Christmas 2019

Sleighbells are ringing, the lights are on the artificial tree so I'm up and out of jim jams and into my uniform for a touch of breakfast ready to open these presents that are just in the corner of the room in a pile. 

Although this came out in March of twenty nineteen it was a highlight of this Christmas which is why it's at the top of the mast for this entry.

It's a special compilation not like the Beano and Dandy one about a theme but one of an entire comic strip run from the girls comic Jinty and Lindy from the mid nineteen seventies with a ecocentric sci fi story.

That was the original comic front cover that introduced it.

Due to increased climate change, the sun starts to melt the ice caps and evaporates the world's oceans, causing an onslaught of never ending rain. At first young Hazelford resident, Fran Scott, finds the whole thing amusing, but as the town begins to disappear underwater, the desperation of her predicament becomes all too clear.

After losing her parents in the chaos, Fran decides to seek out her sister June, who recently moved to Scotland. But as the situation gets worse and society begins to crumble around her, Fran must overcome a vast array of dangers, including disease, wild animals, marauding gangs of vicious thugs and most bizarre of all, the self-proclaimed king of Glasgow!

This is a scan from page twenty that shows Phil Gascoine's talent who was a British comics artist, best known for his work in comics such as Jinty, Bunty, and Battle Action, for which he drew The Sarge.

The entire story clearly indicates that children back then we're far more mature in mindset, as they easily handled such hard hitting themes as survival, starvation, illness, and even death.

Comics such as Jinty were a forbidden fruit to boys, something you could only borrow from a girl you trusted not to blab to your mates about it  and yet here is a story that would not of been out of place in any "boys own" comic showing fortitude and resilience so to have this compilation now is just lovely. 

The Beano today is different than what it was even in 2005 never mind how it was in the 70's and 80's the top comic for boy and girls as I recall well so rather than buying the new annual in the modern rather PC world, I had this 1976 edition, a year from the one I had last year which more as I remember it.

It takes me back to that time and the childhood I had.

I did have this years Christmas special edition of the comic though.

No Christmas could be complete for me without a link to Christmas pasts so I had the Dandy 2020 Annual with all my favourite Dandy characters in it not least Winker Watson, Korky the Cat and Desperate Dan.

I got the compilation in the "Classic" series entitled Chortle With Chums with stories on that theme from the Dandy and Beano archives printed very much as is.

Rupert The Bear was a love of early boyhood so in with the stocking fillers is his 2020 annual which really is a reprint of stories from the past complete with original illustrations which is as well as many years ago things like Rupert annuals were just removed.

I don't need Rupert annuals from the past as a grown up collecting thing in the way some do so much as I need that connection from him to the Eternal Gurl.

I do like to read but good new stuff is hard to find however this Adventure story for 9-13 year olds is just the thing for little me being written more for those of us who like a gripping adventure with no signal virtueing.

I think most children have what you might call a  "big present", the main and usually more expensive one and for me it is one that builds on last years, namely the Lego 11004 "Classic" Windows and doors set that adds those items and more lego bricks to last years classic set.

Playing with my Lego was what little sissy gurl me needed and still needs, enjoying making and using my imagination in play.

While I am a Brownie, my childhood exposure was very much with Cubs I had this past annual to both remind me of boys at that time did as cubs inspire me working towards our own objectives .

When it comes to more of the "Stocking Fillers" one advantage of this current year being very much "The Year of The Gurl" is a lot of the ambiguity of recent years just went and so people went more with what they saw and what in the past it always was.

Traditionally made and fitting into the tradition of what Aunts brought me, it was fitting to be given something useful to wear, a sign of the distance travelled in the last couple of years.

My neighbour knitted me a grey hat with black trim apart from giving me some chocolates also seeing very much me on the streets talking to them.

Outside of the literal stocking fillers a specifically girls own colouring book that ties into that passionate interest of mine to help with my hand-eye co-ordination and some nice frilly knickers.

If the year began as "The Year of The Gurl" it ends with a suitable adult free Christmas that from love contains within it a very gurlish  feminine feel that I'm most comfortable nay happy for.

Christmas was the great mix for the adult little gurl me.