Readers! It's almost Christmas! I hope that you've all got exultant plans this year; I myself will be trying to be as academic as possible while playing host to lots of lovely friends and huge amounts of punch. Also, I think it's horrible to feel guilty about not having any money to spend on my family. I mean, I love capitalist neo-liberalism as much as the next reprogrammed consumer drone (thank you Starbucks), but with the amount of money that gets ploughed into the world, the least it could offer in return is to do me a favour by not shoving it into my face that IF I DON'T SPEND, I DON'T LOVE! everywhere I turn. It's all bollocks, if you ask me. And you should ask me.

On a related theme, I got given a book today, by a slightly mysterious man who said that it would keep me out of trouble, which is something I'm always eager to be kept out of. Somewhat predictably, however, it turned out to be a tract of Vedic knowledge. Random sentence: 'When a rabbit sees some danger it closes its eyes and thinks there is no danger'. I can tell you, however, that if you close your eyes around someone selling religion to you and then open them, that person will still be there. I'm sure this means I can sue someone.