A new year, pronounced twenty ten. Or is it? We shall see. People have got used to saying two-thousand-and because of obvious confusion over twenty-nine and so on, but now that problem is in the past, as so many others are. Will we change? Maybe not. Once we have an idea in our heads, it tends to stick around. A dusting of snow lies on Aspland Road, and the sky is blue over the cathedral; we await the arrival of my Southampton nephew and his wife for a pre-lunch pop-in. Temperatures are still low enough to make driving up the hill less than straightforward.

We arrived home last night about 2am after a laid-back evening with the Robinsons, featuring a lovely meal and a Very Hard Quiz devised by Anne. Well, do you know the capital of Greenland, or what you call a collection of ferrets? Me neither. Well, I do now, and I’m sure it will enrich my life. We also had quite a discussion on family history and a brief stab at charades, which led to my showing them how to access the BBC iPlayer so that they could see a little bit of the brilliantly funny Outnumbered, which I ludicrously attempted to describe as the whole word instead of by syllables. Champagne at midnight, impressively expensive fireworks surrounding the London Eye, some very odd music from Jools Holland’s not-live Hootenanny, and an extra mug of green tea to make sure I was under the limit.

The other highlight of yesterday was picking up a new bin from the John Lewis warehouse after the lid on the old one fell apart. It has a lovely movement, as Alan Partridge might say. I am now reinstalled in my study and about to install Snow Leopard, but I shall wait till my son is available in case of technical problems. He has been strangely offline for quite a while.