If you're going away this Christmas, we're jealous. Very jealous.
However. we wholeheartedly applaud your decision to pack up, ship out and spend Christmas Day with a cocktail in your hands and the sand gently warming your toes. Travel is one of the best ways to spend your heard-earned cash. At least, we think so.
We love the UK - it's our home - but over Christmas, there are certain aspects of living here that can be a little tiresome. Here are ten things you almost definitely won't miss if you're lucky enough to be jetting off to find some winter sun...
1) You will escape the rehashed clutches of Band Aid 30, and their harrowing attempt at 'Do They Know It's Christmas?', which took over the airwaves last Christmas and is doing the rounds again this year. To be honest, it's mainly Bono returning for round two that makes this festive offering the ultimate damp squib. You will also escape, in no particular order, Slade, Wham!, Paul McCartney and Cliff Richard. This alone is a reason to leave the country.
2) You will not have to blindly panic-buy in the days leading up to Christmas, and awaken from a food coma on Boxing Day to find that you have 15 loaves of bread that need to be eaten, and extra turkey, a sackful of carrots and enough mince pies to feed a small nation. Nobody needs that much food. The shops are only closed for one day. This is not necessary.
3) You will not have to smile weakly at cashiers that are clearly hot, bothered and don't want to wear a Santa hat.
4) You will not be forced to take a long, fretful walk on Boxing Day in order to 'work off' your Christmas dinner. Let's be honest with ourselves. You'd need to take a two day walk around the Scottish highlands to even begin burning off the goose fat-laden excess you consumed the day before.
5) You will not have to pop in to see your partner's parents on Boxing Day and fend off questions about when you are getting married, having a child, or if you would like to take home a tupperware box full of sad-looking vegetables.
6) You will not have to flip through the Radio Times in a panicky fashion to avoid talking to your family. As an aside, you will avoid the family rows altogether if you're on holiday with someone who doesn't annoy you.
7) You will not feel guilty about having a cocktail with your lunch because, face it, it's what people do when they're enjoying relentless sunshine and the sea. Try having a snowball before lunch when Christmas Day has been and gone. Your relatives will make a sour face that you will rightly interpret as 'disapproval'.
8) Talking of relatives, you won't have to put up with any of the following: people that won't go home, people that arrive late, people who drink all the alcohol, people who create alcohol-related friction, people who think Christmas dinner is the right time to bring up financial difficulties or past grievances and people who hog the bathroom.
9) You will avoid the crazy heating that shops seem to use during Christmas. Even on a remarkably mild December day, shops like to blast out huge amounts of hot air. The reason why they do this is unknown, and all it does is anger the hordes of shoppers who want to spent money they haven't got on things they don't need without sweating.
10) Upon returning home, you will be rested, tanned, and not a stone heavier due to never-ending tins of chocolates being dotted around your home and eating biscuits for breakfast. You will not have an aversion to roasted meats, your relatives, films with Jeff Goldblum in them or nutcrackers.
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