I hope you all had a great Christmas!

We had a great one – Li’l Bhaji and Akra Jr enjoyed themselves thoroughly and were really well behaved, thrilled with everything they opened and were real little Christmas spirits.

We all have Wii shoulder (and I finally managed to reduce my wii fitness age from 49 down to 29 – yay! Shame my mother was far better than all of us at it!).

Only about a tenth of the Christmas food has got eaten, but a far greater proportion of booze got drunk.

We can no longer see the carpet as we are now apparently a well-stocked toy shop. And both children have been regaling us on the “piano” and “drums” (thanks for the latter goes to my sister-in-law… did I do something to upset you recently? ;) ) and Li’l Bhaji surprisingly is showing some sense of rhythm and musical talent.

I have a huge pile of books and goodies to go through and Akra bought me Photoshop (although unfortunately stuck in customs, it is on its way – yay!).

How was yours?

Over the last few days we’ve had a spate of vandalism in the neighbourhood. Lots of smashed bottles, dog shit not picked up (not quite in the same league, but annoying all the same) and most recently the panels ripped off of street lights leaving the bare wires exposed.

This evening, I phoned up the county council to report a nearby broken street light and the woman at the council sounded really frustrated – they’ve had a run of incidents recently and it sounds like they’re flat out with repairs. She expressed concern that one of the culprits would electrocute themselves soon and said she’d be contacting the police as well (although catching them in the act could be tricky).

A neighbour has just walked back past the broken street light and discovered another one has been ripped out since we’ve been past this afternoon. This time they’ve managed to remove some of the wires too so there’s no lighting in that area. The community officers have been called.

Let’s just hope they get caught before either one of the miscreants, or more likely a curious small child, gets killed.

Well, it looks like Microsoft got their fingers out and brought out a decent upgrade to Vista at last. Early reviews are showing that it’s much more stable, more responsive and has a higher performance. Looks like it may be worth the upgrade.

Good luck with that ;)

Warning, the following link is NOT CHILD SAFE AND PROBABLY A BIT DUBIOUS FOR WORK TOO!:

(it is rather funny though)

I’m officially renaming the last meal of the day to “Idon’tlikethis Time”.

Though I did nearly fall off my chair when Akra Jr ate a single sprout. Shame he prefaced it with “I’m eating this first cos I HATE sprouts… THEY STINK” thus putting off his brother even trying it.

We’ve got end-of-term-itis.

It’s a common affliction with young children (and their parents!) at this time of year. There’s so much going on at nursery and school, dark so early in the evenings and so late in the mornings, it’s been a long time since they had a break. This morning we really struggled to get Li’l Bhaji out of bed at 7.20am – unusual for him, as normally he wakes all the rest of us up at 6.30am. Akra Jr has been argumentative and pushing every boundary possible.

We’re actually looking forward to school breaking up.

The problem is, the Christmas holidays are never much of a break for them. There’s so much hype and expectation running up to Christmas Day… all the full on family stuff… the running around getting last minute chores done before the big day. Then afterwards, there’s the clear-up, the thank you letters, the packing away… normality only just returns before they’re packed off back to school and nursery again. It’s not until after the February half term that they get a genuine rest and start becoming pleasant little humans again.

It seems to be a recognised phenomenon, at least in our local primary. The teachers have often commented to me that January is the worst time for bad behaviour, tiredness, and tearfulness.

Still, given the choice, I much prefer them having the extra weeks off in the summer with the weather to match (sometimes!) rather than in the dark days of winter. I just hope that we get through to February relatively sane.

Wish me luck.

Every now and then, I get an email offering me some free stuff in exchange for a bit of promo or a review. (I promise to always be transparent when this is the case, and always give an honest review regardless of whether an item is free or whether I went out and bought it myself).

Anyway, this time I’ve been contacted and this time it’s even better – the goodies go to you rather than me!

