Christmas was nothing out of the ordinary but a lovely day at home with family. We watched all the regular things, Doctor Who, Eastenders, Gavin & Stacey and the family movie, which this year was Elf. Although I did apply for some jobs in the afternoon and spent more time online than I should have on such a religious day. Catalina came over for a while and it was good fun but there was no Ramzi (my second cousin) until the weekend. Boxing Day is my sister’s Julie’s birthday (16) and she had some friends over or it may have just been one friend I do not remember. All the days blur into one another during this period, I refer to Twixmas. I watched Back To The Future Part II and GI Joe: The Rise Of Cobra. It was my second movie based on a Hasbro toy franchise over the holidays, as I got Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen as a birthday present (which I only collected from my friend on Christmas Eve, a month and two days after my actual birthday). Although I have to confess I fell asleep during the DVD screening of the Michael Bay sequel, because I was tired from all the food and hard work I had put in at ASDA for the past few days. It can be a shock to the system to go back to some hard labour, particularly after nine weeks of getting fat. (It is all relative but I put on a stone since I came back home from Newbury in October). On 27th I headed to Bedford to collect my cousins and got home just in time for the Arsenal Aston Villa match on Sky. Fabregas came off the bench to inspire the Gunners to victory with two great goals. Only then to be injured and have to be substituted. On Monday 28th, was a kind of get back into action day. I decided I would check the oil / anti-freeze / screenwash in all the family cars (three in total). I noticed we had no Anti-Freeze, so I walked to ASDA to get some. However, my Dad had gone to work with the garage key, so I had wait for him to get back before I could even start my car maintenance schedule. Instead I had to find other ways to occupy my time, I dropped my sister off at work then popped into town for a while. My only purchase in the sales was a pillow from House of Fraser. Anis bought some albums on sale in HMV, but apart from that it was a rather lame shopping trip into Wycombe. We then drove to Reading (well just outside Woodley really) to the Novatech store.

Pav has bugged me for years to use this place, as it has everything I could need as a geek, practically on my doorstep. I had called in earlier, to make sure the SATA dock was in stock and available. They took a while to get the box from the back, so me and my cousin-in-law, took a browse of the laptops and desktops. (I do really need to get my hands on a net book soon.) By the time I got back home, my Dad had returned with the key, so I had a chance to check all the cars. In the evening, I headed off to La Tasca in Reading. The occasion was Sazzle’s birthday but it was a rather cosy affair with only Pav, Emily and of course Phil in attendance. They kept us waiting, which was unlike them, but when they did eventually walk through the doors, they had some news for us. Well they kept us waiting. In the end, they expected us to be late (as Pav usually is) but we were on time for a change! An extremely rare occurrence, you may have noted the blue moon in the sky! Oh what was the news? They had got engaged on Christmas Day and were now busy planning their wedding for Summer 2011!