Competition Closed: Nostalgia Week Day 3 : The Den Saves Christmas

The occurrence of nostalgia can a lot of the time be pinned down to one exact moment. It’s that magical time during a night out with your friends and a couple of bar stools. It’s at the point which is post the slightly sober conversations of if Mizzoni’s is simply the best pizza in Dublin or actually an addictive cocaine topped slab from God himself. While it’s pre the part of the night where you have fallen out with your best mate and are drunkenly obsessing about some stranger with a degree in politics simply because ‘The Frontline’ with Pat Kenny happened to be on in the back ground when your Ex stamped all over your heart, the adorable little thing. Yes, the trip down Nostalgia road should happen somewhere in between the two and is clearly marked with a ‘Sure you know what I miss?’ line from one of your mates. Now this happens rather a lot, and it’s because of this, I can bring you, the slightly nerdy edition of..

The Drunken Nostalgia Chat That Happens in Whelans after 4 pints of Bulmers Top 5

5. “Tell you what, I miss the smell of new school stationary. I mean the smell of my ‘Batman : The Animated Series’ case could be bottled and sold in Brown Thomas”

4. “Right screw you, If we were going on Knightmare , I’d be the champ in the helmet alright. Come on outside now I’ll put a bucket on my head’

3. “Who didn’t have their first wank by moving Lara Croft’s arse in front of the camera for a good ten minutes?”

2. “Here I miss fancying teachers, Miss. White yeah? Dirty mate.”

However they all fall down under the mighty, number one most missed thing while being slighty nerdy and nostalgic after four pints of Bulmers in Whelans pub, which is, the clue is in the title to be honest

1. The Den Saving Christmas.

Yes truly the greatest Christmas present of all (apart from the Power Rangers that time, which were wicked) was the Den at Christmas. The antics of two aliens, a Turkey and Mr.D’Arcy being the perfect back drop for sitting around the tree opening gifts. The sheer wealth of what they gave you on that day was stunning, some ‘Micky Mouse’s Christmas Carol’ to start the morning, a bit of banter between the gang in the house, and a chance to get your Christmas clothes on while downstairs that kidnapping snowman was getting what he deserved, the creepy frozen Gary Glitter wannabe. However it was about the 10.45am mark (giving you just enough time before you dragged off to mid may mass to see a priest drag some poor kid and his favorite new toy up to the altar just to tell him that if he thinks thats what its all about, he going to hell) when the real gem kicks in.

The annual Den Christmas special covered such diverse plots over the years from the rather straight forward idea of ‘Boyzone saves Christmas’ to the fourth wall shattering edition where a now ‘Big Breakfast’ hosting Zig and Zag had turned into ego-manics and Ray and Dustin set out to save them. However, with the help of drunken Youtube (though a few more years editions have recently been uploaded), by far the most memorable was ‘Christmas Crisis’ back in 1992. The set up in this was amazing, with arch villain ‘Patrick the Postman’ being genuinely piss your pants scary. He had been showing up at the end of ‘The Den’ since about November and now showing his master plan of delivering letters to kids informing them that they were on the naughty list, stealing the toys and then letting the blame pass onto those now thought of as naughty. Its as if Lars Von Trier was kicking about 10 Celebrity Square Donnybrook back in 92.

While Christmas has been saved rather brilliantly from The Doctor the last couple of years on BBC, there is a huge gap and that will never be filled again. Instead of running down to pop on Ray and the gang at seven in the morning, now you sleep past ten in order to sleep off the hangover, which is all a bit sad really.

Yeah, I left that on sad note didn’t I? So to make up for it here is your chance to win your daily load of nostalgic gifts, including retro sweets, CD’s, DVD’s, cinema tickets and, best of all, a Den goody bag.

All you have to do to win is simply finish this sentence.

“The Den Saves……”

Best or funniest answer wins the swag and entries must be sent to [email protected] by midnight, easier than saving Christmas of a scent of man smelling puppet postman.

Good luck, We’re all counting on you.

Competition closed, winner will be notified.