Be Excellent To Each Other

I want these -







They're not cheap (£15 or so each) but I don't care. Would have to get some frames too but I shall have them.

I mainly need clothes, to be honest. But I don't bother with presents, it's such a waste of everyone's money.

Bah Humbug, Scrooge Agent!

Are Amstrad bringing out a new console this Christmas?

less debt please santa.

Goodness, I better had start compiling a list of stuff I want.

A one-handed Capo.

A full set of Beatles albums

LEGO Rock Band

That's all I can think of off the top of my head.

I want a new "proper" compact camera to sit alongside my DSLR - something like a Powershot G11 or a Lumix DMC-LX3. I won't be allowed one, though. I will end up getting clothes, because I never buy new clothes, except for jeans, and t-shirts from webcomics.

As this is my first Christmas where I am single I will be shortcutting the exchange of presents process by buying myself stuff. However I have already bought almost everything I want. Hmmmm. Conundrum. I need more shiny things to desire.

Quite the opposite. I don't want other people to get ripped off or feel like they have to get stuff for me to like them. I haven't exchanged presents with my closest friends for yeaaaaaars. It's silly doing it because everyone else is - just get each other little things whenever you feel like it if you happen to see them.

Nothing I want really. Got games to play still, Model kits to build and books to read.

A PS3 would be nice for BluRays and for when The Last Guardian is released next year.

A set of quality tyres for my new car would be nice, but I think I'll treat myself to those rather than ask Santa.

It really doesn't matter what I want as my family never gets it...even when they've asked me what I want, my needs aren't excessive just a few books but I usually end up with crap that goes in a box in the garage never to be seen again. The most galling thing is the crap I end up with probably cost more than I originally asked for.

There is nothing I really need this year... I want a NAS but that is about it..


Clothes would be cool, I need more jeans etc

Some peas

I'm at the age where Christmas is at best an excuse to buy yourself nice things, although because it's Christmas you've already spent all your money, so you can't afford to buy yourself nice things.

I have prepared a list, based on what I got last year

1. Socks

That is all.

*sobs*

Peas on Earth?

I specifically asked to NOT get deodorant and socks and stuff last year, and then this week I ran out of anti-perspirant from my stash, and started buying my own sensible black socks.

I always ask for computer games and get socks instead.

I actually would like some socks and undies this year. The carbon dating on my current grots has got the boffins stumped.

A ski trip would be nice

Less debt

Socks and jeans.

And maybe a hat

Yeah those posters will be to me, from me

Last xmas I was a bit skint. Still skint, but not as much. I want all three of those framed and have spent the morning deciding where I shall put them.

I contacted the printer explaining that I don't want to order them til mid November and he said he will keep them on file and can print them for me as and when I need them. Which is good, because I have this dood coming from Yankland and have had to save money. Boo, hiss.

Have also spent the entire morning trying to track down one of these -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q2oGSSn5kxY

But they are impossible to find in the UK. So, I phoned Inwin because I know how helpful they are* and they're going to try and get me one. Apparently they don't make them any more but I think it's nicer than the new Alienware (cue gasps from the back) and will make a excellent second PC case.

*Years ago Inwin sent the shop I ran a test case that was designed on behalf of Intel. It was a plain cream case but was very nice and had lovely clean lines. I spent 6 months trying to track one down but it seems they were a bit of a prototype and I didn't like the final design. In the end they sent me one of their test cases for a good cheap price I loved that case.

Most of all I'm looking forward to just having some quality time with family and friends. The port, ale, roast meats and confectionary are just a bonus.

JC get an xbox

I would like some quickfist clamps and an X-Eng ground anchor.
Chances of me not having bought them for myself before Christmas: 2%.

Oh! I know what I'd like. I'd like Mrs Parm's family to overcome their aversion to alcohol in all its forms before I have to go and spend a week with the in-laws and extended family over Christmas without the shielding of a heavy alcoholic haze to shield myself from it all.

My choices for boxing day will be: sitting in a room full of adults I am apparently related to but have nearly nothing in common with, they being reserved, conservative, ultra-reformed Northern Irish protestants and me being a fluffy liberal Englishman, who will spend the entire time talking about other people I am apparently related to but don't know or have anything in common with; or, sitting in a room full of sugar-hyped children who will whoop and holler and scream and shout and make my ears bleed. Any other alternative (such as, say, sitting quietly in a corner, on my own, with a book or DS or something) will be deemed unacceptably antisocial. And there will be no booze. At all.

