The time is flying faster than a chav with a stolen Burberry handbag. A busy weekend just gone. Went to a Fair Trade Christmas fair where we made a start on a few Christmas presents. Also bought a new kettle - it's a disco inferno!! It glows blue/purple light when it is boiling - so great!! When I told Leila, she immediately advised to don the gold hot pants!! The fish are flourishing too - the cold weather means that they are less active and just sort of sluggishly laze around at the bottom of the pool. It's tempting to pour in a can of Red Bull to see if it has any effect.

On Sunday, Andrew went up to Manchester - we don't normally do work flights on weekends but the training course he is running started early this morning.

Busy day in work. Took a phone call from a Councillor about a problem back lane. As is often the case, it's a combination of flat dwellers with no refuse storage, some dodgy trade waste, residents putting out too early and a bit of mayhem into the bargain. Each element will have to be tackled. Fortunately, she is one of our nicer Cllrs, who is polite and friendly when she phones up - so much better to deal with.

Spent the afternoon shortlisting for the new Smoking Related Litter Project Officer. We received twenty five applications - more than I was expecting with an excellent mix of candidates, both internal and external. I love shortlisting as you feel as though you are opening a Christmas present with each new candidate - each form presents them in a different way. A wide variety of life experiences and ages and backgrounds to choose from. We eventually shortlisted down to ten candidates for interview. Hopefully (if HR play ball) we can interview next week. The candidates will also be doing a presentation as part of their interview. This will form 20% of the marking.

By the time we'd finished, it was nearly time to go home. So I did.