For anyone who is unfamiliar with the title of this post, it is the opening lines of one of my favourite poems ever. I discovered it as a teenager and think its fantastic. It is by Scottish poet Edwin Morgan, who I had the privilege to see perform Beasts of Scotland at the Glasgow Jazz festival in 1996(?) with Tommy Smith.
Anyway, here is ‘The Computer’s First Christmas Card’ by Edwin Morgan (there is other stuff to read after this, too!!)
jollymerry hollyberry jollyberry merryholly happyjolly jollyjelly jellybelly bellymerry hollyheppy jollyMolly marryJerry merryHarry hoppyBarry heppyJarry bobbyheppy berryjorry jorryjolly moppyjelly Mollymerry Jerryjolly bellyboppy jorryhoppy hollymoppy Barrymerry Jarryhappy happyboppy boppyjolly jollymerry merrymerry merrymerry merryChris ammerryasa Chrismerry asMERRYCHR YSANTHEMUM
It feels like we have had non-stop illness in our house, so I haven’t done much to write about recently or indeed had much time to post!!
I was unwell a couple of weekends back and missed a friend’s 40th night out. Now I don’t get out much and was really looking forward to it – I had even bought a new top, so I was mightily peeved. I did, however, manage to write most of our Christmas cards whilst laid up in bed (Silver linings should be sought out wherever possible!!)
Last week, Niblet was very poorly – temperatures up to 39.9 C. There was much laying around wearing not a lot, watching CBeebies, being made to drink a lot (not popular) and not eating much. He doesn’t really get ill so it was a hard week, we made it out of the house on Wednesday to walk up to the shops (well I walked, Niblet was pushed) but that was pretty much it, apart from 2 trips to the walk-in health centre. Trying to get an appointment at our own doctors has been impossible.
Anyway, due to all this and the ensuing festivities, I haven’t had much chance to be crafty. I did have to prepare and carry out the craft activity at our NCT Christmas party on Saturday, for which I cut out lots of paper plates to make fairies for the top of the tree. There was lots of glue spread around and over-glittering by under 4’s!!
The other creative thing this weekend has been putting up our decorations. It seems a little early to me, but we are having a festive drop-in next Sunday afternoon, so I wanted to make sure the house at least looks festive!!
Niblet helped decorate the tree, we bought a little real tree for his first Christmas/birthday (technically second Christmas). We used it again last year, but this year it has started to look a little forlorn. I had pursuaded Hubbie that we should get a new one, but then felt bad as we already had one. Hubbie & Niblet both said it looked fine – I think it looks a little dead but have gone with it. It looks better with decorations on, but this will definitely be it’s last Christmas.
There is something of a red/white/silver theme going on throughout the house. I am definitely feeling Christmassy and will probably start listening to Christmas cd’s this week too!!
I have, however, still got lots of wrapping (and some buying) to do.
the ashton alternative 
Great to see this again. I too came across it when I was a teenager at school in the very early 70s. I found it when ‘skiing off-piste’ in Bradford library, in a book titled Cybernetic Serendipity and found it most amusing and it gave a great insight that was full of creative opportunity. Thanks for making it public again.