If there’s one party everyone wants to attend, it’s Canon’s Christmas bash. Pity any other company that tries to host its do on the same night.

So, what do we remember of the night? Well, there was Chris of the P spilling a full glass of champagne on my jeans and me doing the same on Potunkey’s combats. The drunk woman who I had to help up the stairs and who wouldn’t leave me alone once we got to the top. A long chat with Jalal about why he had to change his name. Eating lots of nibbly stilton things. The difficulty I had ordering a latte at the station, and my subsequent surprise when I found myself instead drinking an americano.

Fortunately it was all digitally documented.

Chris of the P, and Ross in the angry state

Potunkey and Computer Shopper

Will and his surprising dexterity

Me and some fish balls (picture by Chris of the P)

Potunkey later in the night

Will, shortly after arriving

Neil and Mark get friendly

After weeks of backwards and forwards letter-writing with Sky, we turned to the web and the ‘Instant Answers Online’ tool. Simple question - how do we look at our bill online? Sky wasn’t so sure:

We tried several variations, but it was no more helpful than the telephone support centres, the letters we’ve sent or received or the ‘active’ stuff on the Sky+ box. So, we decided to see whether it was any more enlightening on any other subjects. Turns out it is. In fact, when you stop asking it about Sky it’s actually quite clever.

I had a lovely day on Saturday. I went here.

…and this one is Veliko Tarnovo, the city of the Tzars. It was the capital of Bulgaria once. Now it’s just a beautiful hill-top town.

This one is the House of Spies in Bucharest, Romania.

Here’s another mini world. This time it’s Trakai Castle in Lithuania.

Chris of the Phin directed me towards the technique for making mini worlds from your photos this week. He’ll be writing it up for MacUser, but in the meantime I’ve been playing around with the technique. Here’s a little world made from the Pont du Gard in Provence.

Chris of the Phin has been security marking, to protect us from thieveries.

Here’s the little fellow I ate my lunch with today in Bedford Square.

Moo, a British start-up masquerading as an American printing house (Dollar pricing, you see), does only one product. But it does it well.

These funky little calling cards have your own photos on one side, and your details on the back. Anything you like so long as it’s six lines or less. The pictures come straight out of your Flickr account and you can crop them with some judicious repositioning through the excellent Flash interface.

Mine arrived today; the packaging is almost as good as the beautifully printed, matt-finished contents.

Highly, highly recommended.