Kinder Bueno are celebrating the launch of their new website, A Little Bit Of What You Fancy.

Here’s what they have to say about it:

Kinder Bueno, the purveyors of those permissible pods of chocolate pleasure, offer women a little bit of what they fancy. Their website offers tips on getting a little bit of what you fancy, and you can now find great advice on making the most of this party season. Whether you’re a pub girl, a clubber or a socialite, the experts will be on hand to advise you on how to get a little bit of what you fancy – with minimum fuss and effort.

They are also offering one lucky UK reader of Pewari’s Prattle a year’s supply of their delicious bars. For your chance to win, simply answer the following question:

The Kinder Bueno site (www.alittlebitofwhatyoufancy.com) asks visitors to choose what the best thing about Christmas is. What options do visitors have?

C – Family and prezzies

Simply email your answer to me at Pewari [AT] may [DOT] be (replace the words in square brackets with the obvious) with the subject line “KINDER BUENO COMPETITON” by 31st December 2007, and you might well be receiving a Kinder Bueno bar for each week of 2008!

Good luck!

Terms and conditions
The competition is open to UK residents only. The winner will be the first entry drawn at random after the closing date of 31st December and will win 52 Kinder Buenos.

About 2 years after everyone else, I’ve finally got with the times and got myself a del.icio.us account. Mainly because switching machines I realised how useful it is to have an online system of storing all your frequently used bookmarks.

I’ve finally put on all the things I want to be able to find again and have managed to fill up ten pages already. Oops.

Anyway, if anyone would like to add me to their del.icio.us network and want to see the weird and wonderful things I find interesting, then I’m listed under the name of Pewari.

Now I’d better go hunting for some Word Press widgets for my side bar…

Now it’s December, I can probably mention the Christmas word without getting lynched. Probably.

Akra Jr and Li’l Bhaji are very excited about it all and are already begging to get the decorations out. I’m trying to resist until the week before, mainly because I get bored of manoeuvring around the Christmas Tree all the time. I am probably being a killjoy. Probably.

We have committed the environmental sin of buying a fake tree a few years ago (Akra is allergic to real trees – tends to put a bit of a dampener on the Christmas spirit when you spend a week itching after putting decorations up) so I could technically put it up early. But I won’t. Probably.

Talking of dampened spirits. If you do have a real Christmas Tree this year, make sure you water it regularly, won’t you? This is not just due to the dreaded needle drop, but apparently because they have a tendency to go woosh within three seconds at the slightest spark otherwise. Even with a fire alarm you’d be hard pushed to get the entire family out the house within three seconds, so probably best to pre-emptively water. I’d like my readership to have a tragedy-free festive season, if possible.

So, what are your holiday decorating traditions? Got yours up yet, waiting for the last possible moment or do you just ignore it completely? Real or Fake?

Remember my battle with tangled wires last month? Well Dom put me on to an episode of GeekBrief.TV and I’ve been addicted ever since.

The thing that makes this video podcast so easy to get into is that it really is brief – each episode is only around 5 minutes long. This is probably just as well, as it’s frequently updated: every other day (approximately … sometimes there’s a slightly bigger gap, sometimes a new one next day) and I just wouldn’t get anything done otherwise.

I normally don’t watch video podcasts as I have a first generation nano which doesn’t have video – but this show is good enough to make me take time out to sit at the computer and watch it.

The theme is tech news, but presented in a fun, geeky, zany way. Cali is a great presenter with a bubbly, energetic personality. Her enthusiasm is catching.

If I had a pound after every time I’ve got to the end of a show thinking “wow, HOW cool is that?!” then I’d have… [calculates how many episodes I've seen over the month I've been watching]… about £25.

I mean, who wouldn’t want a multi-card reader that looks like a mini toaster in their stocking? I know I would…

If you’re in any way interested in the geeky side of life, then this show will leave you with a smile on your face. Oh, and watch out for the out-takes at the end of the credits – great fun.