How To Enjoy Christmas Lunch If You’re The Family Grinch
It’s Christmas lunch tomorrow, and Lovin Malta has come up with a way for all you beautiful Xmas-haters to get through the annual family fun-fest – all while you sneakily play a game totally alone.
You will be channelling the Grinch, and in this Grinch-alicious Family Christmas Bingo, you will be amassing points for every family fail that your relatives – or indeed, you – do.
As your family become more and more drunk and embarrassing, amass points until the end of the lunch.
When all your aunties and second-cousins have left, tell us how many points you gathered by the end and get in with the chance to win absolutely nothing – this is the Grinch-alicious version, after all.
One point – You fail to open a Christmas Cracker correctly
Standard Christmas fare. If there’s a pop of any sort, you get no points. We are looking for a flat, underwhelming letdown of a pull.
If everyone in your family is watching you fail at opening the cracker, you get a bonus point.
One of these people is about to score two points
Two points – Someone spills a drink
This is really how you’re going to rack up those points. Water doesn’t count – and you get an extra point for every article of clothing that is stained by the spill.
Three points – Someone mentions politics completely out of nowhere
This will probably occur throughout the meal. A cousin of yours will be explaining how she just applied for Erasmus for her Translation course and an uncle will shout totally out of nowhere “L-Erasmus? Qala’ ma nitkellmux fuq l-Egrant l-ewwel,” totally messing up the next 30 minutes of everyone’s dinner.
Four points – The tenth bottle of wine has been opened
And you get another four points for every subsequent 10 bottles. Only red or white counts – we are in Malta, after all.
Five points – Someone makes someone else cry
And then says ‘uwejja qed niċċajta kemm tieħu għalik int‘ while looking at the rest of the family for support.
Six points – You are openly offended
The key here is the openness – if the shade is subtle, you just get 1 point. If your aunt calls you ‘George Pullicino’ from the other side of the room though, you get the 6 points
Seven points – Casual racism
Waiting for casual racism in your family’s drunken conversations is like waiting for death: it’s coming, and sooner than you think.
Seven points for the first racist comment, plus an extra two points for every subsequent “Go to their country and see how they would treat you.”
Eight points – You catch your cousin doing cocaine
You promise not to tell, but you’re already planning on when to use this information to blackmail them
Nine points – Someone passes out mid-conversation
It could be the turkey, it could be wine – what’s important is that they didn’t walk away from the conversation to sleep. They stuck to their guns and tried to contribute to the discussion about Adrian Delia’s longterm chances… but it was all for naught.
Ten points – Actual punches
If two (or more) of your family members actually come to blows, then not only have you won this imaginary Grinch bingo game, but you’ve probably also got some Christmas trauma you’re going to need to work through.