I am now the owner of about 200% more stuff than I have ever previously owned.
I have so much stuff that we had to throw away old stuff to make way for new stuff. Which, now of course leaves the new stuff and not-so-old stuff for us to house. Only, even with the old stuff gone, we still have far too much new stuff and not-so-old stuff and therefore clearly, too much stuff in general.
Amongst said stuff, is a new white 30GB iPod that despite belonging to me, seems to boast K’s entire music collection and only mere fragments of mine. (She has since partially redeemed herself by purchasing Maceo Parker’s delicious interpretation of Prince’s “Greatest Romance Ever Sold” on iTunes for me.) The ‘Pod is also socked in adorable knitwear that I change in accordance to my outfit, for the day. I had my reservations about ‘Pod, but it’s grown on me considerably. My only irk is the lack of AC adapter/mains charger. I’ve one ordered from eBay, but there’s no way I’ll see it this side of Christmas. 
I am also the proud owner of my first ever Digital SLR camera; the much desired Nikon D70s! 
I was given the kit that comes with the body, “standard” lens, caps, straps and paraphernalia, though I’ve yet to master how the bloody thing works. I can snap away merrily in a “point-and-shoot” fashion, but have failed to produce anything worth keeping, as I’ve not discovered how to configure the flash away from the factory setting of “temporarily blind all living creatures within a half-mile radius”.
It must be said however, that I’ve been relishing the return of the satisfying “Mirror Clack” afforded by the D70s (or in fact, any SLR for that matter!), it’s now just so much more satisfying to press that shutter-release.
My mum gave me Christmas money, which she said she felt bad about as it looks like she hasn’t bothered, I disagree — it’ll be put towards some new gadgets for my camera (I’ve already bought the official soft shell case for 20 quid (incl. P&P) off eBay, a bargain seeings as it was about double that in high street shops).
My love for retro gaming can now be fully enjoyed since, K has replaced my ancient and dust-ravaged Sega MegaDrive II (Genesis, to you Americans) with one in near mint condition — it even had the original polythene packaging inside the box, do you know how hard that is to find? I also got 20-odd games with it.
The theme was continued in one of the gifts I bought K: a NES with games and a NES Zapper (light gun), we’ve both been busy down memory lane, “admiring” the graphics and blowing the dust from the innards of the respective 16 and 8-Bit cartridges, in order to make the games load.
I have about a squillion other gadgets and cool things that light up, including: a rubber PC keyboard that lights up blue and you can roll-up too! (for storage purposes etc), a mouse pad that lights up purple (and has a 4 USB hub built-in), a light-up (blue and pink) optical mouse, a Binary Clock (my mood clock died earlier this year) and a “red to blue” Aduki ni (not to be confused with the sibling, Aduki) from Mathmos. I 
Mathmos — I already own an AstroBaby (original 1963 lava lamp) and an Airswitch tc, so I’m building quite a collection.
My sister and her boyfriend gave me some fabulous The Nightmare Before Christmas goodies that match and compliment the ones Bean bought for me.
As a final word on the pressies, I’d just like to thank Vixx again for the Clarkson book and Prince album (which, as she knows from my excited ramblings contains a picture of Prince’s naked arse cheeks! 
).
I can’t wait to get stuck into the book, though it’ll no doubt have to wait until the new year as I’ve started Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita over this last week — I’ve wanted to read it for years, K managed to snag me a hardback copy for Christmas.
As I said before, I shall be away over the holiday season, so if all falls quiet this end, you know why.
Lastly, Merry Christmas everyone!
A full-time wheelchair user since 1998, Claire lives in an adapted bungalow in England with her Partner of 10 years and their two dogs: 
I love Jeremy Clarkson. He just talks so much sense and is logical. Except perhaps the ideology that we all drive fast cars and who cares about Global Warming. I love it that he doesn’t care about being PC at all — and he gets away with it, somehow, too.
Merry Christmas to you! And a Happy New Year.
Merry, merry Christmas darlin’. Wishing you love, fun and hijinks this season and all you wish for yourself in 2007, unless that involves puppy-stabbing or anything. I feel confident it doesn’t.
Much love, sweetie-pie.
Oh, yes… the good old NES. I remember when my sister brought that thing home and we played Super Mario Bros.
I also miss the good old “Atari” and Mario Battle games. We still have the NES, but I think it ain’t working anymore. I tried it once a couple of years ago, but it wasn’t working. I’m jealous about your D70. I have a Nikon F50 (mirror reflex).
Amber: Happy New Year to you too and I hope you had a good Christmas!
Jeremy is my hero — I agree with your disagreeing with him about global warming etc — it’s the execution of his rants/opinions that I love, he says what most people are thinking (but dare not say publicly, themselves), IMHO.
Sam (PCB): You’re right, it doesn’t
Best wishes to you and yours for 2007! 
Atari? My memory of that is hazy — my major passion of that era was the Commodore 64 
Sarah: I love the NES, but I must admit to being a Sega girl, first and foremost.
A friend of mine had a Commodore 64. He got it from his brother and we played with it until the late 90s. It was a lot of fun, indeed. We played games like “Donald Duck” or the Winter / Summer Olympics. It was like NES in a way — If you only take the graphic-aspect into consideration. You can get to know something about Atari at atarimuseum.com
I think the one we had was This one
Sarah: Thanks for the link
‘Twas good to see as I barely remember the Atari at all… I do remember the Amiga though, my cousin had it — I thought it was so “hi-tech” at the time! 
My sister didn’t have an Amiga, but an old Schneider computer. It had cassettes instead of floppy discs — real cassetts like the music cassettes. I still wonder how this worked.
Sounds like you came down with a bumper haul of swag this year! I am sooo jealous of your D70 — I would sell off various lesser known members of my family to raise the funds if I could!
A C64? Pah! I was a proud Sinclair 64k owner with seperate tape recorder — oh the endless hours of waiting for a program to load, only to realise that the f***er hadn’t picked up the signal properly!
Anyway, Happy New 2007!
I promise you that the situation improved no further with the C64
Happy New Year
1. I love stuff too. Especially from people who care. They know what stuff you want. Lucky thing you.
2. Waiting to see what the D70 does for your photos. I guess if you have an eye, you have an eye. I have a Canon D350, but no eye (figuratively speaking).
3. Retro gaming: Arcade Joust — the only thing I looked OK playing without dying in 30 sedonds. Home computing: BBC micro with Chuckie Egg and Elite. Also Spectrum with Jetpac which was a bit like Joust if I remember right. Those were the days!