"Ho ho... Oh."

I have been an avid reader of dooce.com ever since Not Enough Drew emailed me a link to her birth diary with a note saying: '"Today, Dooce has had me laughing like a tickled Buddha".

I have no idea why I remember exactly what he wrote in the email. It possibly has something to do with the fact that I was eight-and-a-half months into a personal challenge to establish how long I could get away with turning up to a temporary job (late) every weekday (except Mondays if I was, you know, tired and stuff), doing exactly nothing all day and putting in a docket every Friday. Quite a long time, as it goes. So I don't really have many golden memories battling for space from that period. Just the day when the staionery company sent me free shiny jiffy bags. Free! Shiny! God, that was a good day.

Drew was equally as committed to his work at the time, although we did manage to achieve something, which was this.

I occupied my "working" hours with a myriad of blogs, blogging, arguing on web forums, drawing endless pictures of myself on a face-drawing site. I don't have time to dick around at work anymore but always, always read Dooce and have very much enjoyed watching Leta - the baby born under the star-shaped ornament bedecking Janet Jackson's 'malfunctioning' nipple - grow up online. Yes, creeping though the internet garden and peeking though a portal into someone else's daily family life feels a little stalkerish sometimes, but what the hell. Heather's funny, Leta is very cute and likes to scream, and Jon even has a beard sometimes. note: this is not a picture of Jon.

And who could fail to love a kid, even if just in an stalkerish, unwanted internet auntie kind of a way, who sums up the holiday season so well. Gawd luv 'er!

Merry Christmas, little girl I read about on the net!