Drol on the Lobe Goose, you Yuletide Q's Axe.

Welcome to the Pline by podcast.

I'm recording this exactly.

At 8.55am on Sunday the 21st of December.

The winter solstice. The shortest day of the year. I'm here in my office.

And if you're a long-time listener, over the summer, you know we had all that drama with the

starlings. And I used to try and record the podcast at sunset so that we'd hear the starling marmoration.

There's no starling marmoration now because the starlings aren't here.

They're often their winter roast.

But I'm recording the podcast right now at this very moment, the moment of the solstice, the shortest day of the year.

Because I'm thinking about New Grange. like I'm down here in Limerick City looking out my office window. A chilly Christmas morning out there.

Thinking about the mulled wine I'm gonna make later.

Well I don't actually mull wine.

I mull apple juice.

I get apple juice and sugar, cinnamon and cloves and all that shit.

And I boil it in a pot and I leave it there bubbling away for the scent.

I ladle the mulled apple juice into my cup and then I pour the wine on top of that to cool it down but also it's so you don't

burn off the alcohol.

I want the violence of the alcohol that's in the red wine or you don't even have to use

red wine, put in a drop of whiskey, brandy, fucking port.

Or maybe someone doesn't want alcohol at all so you just ladle them your mulled apple juice.

It's the best way to do it.

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