Better to give than to write thank-you letters

'Thanks for another super present. I rang my friend Barry on his new mobile (lucky thing!) to tell him'

Today I am addressing myself to the children among you. And I'm afraid I bring you bad news. Because very soon your mother or father or some other cruel grown-up will come to you and say: "You ought to write some thank-you letters for your Christmas presents."

Today I am addressing myself to the children among you. And I'm afraid I bring you bad news. Because very soon your mother or father or some other cruel grown-up will come to you and say: "You ought to write some thank-you letters for your Christmas presents."

Your heart will sink, and you will do your best to get out of it, or at the very least postpone it all until February, when even the cruellest grown-up will sigh and admit that it's too late now.

But I'm going to suggest to you that it is a good idea to write your thank-you letters straight away, however horrible it seems. Why?

1. Because it gets them out of the way.

2. Because it impresses the people you are writing to and gets them to give you better presents next time round.

3. Because it impresses your parents or other cruel grown-ups, and they will find themselves being nice to you without quite knowing why.

4. Because, if you play your cards right, you might get pocket money for writing them.

Now, when you finally start a thank you letter, it is very tempting to try tricks like writing your address very large at the top, followed by the date and "Dear Granny" in huge letters to take up half the page, but I would advise against it, as grannies aren't that stupid.

What you must do is start off with an oily phrase to flatter the recipient, such as "Thank you for yet another lovely present," which implies that you can remember what you got last year and that you wrote a thank-you letter then. Perhaps you can then mention a present someone else got, to drop a hint that that is what you would have liked instead.

Then you should strike a newsy note by mentioning something that happened over Christmas, preferably in a light-hearted vein. Perhaps a kitten being sick under the tree, or the dog chewing up a present, or the holly on the Christmas pudding catching fire and your father, with a mighty curse, rushing outside to extinguish it. If nothing like that happened at all, you can always make it up and pretend it happened to a friend. (This is what novelists do, on a much larger scale.)

At this point, introducing an intellectual note may impress some people. Something like, "When I count up all my lovely Christmas presents, I think of Jesus saying 'It is better to give than to receive,' and I have to say I find it hard to agree with him, but perhaps Jesus just didn't like writing thank-you letters! In any case, if everyone gave, someone would have to do a lot of receiving as well, wouldn't they? I wonder how Jesus explained that one..."

Giving the recipient an illusion of sharing in your family life is always a good way to finish. "But I had better sign off now as we are all off to have drinks with those ghastly people, the Leatherheads, and I shall have to watch some boring video while the grown-ups get tiddly, but at least I will be able to post this on the way. See you soon - lots of love, and thanks again for the present..."

Do you get the hang? Here, to help you, is a complete sample letter:

"Dear Granny, Thank you ever so much for another super present, which is even better than last year's. I rang my friend Barry on his brand-new mobile phone (lucky thing!) to tell him about it, and he is longing to come and have a go with it.

"Nothing much happened at Christmas except the Christmas tree falling down, which was very funny, but nobody dared laugh because Daddy had spent hours securing it and went into a great rage. I felt like saying, 'Never mind, Dad, into each life a little tree must fall,' but decided against it.

"Oops! Mum says we have to go in the car now to say Happy Christmas to Aunt Jane, which is a shame as I would much rather stay and play with your present. Still, it will give me a chance to post this on the way. See you soon in 2001, I hope, and thanks again!"

Pretty nauseating, eh? Still, that's what they like. By the way, if you do copy out that sample letter and use it word for word, you're quite welcome. But it would be nice if you wrote me a little thank-you letter to say so. Nothing elaborate! Here is a suggested wording:

"Dear Mr Kington, Thanks very much for helping out with my thank-you letters! To pay you back for your time and effort, I enclose a £10 note I found lying around in my mother's handbag."