Advent Calendar 2023 Day 13: Bod's Present

Who starts a new series two days before Christmas, with a special episode to boot? Bod does, of course, wedged in at 1.45pm between Pebble Mill At One and Little House On The Prairie, though the story had actually already appeared on television seven years earlier when read on Play School the week before Christmas 1968. So, imagine you had no idea of the cult, characters or associations around this weird looking character and Derek Griffiths' scatting/penny whistle theme. As a bonus there's also our first introduction to Alberto Frog, albeit without the milkshake prizes yet, notable for a long time his Animal Band stories and the snap games, and on this occasion present guessing and Five White Snowmen, were thought to be the only add-ons that still existed, having been produced separately from Michael Cole's five minutes of work.