With plenty of depressing news, massive credit card bills and your extended family in suffocatingly close proximity, I think that the best way to get through the holidays to stay a steady amount of drunk all the way through.
If your boss reneged on your Christmas bonus and you can't afford gifts for your kids, or your uncle Geoffrey finally made the step from eccentric to outright senile, you could try to work through your problems with care and self-awareness, or you could just drink your problems away! How could that possibly go wrong?
But if you're not a fan of eggnog and pouring yourself a stiff measure of whisky by the fire proves to be too problematic with all those flammable kids running around, then boy do I have the perfect advent calendar for you. For the first 24 days of December, you can count the days down to the ostensible birth of Jesus with a consumable calendar!
Come on, guys - don't make me explain Advent to you. So you know how most people have chocolate in their advent calendar? I like chocolate, but I feel like between all those delicious Santas and various other desserts, you're getting more than your fill of chocolate. So why not try something new?
Ladies and gentlemen: I present to you the wine advent calendar - a boozy trip through the month of December that you never knew you needed until you realised it existed. Bring each new day before Christmas with a little tipple, and before you know it, it'll be January 3, and you're sobering up in the middle of an intervention with all of your loved ones, nursing a massive hangover. Yay!
For this particular theme of advent, we previously only had one place to thank, and that's Aldi. Before, you could only get that boozy calendar out in Europe, but two months ago, Aldi were gracious enough to bring their advent calendar all the way across the Atlantic. But you'll notice the past tense - what happened there?
Well, a group of award-winning winemakers saw all the fun Aldi was having, and decided they wanted in. So they did, with their own Wine Lovers’ Advent Calendar! With a $129.99 price tag, it's not exactly the cheaper option (with the Aldi version costing $69.99), but once they describe it to you, you'll really want to try it out.
"We don’t want to give too much away (and ruin the surprise), but you’ll enjoy our favorite Prosecco from one of Italy’s top specialists and fine Bordeaux from the exceptional 2015 vintage. Plus, look forward to a 5-star estate Rioja, barrel-aged Chardonnay, and more."
Ooooh. Sounds interesting, doesn't it? Well, if you're on the fence about it, I'd decide on what you want to do quick; if you want your drinks calendar here in time for December 1, you're going to have to have everything sorted by November 19. Sounds like a long time away, sure, but you'd be surprised how quickly the time passes.
Especially if you're blackout drunk on wine. Which can be every day now, thanks to wine advent calendars!