Christmas special

…... well there’s no getting away from it so I’m giving in - here is my first Christmas blog. Last week I went to an e-Learning event in a Lancashire college. (e-Learning / IT in teaching is the main thrust of my job - so occasionally I get to spend a day away from college). The main challenge at these events is to collect the free pens - only the good ones though. It is normally considered bad form to walk up to a vendor’s stand, grab the freebies and clear off, so it is sometimes necessary to pretend to be interested in a piece of software for graphing polynomials, or a set of electronic manuals covering every angle on health and safety in the construction industry. (If Katherine Jones from the Thomson stand reads this - I really was interested in your demonstration and I didn't take a pen and I will be following up the use of Infotrac in my college!)

Anyway, it being December, the event was called a Christmas Market and there amongst the freebies was a big box of Christmas crackers. OK, I admit it - I put a couple in my bag of handouts and pens. I’m telling you this because there was a really innovative ‘motto’ inside each cracker as we discovered at home over a festive weekend snack. If you are thinking of making your own crackers this year you may want to steal this idea. See the picture (click on it to enlarge)

The possibilities are endless - how to avoid the moire effect when scanning from a magazine - a quick way to create a parameter query in Access - configuring a podcatcher (isn’t that a brilliant word? I’m going to use it at every possible opportunity).

Here’s a photo of Manchester Town Hall (a wonderful piece of architecture) with the inflatable Santa gazing out over the city from his lofty perch. It was one of the possibilities for my Christmas card this year - but since it didn’t achieve that high honour I can unveil it here.

I learned something today when I was removing a net stocking (…..I’d better not elaborate on my thoughts at this point) . Don’t do it outside! You wont believe how much bulkier a Christmas tree becomes when released from its restraint and then it’s such a pig to get indoors - and the mess!