First up are some humorous airport announcements. We then move to pee-mail, which is only slightly less infantile than it sounds. It's nice to know the geeks are still hard at it, and that ancient Macs are still at the cutting edge. Good to see too that the Mac inspires the kind of fanaticism necessary to create this beautiful series of adverts.

I know that this is in appalling taste, but I'd still like a go. I can't remember why I bookmarked this; anyone like to enlighten me?

I came across this a few days before the young lady and I went to Paris and intended to read it before we went to the Louvre. I have neither read it nor been to the Louvre*.

A long video whose brilliance is only matched by its randomness. This takes a second or two to get, but is worth it.

As shameless a piece of publicity-seeking as I have ever seen. I really want to buy several of these; the only reason I haven't is that I can't be bothered working out postage and stuff to the UK. Better page here.

A very beautiful little animated movie.

Though I can't quite put my finger on why, engineering cats for allergy sufferers seems wrong. Conversely, this cultured brain which now controls an F-22 fighter jet simulator just seems bloody scary. Not, possibly as scary as the social ramifications of this rather amusing game. The game where you play an IT manager is slightly less gripping.

I forget exactly what this list is; I think it's a list of characteristics common to all known human civilisations.

These pens are very cool indeed.

I find this page to be a source of regular joy. His book is on my Wish list.

Who needs Raymond Briggs? Another gorgeous film here

The Rasterbator - now in colour!

These pictures are of the water management system beneath Tokyo. I'd love to visit; they look spectacular, like something out of a particularly successful computer game.

My own little brush with fame; one of my articles linked to from Wired.

Tragic. The more I look at this, though, the more it looks faked.

Snazzy phone. Kool kalender. Spectacular pictures. Don't muck around with fireworks, kids. Wow. Tiny little orange. U2 worked out a good deal to get a U2-branded iPod; David Hasselhoff didn't. Crochet chaos (literally). Another gorgeous music video. Shame it looks so crap.

Phew! I promise not to let it build up so much again. Apologies if I have screwed up any links. Cx

* Technically I have, just not on that trip.

One side-effect of this is that I'll get even fewer exciting stamps in my passport as I travel around. The whole EU thing stopped much of that, and now I won't even get US stamps.

And now, for your amusement, compare the photo in my visa to that on my passport. The latter was taken in 1997 when I was 17. Look at the amount of hair!

In a moment of rash romanticism, Jenny agreed that we could have A Real Tree this year, and after passing over a frighteningly large wedge of folding money we found ourselves in possession of a very handsome specimen which we immediately christened Tommy Tree.

We scuttered off to B&Q to buy decorations and a stand, only to find that they had run out of stands two weeks ago (WTF?) and that the few decorations left were ripped open and trodden underfoot in a way reminiscent of the scenes of devastation in 28 Days Later.

Undaunted, we ferreted out a few whole specimens with which to dress Tommy, and bought the raw materials with which to fashion our own stand.

On returning to the flat, we set about hacking Tom's lower branches off with a bread knife (you can't buy class, as Mr B says) and attempting to strap shelf brackets to his nether regions using tree ties. We both got a little fractious during this escapade, however, and I decided we should call it a night.

We got up (comparatively) early this morning and wandered purposefully into Greenwich (apparently properly pronounced 'Grinnidj' rather then 'Grenitch') where we managed to get the very smart green number shown in the bottom-most picture.

So Tom is now fully dressed and in pride of place in our living room. Jenny is currently wrapping presents to rest in an exciting fashion at his feet. Ho ho ho!