local Labour Party had Red Squirrels, Robin Redbreasts, red berries, a red rose and some cuddly mammals which might have been Red Deer (but probably aren’t) on it. It’s the card on the left (appropriately enough!):

But then I noticed that it was very similar to the Christmas card on the right, sent by some friends, and which is a BTO card. I had not realised that Andy Clements and chums at the Nunnery in Thetford were so keen to send a subliminal message supporting socialism – but good for them! Incidentally, the Labour Party card is actually a charity card supporting the Alzheimer’s Society (and very nice it is too).

Moving on, I got a lovely card (left over from last year but that really doesn’t matter – a Harry Hen Harrier is for every Christmas not just Christmas 2014) from Findlay Wilde.

The next card is an RSPB production and is quite pretty, a lovely linocut by Thelma Sykes, but the snowdrops are a bit later in the year than Christmas and despite loads of words about the fact that the RSPB is a charity, where the profits from the sale of Christmas cards go, a logo with the strapline of ‘giving nature a home’, a link to the website, four lines on who the RSPB is and some stuff on how environmentally sound the card is, it forgets to identify the bird as a Fieldfare. It seems a foolish omission in a year when the RSPB has been under fire from YFTB to…errr… forget the bird.

But my favourite card of all, another charity card (Amnesty International – an excellent cause) is very attractive, quite Chrismassy, and is called Christmas Goldcrests.

And just remember – there are ‘only’ 353 days until Christmas 2016.

 

 

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