1. If you haven’t discovered the Swingle Singers yet and you love singing you are in for a delicious treat. Here’s their Christmas single, a unique version of O holy night.
2. Ever found yourself reading the comment thread on a Christian blog and thinking “I wish there was a gif for what I’m thinking right now”? Look no further, because here’s a brilliant new Tumblr called When In Comments, providing gif reactions to those comments that make us roll our eyes, tear our hair out, or start to fear for humanity.
3. Domestic violence charity Refuge has teamed up with the Independent on Sunday for its Christmas appeal this year. It’s well known that incidents of domestic violence increase over the festive season. Due to spending cuts, budgets for refuges and domestic violence services have been cut, despite the fact that they are in demand now more than ever – in some areas. Something to think about as we remember that the festive season isn’t a happy one for everyone.
4. If you’ve bought fair trade chocolate this Christmas, you can download a specially designed tag from Stop the Traffik to label it traffik free.
5. A comment piece by Peter Oborne in the Telegraph last week on the conflict in the Middle East.
6. If the world was going to end in four and a half minutes this would be a fun thing to do.
7. It’s Christmas, lots of talk about angels, shepherds and baby Jesus in a manger. And we sometimes customise our Jesus, a bit like in Talladega Nights
but also like in this great poem from Godfrey Rust.
8. The Big Fat Christmas Infographic
Let this interactive infographic take you on an alternative Christmas journey, through space lifts and dinosaur eggs.
9. Coldplay aren’t everyone’s cup of tea, but the Christmas song they released a couple of years ago is still one of the best modern festive tunes.
10. The world’s number one elasticated table game. Or, the most fun you’ll ever have. With its simple rustic charm, ethically-minded production and seriously great gameplay, Pucket‘s a winning alternative to the post-Christmas repetitions of Articulate and Settlers. Not as portable as Boggle.
11. Jesus famously got given gold by some wise men, we willingly hand over handfuls of gold (coins) during this gift-buying season, and Willy Mason keeps his own gold underneath the ground. Need some energising to wrap those final few presents? Enjoy.
12. And a crazy video of a man playing the spoons to Faithless
Image by Florin Garoi, via stock.xchng images.