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Mr. Butshesagirl and I went for a walk this morning to get some fresh air and some perspective. We chose a circular walk taking in Muswell Hill (no, not the one in London)—from the top you have a view over two counties; Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire.

It turned out to be much muddier underfoot than we’d anticipated. Every step was accompanied by the schplock of mud reluctantly releasing wellington boot. I’m fond of woods in winter—their starkness has a beauty of its own. In the woods, clumps of grass seemed supernaturally green. I wasn’t sure if they were really that colour, or if my eyes were seeking out and accentuating colour in the drab of winter. There were also surprising pockets of snow still persisting in places, nestling in hollows like sheep.

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Sometimes to-do lists have a function. It’s true that most of the time they just mock you silently for falling behind with their endless tyrannical demands, but sometimes—just sometimes—they are a source of satisfaction. This morning, I had 15 items on my to-do list (anything over 10 makes me hyperventilate), and they were all reasonably non-trivial and urgent things. This evening, I have 7½. The bonus is that it happened on a Friday, so that I can go into the weekend with a profound feeling of Zen calm with my productive day behind me.

Ticking check-box on the list is pretty satisfying by itself, but what I’d really like is some kind of automatic reinforcement system. My computer could dispense a yummy square of dark chocolate for each completed item, or better still, I could get my lateral hypothalamus (the ‘pleasure center’ zapped wirelessly to give me a little bolt of happiness. The result would be a operantly-conditioned response to completing tasks—ideal! Alternatively, I would just cheat and tick the box anyway to get the hit, which—let’s face it—is the much more likely scenario.

In Bristol at the weekend, we decided to visit Explore, one of the exhibitions in the “At-Bristol” complex. It’s a funkier and more up to date version of the Science Museum in London, with lots of buttons to press and levers to pull. In no time at all, we three adults (or so we like to imagine) were elbowing small children aside to have a go on the digger bucket or the reaction time tester. I’d forgotten how fun it is to just play.

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Mr. Butshesagirl and I have just got back from a weekend in Bristol with my brother. We were originally intending to go to a Flaming Lips gig, but the promoters screwed up badly, and we found out last week that—despite having ordered and paid for our tickets—we weren’t going to get any. Ever since, we’ve been tormented by rave reviews for their live shows. Dammit.

Since we’d already booked train tickets and a hotel room, we decided to go to Bristol anyway. Why do I live in Oxford again? Bristol is such a lovely city. There’s a tang of the sea everywhere, and I love the bustle of the docks and the sound of the gulls (though I didn’t say that when a herring gull nesting on the chimney opposite my flat used to yell its head off every morning at 5am). We wandered over the Suspension bridge after dark (always one of my favourite places), and went up the Cabot Tower. I was speechless at the top—partly because you have to climb about a million steps. The whole city is laid out all around you. I’ve seen it before of course, but I’d forgotten how stunning the view was. Oxford is very picturesque in places, but Bristol is exciting and alive. And big. I took some pictures which I’ll probably upload next weekend, if they turn out to be any good.

I continued to work on my grant applications today, setting out my ideas for experiments in the project. I switched briefly to my browser (Safari - yay!) to look some information up, then switched back to the text editor again. For a fraction of a second I thought, ‘Hang on—someone’s nicked my super-cool experimental idea.’ Then I thought, ‘Oh. Yes. It’s me.’

Sometimes I worry about myself, I really do.

I’ve taken to listening to my iPod, with all the tracks shuffled, while I’m on the bus or walking through town. This allows me to shut out the noise of traffic, but it also sometimes leads to a happy synchronicity between my mood or surroundings and the music. This happened today.

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I don’t hold much truck with resolutions: either they are so easy to keep that there isn’t much point in making them, or they are so hard to keep (and here I include those old favourites, ‘lose weight, get more exercise, be more organised’) that they are impossible to keep. I also question the sanity of trying to change your life at a time when it’s dark and cold, and you are deflated and depressed after the fun of the festivities. Still, I enjoy reading other people’s resolutions.

If I was forced at gunpoint to make a resolution, I would make it in the spring, and it would be to remember to live - it’s too easy these days to forget. I should look more, and see little things. I would also like to live more in the present. Worrying about the future is a quick way to suffocate yourself.

It struck me when I went home to my parents for Christmas, that you never really leave your former selves behind. Superficially, a lot has changed in the house that I grew up in, but when I walk around in it, I keep finding myself drifting into layers of my childhood - seeing myself aged 5 or 9 or 13. There’s an old Russian saying that you can’t step in the same river water twice. That may be true, but the family home seems to act more like a lake or pool, and the water stays in layers. This isn’t a bad thing - I had a very happy childhood - but it is odd when you are a grown woman visiting with your husband.

For as long as I can remember, the bolt on the bathroom door only slid half way because, when I was little, I stuck a green crayon into the bolt’s staple (in a spirit of scientific enquiry), and the crayon broke off. Dad (amid a good deal of muttered cursing) tried to get the stub of the crayon out with a knife, but nothing would budge it. So there it stayed for the next 15 years or so, impeding the progress of the bolt. My parents redecorated the bathroom a few years ago and replaced the bolt, but when I go in there, I’m still surprised when it slides all the way home.

We’ve just got back again after visiting my folks for Christmas. We’re laden down with nice presents (including the extended DVD of The Fellowship of the Ring, so many hours of happy watching in store there), and left-over food.

