One Brick at a Time

A round-up of the year will follow next week, I think, as I’m determined to update this thing more often. For now, a very quick summary of Christmas this year.

Presents received from my daughters:
A pair of slippers*
Various bags of sweets and chocolates

Presents received from my next-door neighbour:
Star Trek (2009) DVD

Presents received from the missus:
A radio-controlled indoor “mosquito” helicopter
Boneshaker by Cherie Priest
Alice in Sunderland by Bryan Talbot
Dexter season 3
Eureka season 2
Castle season 1
Various boxes of sweets and chocolates
Bye Bye Birdie by Shirley Hughes

The Doctor Who Christmas day special was a curious mix of the wonderful, the magnificent , the daft and the disappointing. I watched it on Christmas night, but the viewing was constantly interrupted by my daughter crying in bed, so I didn’t get as much from it as I should, so I revisited it the following evening. I was very disappointed by the first viewing, but it was much more enjoyable the second time around. John Simms evidently had a ball. His Master was constantly hungry, which perhaps goes some way to his chewing the scenery in every scene – it was wonderfully, gloriously over-the-top. Tennant’s Doctor, meanwhile, had a much quieter time of it, and his scene in the cafe with Wilf was a masterclass in understated performance. I suspect we’ll see more from him in his final episode next week. The only thing to truly spoil the episode for me was Murray Gold’s score, which was often intrusive, and which pulled focus from the on-screen action in a number of important scenes. Part of the blame for this should lie with the editor, of course, who chose to RAMP UP THE VOLUME whenever something interesting was happening.

*The slippers thing
I’d known for weeks that Verity had chosen slippers for me for Christmas as I’d mentioned my need for some, and that I’d intended buying some. She said – “Buy some after Christmas, Daddy” and then paused, turned to my wife and said “It’s so hard keeping a secret, Mummy.” So every few days I’d say something like “my feet are cold – I need some new slippers” only for her to repeat almost verbatim her previous comments. She wrapped both slippers separately, so on opening the first I was able to feign surprise and then delight that I only needed to buy one slipper! I couldn’t get my feet into them as they were stuffed with packets of sweets, so I pretended they were too small, which was again the cause of much hilarity.

The opening of the kids’ presents took a long time, and Verity was reasonably happy with the helmet we’d given her. “I suppose I can wear it when I’m on my scooter, until I get  a bike.” After lunch we brought out her main present. It’s pretty difficult wrapping a bicycle with stabilisers, you know! She started to unwrap it. “It’s a bicycle! And it has tassles on the handlebars! AND IT’S GOT A BABY SEAT FOR MY DOLL!”

Two very happy children, and all in all, the best Christmas in a long, long time.