Spent the day working through some of the Christmas presents, starting with Longitudes and Attitudes
by Thomas Friedman. It's collection of Friedman's writings for the New York Times both before and after September 11th and because of this it makes for rather unsatisfactory reading.

Friedman's columns are thought-provoking nuggets but collected together and read side-by-side they seem superficial and overly showy. Still, Friedman's workview is fundamentally sound -- even if his repertoire of core themes is limited. My advice; Read the Prologue -- "The Super-Story" -- in the bookshop and skip the rest. The into tells you everything you need to know about his take on the world.

My soundtrack to the drive back to London has been Uninvisible by New York Trip-Boppers Medeski, Martin and Wood. It's my first MMW album; it won't be my last.

This evening I had the misfortune to watch My Little Eye which I tried hard to like because the director Marc Evans is Welsh. But even patriotic allegiance couldn't save it. It's thoroughly awful. How one of the main characters manages to log onto the internet through a handheld GPS device is anyone's guess. He might as well have logged on using a washing machine. Avoid.