Christmas shopping is done. My tip? Make sure you have no pals

I've finished my Christmas shopping.

- Lucy Mangan

You can do this when you have no extended family you care about and no friends. Strong recommend.

If you start cutting off the latter (accept no invitations to Christmas parties is my top tip) and arguing with the former (if you do so in the run up to 25 December and really get into it over the turkey dinner, you will get maximum estrangement bang-for-your-bellicose buck) by this time next year you too will be in a position to do a quick dash to M&S for a blue jumper for Mum, buy online gift cards for all the under-18s, pick something concordant with your personal budget from your sister's email full of links to desired items from Wolf & Badger, choose a book/contribution to your husband's latest stupid hobby, then sit back and relax with a box of peppermint creams while you apply yourself to the important business of searching the internet for the perfect outfits, toys and treats for your pets. Happy Christmas 2026 to you all.

Tuesday

Collins Dictionary has announced its word of the year. It is two words, which seems about right in this faithless, degenerate age. Those words are “vibe coding”.

What do they mean? Well, in one sense they mean the practice of telling AI what you want your computer to do and having it write the code necessary for it to do so. In another, it means we have all lived too long and, collectively, quite badly.