Friday, December 24, 2004

Christmas Eve

An unhurried start to the day, doing the last minute shopping. We are eating stuffed duck for lunch tomorrow and we needed a decent roasting rack. Rosie and I headed out into Wimbledon for it and other bits and pieces this morning while Brett wrapped my present.

After the shopping came the tidying. The flat has degenerated into a bit of a tip with all the hurried Christmas Card writing and present wrapping that’s been going on over the last week and we wanted it to look a bit smarter for Christmas – particularly since we’ll probably be having friends round on Boxing Day (that’s the 26th to any overseas readers!)

Around about three o’clock I suddenly realised I didn’t have a pan big enough to steam the Christmas pudding in, so did a last-minute rush to Sainsbury’s. Brett cooked a lovely lamb tikka masala for dinner and our Christmas began.

He is planning a video chat with his mum tonight, using his new ‘iSight’ webcam to connect to his mum’s new computer. But we aren’t opening our presents until tomorrow after lunch as none of us fancied staying up late tonight, or getting up early tomorrow.

I suspect that the third set of DVDs of the Lord of the Rings trilogy is under the tree somewhere so tonight, over dinner, we watched the first one, the Fellowship of the Ring, and had fine Scottish shortbread with our coffee, followed by chocolate liqueurs from Fortnum and Mason. Rosie was out watching pantomime with some friends, so it was just the two of us by the light of the tree and the half dozen candles around the room. A lovely start to the festivities.

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