Hello. Hope this Xmas newsletter finds you all well.

Quiz: What has converted the once shy young man on the left into the sad old dude on the right ?

The answer is of course as so many of you will have guessed by now, 25 years and 3 kids.

Well its the end of the year again. Don't know where that one went as usual. This year has been dominated by the EXTENSION. This actually started in Oct. 2000 and finally ground to a halt a year later leaving us with no less than 6 places of easence - Carlton Road's only 6-holer. Gillian took one or two photos during this process. If you flick them, you can see it being built at the expense of a sore thumb.

So we have gone webby this year - hope you can all get to it. Your chronicler thought it was time to summon the combined experiences of 30 years of playing with computers into something useful. Unfortunately, this appeared instead. So how are we all ?

Leo is settled down in his second year at the University of Liverpool reading occasionally but he seems to be doing well. He now shares a house with 4 others one of whom appears to be a vampire. You will like this. Walking into the bathroom on a recent visit, my shoes actually stuck to the floor. When I asked who cleaned the bathroom, it turned out that none of them did - they each 'cleaned' their own rooms but hadn't quite got around to cleaning the communal areas like bathroom, kitchen and so on. So this is a warning to all visitors. Don't eat there, seal all bodily orifices, make sure your jabs are up to date and hold your breath. To those of you who remember my postgraduate pit at Mauldeth road, their's is worse already, (although the windows haven't fallen into the garden yet). Leo is still saving his lovely voice until his allergy to practice goes away and his music studies seem to involve surrounding himself with computers, synths and sundry other bits - "its music Jimi but not as we know it". There is still something slightly odd about hearing an obviously real 36 piece orchestra emanating from his room, opening the door and find him grinning inside surrounded by flashing lights. He took up the guitar again in the summer and makes some really nice sounds with it although practice seems once again a significant obstacle. His sprinting has withered away but he is now secretary of the University ski club on which he can bring to bear his not considerable organisational skills. A lovely lad, he was 21 this year. Urk.

Felix is officially the largest member of the family and still growing fast and now has to tow a fridge around with him to top up between meals. The strange asymmetry in his forearms, (the right one was much bigger than the left owing to his childhood carpentry activities) has now mostly disappeared as he continues athletics training so he doesn't look quite so much like a genetically modified lobster as he used to. He got a very good set of GCSE's or whatever they are called this week and his athletic year culminated in him being ranked 3^rd in the UK under 17s for javelin. His speaker fetish of last year has been mostly replaced by a dirt-bike fetish but he remains pleasingly eccentric - every home should have one. Just recently when Issy wrenched her ankle, we were pleased to be able to tell the casualty doctor that we had our own crutches. Felix was on them so often that we felt guilty about depriving the NHS of an important asset so we bought our own. If anybody wants to borrow them please contact Nurse Libretto. Fe is continuing his art studies in the sixth form at Millfield but we are not sure what he wants to do yet.

Both lads retain their wacky sense of humour which is very nice - here they are interviewing a plant ...

The plant is the green one. Leo is on the right.

Isabelle, (nee Decibel), now Issy, continues with her love of music and drama. She's 13 now, at Surbiton High School, enjoying herself and doing just fine. The piano, flute and even violin are coming along well and she has some nice friends. The voice is still there but mostly in control although you can still hear her clearly in the school choir and the assembly rooms where they practise has suffered some minor structural damage. She still does gymnastics and has become a gymnastics coach this year. As her brothers will attest, she is unusually strong for her size recently whupping everybody in the school drama production at arm-wrestling including all but one 16 year old boy whom she allowed keep his arm. Yes, I know this is not a conventional activity for a demure young lady.

Issy in between tootling.

Gillian's year has been manic as usual. Unfortunately her asthma came back with a vengeance in the later part of the year due probably to the immense amount of dust generated by the extension. Hopefully that will now decline. Apart from organising the whole of the extension, her indoor athletics teams have done really well this year so all her hard work is bearing fruit. As well as organising all this lot, she also organises the family holidays. This year we went to Crete accompanied by various friends including the kids' godfather Dave and Les' old friend Don. Basically its too hot for Les but we all had a lovely time with Don demonstrating his water-skiing skills and later his collapsing in a heap skills having been towed half way to Thera and back. Speaking of Thera, (aka Santorini), a day trip allowed Gillian to continue her volcano collecting. Santorini is lovely if you are prepared to turn a blind eye to the tourist activities which leave you with the thinly-disguised hope that Thera will blow its top again. (The occasional Minoan still comes hurtling down with a big splash after the last eruption in 1570 BC). Just listen out for ...

................ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhhiiiiiiii ... SPLASH

Gillian, revelling in sunlight.

Les is still travelling - about 25 trips this year. Earlier on it was the US and India where in an idle moment he watched India v. Australia in the third test at Chennai and the Australian team in even better form in the hotel bar afterwards. Latterly though its all been European so its not too bad. He still spends part of his time as a pillar of the academic community. If you believe that you'll believe anything. The band is doing fine but not playing often enough, something we hope to sort out in the New Year. Athletics had a plus and a minus. The plus was that at the third attempt he finally became UK M50 vets javelin champion. The minus was that he dinged a knee cartilage competing a month later and it looks like it might need key-hole surgery.

Nannie is fast approaching 80 and keeping well. She will again be spending Xmas with us and talking to the turkey.

The tortoises have had a very, well tortoisoid year. Kerby humped everything in sight including Les' boots and bit his toe. Trampolina hid in terror and Thomas escaped to get away from him. We think Kerby is a Tortoisaurus Rex. The fish have spent the entire year swimming.

We hope you are well and here's wishing you a very merry Christmas and Happy new Year. 8-)

This missive was constructed entirely without the enriching experience of Microshaft software. Nothing crashed, everything worked. How dull.