Ready for him this year.
Right, I'm leaving out the invocations this year. All I ever get is that red guy with the horns, and never Santa. This time I'm trying a more direct approach.
Every chimney is fitted with a grille that falls into place when someone passes it on the way down. He won't get back out that way. There are nets, crossbows on tripwires, and the lights on the tree have bare wires. All the doors will be locked and I have bear traps on the roof to immobilise the reindeer. I think of them as self-attaching wheel clamps. The stockings above every fireplace are filled with scalpel blades and I even have Father's old blunderbuss loaded and ready.
This time, Santa's going down. If he has an eye-pod in his bag, Stumpy is in luck, even though I intercepted the greedy little bastard's letter and sent him a suitable reply. Well, there'll be no Santa next year so it's only fair he share in the spoils.
I'm ready.
