Now then. We’ve had much Christmas and a tiny bit of New Year and, well, lots of things. I’m now the proud owner of Look Around You, Knowing Me Knowing You and Phoenix Nights Two, what a lucky boy.

Just before Xmas I sent an email to Kirsty’s sister asking what she was getting for Kirsty (so as not to overlap etc) and received a reply saying she was getting her "a book about women in a country where they have no rights and a hair brush".

We visited lots of people in a very short space of time, drank rather more than we really meant to and generally lounged about other peoples houses eating their food and being treated really very nicely thank you very much.

When we arrived home we turned on the bedroom light only to have it flicker for a while and turn off. We tried it again only to have it flicker for a while and then turn off, this time taking the rest of the upstairs lights with it. After much stomping around and then a bit of crawling around (in the attic) we called an electrician who for £15 exactly told us that the problem was a badly connected neutral wire in the bathroom. A light fitting I put up myself. Doh!

I bought Kirsty the book of the series How Clean Is Your House for Christmas. I know I know I shouldn’t really encourage her, but she really loved it and well I’m a sucker for seeing her happy. Of course this means that at the moment we’re at DEFCON 4 in terms of cleanliness but, as I keep saying, the book is about cleaning better and not more often. Yes, I keep saying that. Over and over.

And finally we did of course have the usual Christmas Day walk to the beach in Formby. It was cold and wet and blustery, but you gotta get out there and earn those presents right? Christmas Day just wouldn’t seem right without it.