Well it's here - the new millennium. When I was young I felt that the year 2000 was never going to reach us, it was off there somewhere. I would be old when it did catch up with us.

Now I'm convinced time does fly, because it has arrived. (And so I suppose I must be old.) Is it a fact as we get older time goes quicker, or is it we are more conscious of time?

When my children got their Christmas holidays they were delighted and excited: nearly three weeks off school. Having to wait a week for Santa seemed almost too much for them to bear.

My youngest son, on finding a present under the Christmas tree with his name, could hardly content himself to wait until Christmas morning before opening it. He shook it and rattled it, to no avail. "Would you not even give me a clue?" he asked his grandmother. "No clues. You must wait until Christmas morning," she told him. "But that's too long! I'll never wait that long - it's not fair! Why do I always have to wait?"

He knew his grandmother would not give in, so he turned the tables: in his most charming and winning voice he gave her a present from himself. "Here's my present to you," he said. "It is my present and I want to give it to you now and I want you to open it now." She couldn't refuse - he was so enthusiastic.

She opened it up to find a bar of perfumed soap. "That is a very expensive bar of soap," he declared. "You must only use it for special occasions, okay? Now can I open my present?"

"Sorry," she said. "Tomorrow is Christmas Day - you must wait." "Tomorrow will never come, and I won't be able to sleep waiting." But tomorrow did come. So did the New Year. Time stands still for no man. Have a good one.