Wanna come round mine? Sounds like you'd fit in

I don't miss Christmassing with the In Laws. My ex wife's parents were divorced and it meant getting up christmas morning, heading to one, listen to one slag off the other and try and keep us there and then heading off to the other one to hear more bile and spite.

Which usually involved about 100 miles of driving and by the end of the day it didn't really feel like Christmas at all. So bad was it that two years in a row I decided to go into work.

I have to ask. Why do you go?

Probably for the same reason I did, the wife wants to be there. That's why I ended up telling them to schedule me for Christmas day and then went home and told the wife I couldn't get out of it

As it is nippers 1st christmas, we are not going anywhere!!

Then you'll have a wonderful Xmas.

This year I won't be seeing my brother as he and his wife have decided they're not going anywhere and want to spend it at home, together, alone.

Mum was a bit upset but I managed to convince her that it was the right thing. Toward the end she said "You know, I wish me and your father had done that now instead of fucking around visiting everyone"

His wife's mother on the other hand? has kicked off merry hell and has been serving up enormous portions of guilt. Accusing them of not caring about her etc. Selfish coo.

Yeah, it's hard to please everyone at Christmas.

Time management is bad enough now we have Baba Z, but Christmas it just gets silly. So hard to meet up with everyone.

We have don the travelling bit, so not this year, any one wants to visit they can..

Me and this missus have had 2 in a row just us. Sleep in and slippers FTW.

Thanks Kov

No Probs.. bring nibbles

Because I don't realistically get a choice in the matter; the Irish have a different understanding of family and personal space to the English - that is, family trumps all, and personal space doesn't exist. The thing is, I don't actually mind my in-laws too much; they're nice enough people, but I'm naturally an introvert - I find being around large groups of people exhausting, and it's made worse if I have nothing in common with any of them, so the annual boxing day get-together is pretty much my idea of hell - and Mrs Parm knows it, too. It is, in fact, the one thing that might persuade me that having kids is a good idea, because then we'd have a damn good reason not to fly to Ireland for a few years.

I am making the case that we don't need to actually go for Christmas/Boxing Day this year, as we've still not done Christmas at my parents house (which is a lot more relaxed, features considerably more booze, and considerably fewer relatives, on account of them all being dead). And we'll definitely be back for New Year, as my brother is over from Japan for a few days.

You have a pet name for Mrs Z?

I think this year I may finally get round to spending that christmas walking around town alone, taking photographs of things and writing.

Or we might have a big party and meal at home with none of the bullshit. Christ, has it really been nearly ten months since last year's shenanigans?

Beat this lot:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ianvisits/ ... 633177884/



Awesome.

I'm spending my first ever Xmas, at the age of 31, without my brother and ssiter. Eeeeek!

We're off to Ireland to stay with Maria's folks. She's spent the last five ones with my lot, so it's only fair. Thankfully they are the Right Kind of Irish, and will be serving up lots of alcohol and meat.

Though I'll probably get dragged along to church. Boo!

And chips. There will be lots of chips, trust me.

I'd love to do that, but we don't see enough of the family throughout the year to get away with it, really. My best ever Christmas was a few years ago, with just mates.

Up until the mid 70's London was still like that early on a Sunday morning apparently. Doctor Who shot a couple of stories very early morning on a Sunday in the Summer. Dalek Invasion Of The Earth being the most famous:



Of course you can still shoot a deserted London today of an early morning, but you'd need thousands of pounds to shut the streets and a bung for the GLC. In the 60's you just needed permission and then off you went, no need for street closures.

We've stayed in London for the last five years and we've successfully managed to stop HC's family members from expecting to just come and stay - day trips are alright coming to stay for more than a day is a no no. This year is going to require herculean levels of optimism and patience on my part as Roz's recently widowed mother is staying for ALL OF BLOODY DECEMBER. I'm simply not thinking about it though one way tickets to Switzerland and Dignitas vouchers might be last minute gifts if it's anyway near as bad as I think it'll be

Actually, I want a new long leather jacket. My wife 'accidentally' painted my old one.

We always have everyone over as we've got kids, and a big house, and no one else did. When we fist started doing this, people would come for about 2 and 1/2 weeks, as time went on, we got them all down to a week or less, which is much more managable.

Malc

Get a black one and I can paint some nice details on it, ooh like a couple of white hairlike stripes down the back...