Reality? Over-rated.

It's striking, and massive - and quite ridiculous. The whole idea of annually constructing and decorating large fake trees is fairly daft in itself; but there's something that I love about this unthinking, bold fakery. Real trees are, naturally, lovely things - but hey, let's create some insanely-proportioned thing and drown it in fairy lights. Because we can. Normal trees are ten to the dozen.

I saw Seven Brides for Seven Brothers last night at the Alex and, bizarrely, thought about this tree. Musicals are pretty ridiculous as standard; but there's that same sense of unashamedly gung-ho, larger-(or just better?)-than-life embellishment of reality that's actually kind of appealing. Why not take the story of normal people's lives and turn it into massive spontaneous song-and-dance extravaganza? Why not take a tree; make it huge and cover it with sparkly things?

George Bernard Shaw said: "Without art, the crudeness of reality would make the world unbearable." I'm inclined to agree. I know we can't all go singing and spinning around Birmingham in swooshy skirts all the time, or decorating everything with fairy lights, but I do think that sometimes things need a little bit extra 'ornamentation'. Life is too short otherwise, and 'reality' too boring.

Long live the ridiculous trees and dance-offs.