Chris Thompson   Chris Thompson on the internet

Well, mince pies have been eaten, booze guzzled. But most importantly, I’ve spent time with people I haven’t seen for a while. Indeed, some friends I haven’t seen in over a year, because after university everyone followed the road that lead to their ideal job, or at least a job in the vague direction of their ideal job, and more often than not this meant leaving the area and going to a city somewhere. So it has been nice seeing them, exchanging stories, catching up.

Ultimately, Christmas is about family, about spending time with the ones you love, and even if you can only do it briefly in some cases, and not properly in others, it’s nice all the same. So it was especially good to see my grandparents, and my auntie, who is not often in the country.

But one of the main reasons I wanted to write this piece is because I’ve found quite an interesting news story here, on the BBC website. It is about chimps, and is particularly interesting because it comes after an episode of Life, narrated by David Attenborough, which focused on primates, and was really very good. In that, we saw how they use different tools and techniques to break open food.

Here, though, apparently that extends to cleavers: they’re chopping up food into more manageable chunks with blades. I just thought it was quite a charming story. And, after all, why shouldn’t monkeys celebrate at this time of year, too?