I don’t usually get too many presents for my birthday, since I don’t exactly have a huge family. It’s never bothered me because it’s always been that way. All I want right now — since I don’t have any major needs, and most of the stuff I really want is damned expensive — is for people to wish me a happy birthday, and if they want, get me a well-thought-out gift (or one I have prepared earlier, if you don’t want to think about it).

Here is what I have currently received this year:

• A Royal Selangor Chinese Dragon
• A bottle of fine Woodford Reserve bourbon (bottle 7840 from batch 4)
• The Simpsons - Season 3 DVD
• A piece of paper with a monetary value attached (commonly called a “gift voucher”); redeemable at Sanity music stores
• Another piece of paper with a monetary value attached. This time, it’s redeemable at JB Hi-Fi stores
• A picnic rug
• A picnic set, contained within a backpack
• A nice big blanket thing
• An Atlas pasta maker
• A Simpsons photomosaic puzzle

I will update this list as more things arrive.

Certain people have mentioned they are having trouble deciding on presents for my birthday. Personally, I don’t care what the present is, as long as it’s thoughtful. Although I love stuff, I can really live without more so don’t feel like you’re compelled to get me anything.

Only get me something if you want to; if you are still having trouble deciding, this list may help.

Since Justine’s birthday is coming up soon (along with mine, my Dad’s, and Justine’s Dad’s), I thought it was time to get her the present I’d been planning on getting… her. Because I usually get badgered around present-time until I tell her what she’s getting, Justine already knew she was getting an ice cream maker (ours is a Breville, but appears to be the same model).

The machines are sort of dodgy, except for the really expensive (i.e. $500+) ones. Basically, they consist of a big bowl that you put in the freezer, and a churning attachment. Once the big bowl is frozen, you pour the pre-made ice cream mix (that you make yourself, from real ingredients; it’s not a packet mix) into the cold bowl as it’s churning. Even then, the only real difference with the expensive ones is that they have a freezer unit inside them instead of the bowl you put in your freezer.

And since we couldn’t wait until June 9, we decided to make ice cream yesterday. Well, I decided to make ice cream yesterday.

I made some lemon sorbet using some lemons from the tree in our back yard and some strawberry ice cream using strawberries from … the store. The lemon sorbet turned out pretty well, except that it was quite a lot sweeter than we’d anticipated. Next time we’ll use a lot less sugar (1.5 cups in 1 litre). The strawberry ice cream turned out really well though. Perhaps a little too egg-yolky flavoured but otherwise really nice.

Hopefully it will cut down our ice cream costs, which seem to soar into the thousands every year.

It’s (quite) a few days after Christmas now. I meant to do a write-up of my Christmas but have been too lazy to do it until now.

So, without further ado, here’s the lowdown on my Christmas Day and Boxing Day hijinks…

Christmas Day, I was woken up by Justine at 08:15. Not too bad, I’d expected to be woken at 07:00 so I did manage a little sleep in. First things first though, presents!! Unfortunately, none of the DVDs I’d ordered as Christmas presents had arrived, so there will be a mini-Christmas in the early New Year (hopefully!). I nabbed some clothes, an eyebrow ring (mmm… anodised), SSX3 for Gamecube, the DVD which hasn’t arrived and a gigantic Simpsons mug from Justine. Sweet. I got her a DVD which hasn’t arrived, two sets of pyjamas (as if she doesn’t already have enough!), a picture frame, two little wooden cat… things, and some clothes.

Right, now that’s out of the way, time to get this show on the road. 09:30 and we take the chooks out of the fridge… they’re still frozen. Oh great. We panic for a little bit (this is the first time we’ve held a Christmas) and then chuck the chooks in the microwave. Phew, they aren’t stuck together any more. We were only going to cook three of them (cause, you know, three chickens is nothing) but as we had put them in the microwave, we decided to cook all four. Four chickens should be enough for eight people, right?

So it’s 11:00 and the chooks have been in the oven for half an hour. Justine calls; “There are another seven people coming.” Seven? Oh, great, we’ll just set another place at the table. Seven?! Luckily, a few people pitched in and grabbed random food from their cupboards, as well as some chairs.

People start arriving, and we’re on track. By 13:30, there are seventeen people in our house. Of those, i had never even met four of five of them before. Two I had met once. Who the hell were all these freeloaders at our place? Were people just walking in off the street? It’s not like my cooking is even particularly good.

Justine and I have had nothing to eat so far today. I’ve been madly cooking and Justine’s been preparing a big salad. Justine has also had three UDL Fusion thinagmies and is looking rather red in the face.

Well, the vegies aren’t all done and the chickens aren’t brown, so why not give out presents? I get a few bits of assorted crap (one doesn’t seem to like me, but more on that later) which get shoved aside but nothing of any interest. Strangely enough, all these people I’ve met zero to one times gave me nothing, but are all going to eat my food. How generous of them.

Well, the chickens spent five hours in the oven. Much too long but Justine didn’t start the vegies until 12:50; and with all the stuff in the oven (four chickens and two huge trays of vegies), everything cooked slower. They were a bit overdone but the freeloaders didn’t seem to mind a free feed a bit.

Time passes…

It’s 17:00 and the freeloaders are long gone (they left just after dessert) and there’s a mountain of cleaning up to do. Somehow, I manage to evade that task completely (though I must thank Justine’s family, and especially her nana for doing this all for me ;).

Day’s over, right? Wrong. I’ve already written a crapload, and if you’re still here, you’re probably tired, so I’ll speed things up a little.

We get to Dad’s place, and force-feed more food into our swollen stomachs. Play a little Pictionary (we had a massive lead, but Justine got tired; and subsequently got pissed off whenever I didn’t guess her crappy drawings. We got a gigantic Ferrero Rocher thing (there was 30 in there, I’ve had one; I think about 10 are missing), a calender for me, candle thing for Justine and I also go the Alien Quadrilogy. Sweet.

12:45 - Bedtime.

Boxing Day started without much sleep. We got up at… I forget actually, but it was probably too early for me. We meet up with Justine’s Dad and her half-brother and sister (and their mum) and head off to Justine’s (other) nana’s house. We eat lunch, I let James (Justine’s half-brother) beat me at chess and we come back home. We have dinner at home again. While preparing a salad, I manage to slice the top off my middle finger with a vegie slicer. It didn’t look bad at first, but the top is definitely straight or bevelled, where my other fingers are rounded… Oops.

Two long days. But they aren’t over.

23:00 - we arrive at Southland for the first time in four months. I’m sitting three rows from the front, four seats from the side, and grinning like an idiot. Yes, I’m watching Return of the King. This film is awesome. Twenty minutes in, I didn’t care that I had a crappy seat; hell, I didn’t even care about my popcorn for about the first hour. This film caps off the trilogy perfectly. Here is an accurate review of the film.

03:45 - In bed, finally. Two long days over. Thank God there’s only another 365 days left (it’s a leap-year next year!).