So, what happened chez les parents this year? A huge quantity of very nice food was consumed. My mum went over the top as usual with the catering arrangements, and we had enough food to survive a reasonably extended seige. We watched “Mrs. Quinn’s speech” (as my dad refers to the Queen), and a certain amount of slightly drunken Trivial Pursuit was played. Our question pack is getting long in the tooth, and contains questions about rather obscure early 80’s TV series which we no longer remember anything about.

My car decided to develop a seasonal fault as a nice Christmas present for me, so Dad and I spent ages on Christmas Eve with our heads under the bonnet trying to work out where the coolant leak was. Ah, Dads - what would we do without them when something greasy breaks? I’m fine with computers, and while I can just about identify parts of the engine (I know my distributer from my spark plugs), I don’t really know how to go about fixing stuff in there. Added to which, I have a very small and economical Korean car. The engine is all neatly packed into a very small space, which is all very well until you have to do anything more complicated than check the oil. Then it’s an absolute bugger to get at anything.

Anyway, we made it back in one piece. One of our great presents was some money for a DAB radio, we we’re looking forward to overdosing on The Goons, Round the Horne and Phillip Pullman readings. Hope you all had a good Christmas!

Mr. Butshesagirl and I are off to my folk’s place for Christmas tomorrow, first doing mightly battle with the jams on the M25. Since we’ll be deep in ancient dial-up territory (and no doubt, busy stuffing our faces with mince pies) I’ll be off the air for a few days.

Have a good holiday yourselves, and remember - it’s rude to eat all the green triangles from the box of Quality Street.

I was reflecting today that I would rather give up watching TV than listening to the radio. There’s The Archers of course, but Radio 4 and now Radio 7 have some excellent programs. This afternoon, we listened to “The Northern Irish Man in C S Lewis”, a play about C S Lewis’ early childhood in Northern Ireland, and the events that influenced his writing. It had great acting, evocative sounds, and set the scene beautifully. The Christmas before last, Mr. Butshesagirl and I spent all Boxing Day listening to Stephen Fry reading “Harry Potter and The Philosopher’s Stone” on Radio 4. It was so gripping and vivid that we were severely disappointed by the film. This time last year, I was terrified that the film of The Fellowship of the Ring wouldn’t live up to the fantastic radio adaptation that I listened to as a kid. Luckily, I needn’t have worried - the film just enhanced the picture in my mind from the radio play and the book.

The play also fitted well into a current theme in our lives. We’re going to see The Two Towers tomorrow (yay!), and spent a very pleasant Saturday lunchtime last weekend in the snug of the Eagle and Child pub, where C S Lewis and J R R Tolkien spent a lot of time with the other “Inklings”, drinking, smoking pipes and discussing elves, amongst other things.

It was my last day at work before Christmas today. When I got off the bus, the nice bus driver (the nicest driver on the route) wished me Happy Christmas. It reminded me of the driver (aka Mr. Nice) we used to have on our school bus. I went to school just outside Croydon, a good 15 miles from my home. A lot of girls (I went to an all girls school) were in the same boat, and there were no public bus services on the route, so the parents clubbed together to hire a coach.

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This afternoon was The Great Work Christmas Do. There was a slightly different format this year - gone were the tiny sandwiches, sausage rolls and cheese and pineapple on a stick. This year we had a proper sit down Christmas dinner with all the trimmings, and (more importantly) lots of free booze. Me and my co-workers are a cynical old bunch, so our expectations of a 3 quid dinner weren’t what you might call high, but it was really quite impressive.

Then there was the disco. At 3pm. This was just plain wrong on so many levels. Even the provision of copious quantities of more free booze and ABBA on the sound system couldn’t pack the dancefloor out. As far as I know, no one tried to photocopy unusual parts of their anatomy, have any ill-advised sexual liasons, or go on an expedition through the ventilation ducts. But it was still a good party.

I made a big decision today. I came out as an Archers listener. Note that I said “listener”, not “fan”. This is very important. I don’t, for instance, feel the need to write to the BBC and complain that cows take about 300 days to be cured of mastitis, and NOT two weeks as the so-called writers believe¹. Nor do I believe that Ambridge is a real place. I know this because:

1. Everyone knows each other, and, more importantly, speaks to one another.
2. Ambridge has a village shop, and people buy things in it every day.
3. No one goes to a big supermarket.
4. Everyone who lives in the village works in it. It is not full of people who visit at the weekends and find it “terribly convenient for the City - just a quick hop down the motorway in the Beemer on a Friday night”.

Despite all that, it’s blummin’ exciting at the moment. Mr. Smarmy-Love-Rat-Git-Face-Bastard (aka Brian Aldridge) has finally been found out, and now has to choose between sultry Irish temptress Siobhan, and long-suffering wife and cake-baker extraordinaire, Jennifer. It’ll all end in tears, you mark my words.

¹When surfing briefly to check the correct recovery rate (I know - I’m a sad sad person, but I aim for accuracy), I discovered that there is a journal called Udder Topics. I must subscribe immediately.

There’s a house in the street opposite which is laden with Christmas lights. It has snowmen, reindeer, Christmas trees, stars and bells, all twinkling and flashing in technicolour. Yes, it’s tacky. But when I came past it on the bus this evening, the lights were like a defiant shout against the cold and dark, and they made me smile. Christmas (as the pre-Christian winter celebration), should be all about light and warmth, sticking your tongue out to the dark and saying that you aren’t afraid of it - that you aren’t afraid that Spring will never come. Even now, with electricity, central heating and satellite weather forecasts, I think we still need that.