We’re starting with a task that you have already accomplished just by being here:

DAY 1: START ADVENT CALENDAR. I have two real-life advent calendars this year; a Nicolas Cage one and a cheese one which has to be kept in the fridge door, taking up valuable Champagne space:

Totally worth it though:

I have already eaten the cheese as a mid-morning snack, which is why a cheese calendar is better than a beer calendar, because you can only really have beer for breakfast at the weekend. (There is a beer advent calendar in our house too but it’s not mine and it’s not pretty so I’m not including a photo.)

I looked for an advent-specific pop song to set us on our musical way but the only recent-ish one I could find was by R. Kelly, which didn’t seem to hit the right tone, so instead here is a lovely arrangement of a traditional song by Marty Haugen, whom Wikipedia describes as a “liturgical composer”, which sounds like a great job.