Thursday 21 December 2023

Dec 25th Just Another Day This Year

For the first time in around 20 years i am working on Christmas and Boxing Day this year so i hope nothing newsworthy happens as i want a peaceful few days and you would assume that December 25th is a relatively quiet news day and compared to the rest of the year it generally is but there have still been some important events which would have me scampering to cover if they happened in 2023.
In 800AD Charlemange was coronated which would warrant a mention and in 1000 the country of Hungary was established although 13 years later England got a new King in the shape of Danish Sweyn Forkbeard which would be pretty big news but December 25th is a good day to take control of England because in 1066 William the Conqueror did it also.
Things were quiet for a few centuries and then in 1989, the Romanian Revolution reached its conclusion with the President and despot Nicolae Ceaușescu and his wife, Elena, being stood against a wall and shot by firing squad for 'illegal gathering of wealth and genocide'
Mikhail Gorbachev went much more peacefully in 1991 when he resigned as President of the Soviet Union leading to its collapse the next day and then in 2021the James Webb Space Telescope, the replacement for the Hubble Telescope, was launched.
The Grim Reaper has no concept of Christmas or allowing me to put my feet up and eat mince pies so he swung his scythe in 1977 and took Charlie Chaplin, then came back in 1995 for Dean Martin, 2006  for James Brown, 2008 for Eartha Kitt and then took George Michael in 2016.
With a bit of luck anything big which is going to happen will on December 27th and i can say to my returning colleague something like, wow, we have been rushed off our feet while you were opening presents and scoffing your turkey while making sure there are no mince pie crumbs or empty bottles of Prosecco left hanging around.