THREE FRENCH HENS, TWO TURTLE DOVES AND A NUT-ROAST IN A CURRY.

And so we are at the 'nut roast curry' stage of the proceedings, which could possibly explain why everyone else has gone out with no return eta. It might also be the reason that the majority of my Christmas presents seemed to contain a subliminal message - a food processor, a cheese grater, a spatula, a chopping board- you work it out. Still, I'm a whole Martha Stewart more of a corporate wife than I was last week, as until Sunday I'd not even turned the oven on before. Now I'm experimenting on an hourly basis. Not always with food, mind you.

The present which has really captured my imagination (and most of my time since 25th) is a remote control shark from the lovely Catster. There are queues all down the corridor to use the bathroom as everyone waits whilst I have 'just one more go', (the remote-control-shark version of 'just-one-more-drink'). The ever-observant T is concerned that I am in fact somehow (sub)merging with said shark and asked me to check if it has started booking gigs and is hanging out menacingly on a submerged stool at the right-hand side of the bath yet? I can only answer - clearly not - it is a left-hand-side-of-the-bath shark - obviously.

Some of CodenameLizzy's fantastical skillz with children have obviously rubbed off on me over the past year as I also seem to be seriously scaring the under 40's in the flat with my excessive use of the dive and attack features. So much so that I'm not sure the Elf will ever bathe again. On the other hand, with her new-found total computer obsession, I doubt she'll ever do anything else ever again.

So this is Christmas, and I'm looking back over the year and contemplating the next. A yearly summary will follow at some point this week, and in the meantime the TH is happily humming along to Prefab Sprout, Mrs N. is away for a week and I'm about to have 'just one more go' before going out to see the amazing Heernt at the Knitting Factory tonight. Life feels good.