From the spiritual to the material, and Santa has come early, bringing me a 2012 desk diary of extreme smartness. It's so smart that I fear my notes and scribblings will only sully its pages, but on the other hand it's too lovely a thing not to use, so perhaps I should take that as a challenge and resolve to live up to it.
Apparently, it's of a type known as 'the Panama hat' of books, as despite (or maybe because of) a handmade leather binding and stitched spine, "it can be rolled up and squashed and will improve with age". Although it's very tactile, I don't think I'll test that claim.
