Mrs Henderson Presents: Dragonmeet...

December 1st saw the ceremonial plugging in of the USB Christmas Tree in my office. Well, when I say "ceremonial," what I actually mean is "stretching behind the back of one of the computers sat on my desk, trying to find the USB ports at the back by feel," but the first option sounded better. It also saw a trip up to Oxford to have dinner with secretrebel and angry_marmot, which would have been improved by (a) the M40 not being completely todgered on my way up there, causing me to be rather later than planned; (b) the weather not being horrendous while driving (both ways) -- high winds and driving rain; (c) one of angry_marmot's friends not having been mugged, causing AM to have to dash off on a mission of mercy... still, dinner was good, and it was nice to have a chance to sit around and chat with SR, venta, and the mysterious C.

Friday saw day 2 of delivery people being incredibly stupid as to where to leave packages; on Thursday, our mailperson had left the parcel containing the prototype of SPX out in the rain (along with something misdelivered for one of our neighbours). Friday's haul involved another parcel left outside by the postperson (this time it was the Christmas cards I'd ordered the previous day) and also Securicor/DHL/whoever they are this week leaving a large box of Amazon stuff on the damp ground (luckily not damaging any of the contents, as it turned out). Our porch now bears a large notice involving huge fonts, red ink and underlining suggesting that delivery people use their eyes some common sense the doorbell, handily located in the porch, to summon assistance [which has just, even as I type, worked; the first parcel-bearing delivery person of the day has knocked on the door] . I'll settle for them actually leaving stuff in the porch, at a pinch. Muppets.

Saturday was, eventually, Dragonmeet. I say "eventually" because we never get there very early at the best of times; this time we made it there by about 2pm. (rotwang wanted a lie-in after having driven back from Sheffield the previous night, and who was I to complain?) We pottered around, bought stuff (including thessalian's very impressive Affiliates game), attempted to persuade people to come out for pizza and failed, and finally wound up having a very pleasant Italian meal before pottering home.

And finally, Sunday: we ventured out to do some Christmas shopping in Kingston. We survived, and managed to clear out some of the list of people for whom we had no idea what to buy -- Muji has all sorts of nifty odds and ends at the moment, for instance. I'm still somewhat at a loss for what to buy the one-year-old on the presents list (O parents of said one-year-old, do you have guidance for me?) We went to see Mrs Henderson Presents in the evening. Excellent, as might have been expected from the cast -- Judi Dench and Bob Hoskins make anything good.