…blog about Christmas, but I’ve been reading pretty much solidly since Christmas Day.

The cats enjoyed their holiday to Coventry and behaved impeccably at my sister’s house.

I survived driving on Coventry’s Ring Road to get to Midnight Service. The service was absolutely wonderful: full choir, music with harmonies printed for all the carols, relatively entertaining sermon and a surfeit of queuing to get out again. Very English.

I’ve now been jumped on by a wet and affectionate cat. Back later.

Hope everything is lovely for you too.

This morning involved a tricky decision. When I got in yesterday there was a parcel delivery card saying I needed to go to the depot to collect it. No problem, I could go this morning, except that there were at least two more parcels expected today. What were the chances of going out and finding another delivery card on the doormat when I got back?

After much deliberation, I decided that the remaining parcels might not arrive today anyway and one present is better than none. There was a long, long queue at the depot so I was out for nearly an hour. When I got home, the postman had indeed been, but one of the parcels had fitted through the letterbox and there was no card so I presume that the big parcel is coming separately.

So I’m sitting at home waiting for the final parcel to arrive for my sister and for Mr F. This is payback for not doing my shopping until the 18th and then ordering it all online. Ah well. Un-Christmas presents are good too.

This will probably be my last post for a few days. Hope you all have a lovely Christmas.

For Ian:

Settlers of Catan is a fantastic board game for grown-ups. There is a link here that will tell you more.

I realised yesterday and today just how much I love Christmas, and just how unconnected the things I think of as being part of Christmas are with Christianity.

Having a few days off and spending them with family*

Playing board games: We had a great game of Settlers of Catan yesterday. In a thrilling endgame I just beat Mr F by 1 victory point.

Annoying people by asking when we can open presents**

Christmas specials on the tv

The food, ah the food. Compulsory components of Christmas Dinner are:
-Bread Sauce, at least a pint made with lots of pepper, garlic and cloves.
-sausages in bacon
-sausagemeat stuffing with mushrooms and garlic
-lemon and herb stuffing
-roast potatoes
-parsnips
-assorted other vegetables
-I suppose some turkey ought to be there somewhere too
-gravy
-brandy butter

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Perhaps I need to reexamine my priorities and get a bit further with my advent book.

*selected members only
**yes, I still find this funny

The key to stopping procrastination may be to keep telling myself that it doesn’t matter if I write something bad, as long as I write something… anything.

It is something to do with it seeming too hard to answer the question that is being posed and deciding to do something achievable instead.

List of things to help next time:
1) Remember how much you like sleeping. Work during the day and you can sleep properly at night.
2) If that paragraph is too hard, write a different one
3) Don’t get bogged down, just read it. Skim and then come back if you want.
4) Just think how nice it would be to give an essay in and be pleased with it, not hate the sight of it.
5) If you are bored with the essay DO SOME GREEK. Greek is fun! Much more fun than losing at Solitaire.
6) Reward = good.
7) If all else fails, turn the internet off.

Who says I have learned nothing this year?

Deadline and exam tomorrow, hence the following measures taken:

- Rimmeresque timetable* established for the day
- All, and I mean ALL games uninstalled from the computer, even Tali which is strangely addictive.
- My internet connection (nearly wrote ‘the internet’, but realised that I don’t have that much influence) will be disabled in 2 minutes.

Procrastination monster, this is war.

See you on the other side.

* lets hope I haven’t put two Septembers in

Well, it is semi-final night and I’m out being sociable. Not to worry, Mr F is recording the proceedings for me and I can always look at his website later to find out what happened.

I think I posted this last year, but I haven’t yet this season.

Loving the sequins.

I am writing this to remind myself that I do actually enjoy studying, no matter how frustrating it is at times.

This morning I have been tying my brain in knots trying to understand the 5th century debates about Christ. My understanding so far is something along the lines of: He was (and is) divine and human, but how? Discuss.

It is very confusing and I keep forgetting what the words mean, but at the same time, I am spending a significant amount of time working out what I actually believe about Jesus and what that means.

My new favourite word is theotokos. The word I am most confused by currently is hypostasis.

I scared a group of first-years today. They were in the library and I wandered in carrying the first batch of books for the next essay (on Christology, so they are all very big and heavy books). Mouths dropped to the floor and their heads turned to follow me. I heard one of them say, ‘She looks like a real scholar’.

If only they knew.

I am up against an essay deadline and I do not have the fear. I couldn’t care less about it.

Ah well, at least if I stop blogging there is more chance of work happening.

[Edit] The fear did not arrive, but the absolute fed-uppedness did. I’m sure the essay is quite poor, but it is at least handed in and I can concentrate on the next one. Why they always take so much effort I don’t know. I love studying and there is little I would rather do than learn new things. I think the trouble comes when I am forced to sit in a room and miss out on all the fun that the more organised people are having outside my door. If only there were a way round this…

Work isn’t going badly: I have all but finished reading in-depth the book I am meant to be reviewing* and have many ideas and opinions to include in the essay.

My work breaks today have been quite enjoyable as well, so the day has very much not been wasted and in fact, doesn’t feel that much different to a day off.

The cats have continued to add entertainment to the day, being particularly affectionate when wet. Strictly and Robin Hood were excellent (well, Strictly was excellent and Robin Hood was good apart from a plot hole wider than most weeks), particularly since they were accompanied by curry and Ellen.

I have also caught up with a few feeds, most notably Stephen Fry’s blog and in particular, his entry (originally published in the Grauniad) on making Firefox more exciting. His advice seemed to be a relatively harmless bit of procrastination so I went and had a bit of a play and now have a very nice theme called Walnut, giving me wooden toolbars and tabs, among other things.

A most productive day really. How was yours?

*always helpful to have read the thing you are talking about