1. Google yourself, your friends and your exes!
With an estimated 20 billion web pages in its index, the chances are that there’ll be a reference to someone you know listed in Google. If there’s not a specific reference you yourself, you may well have a namesake living somewhere else in the world. If there is, drop them a note, they’ll more than likely be pleased, or at least curious, to hear from you. You can extend your search to friends, work colleagues, old school mates and even exes, you’ll be amazed what you can find out!

2. Get Flickr’ing.
Most people now own, or have access to, a digital camera (nearly all mobiles have one these days) and have thousands of digital images clogging up their computers’ hard-drive. One of the joys of photography is sharing your photos and memories and flick.com is a great place to do it – and it’s free!

You can create your own online albums, upload images to them and then share them with the world. Guests who view your photos can also comment on them and you can get some great feedback on what’s great about your pics and how they can be improved.

If you fancy yourself as a critic, you can also comment on other people’s photos. Flickr.com has an estimated 4billion photos that should keep even the harshest critic busy for a few days.

3. Get a new Notebook.
We’re not talking about a new laptop here but referring to a great online service that helps wean you off post-it pads and start using a digital version instead. www.evernote.com lets you post notes, pictures, videos, screen-shots, web-pages and just about anything else you can think of to an online site that allows you to retrieve your notes wherever you have internet access, including your mobile. And it’s free!

The concept of saving ‘post-it’ notes online takes a little thinking about but once you’re over that, you’ll ever go back. You can organise notes into different notebooks – home, work, projects, hobbies etc and tag them (e.g. articles, shopping, technology) for easy searching, retrieval and amending. If you have mobile Internet access, try the mobile application, it’s great for capturing your notes and thoughts while on the go.

4. Entertain yourself with Youtube.
We’ve all spent hours over Christmas watching reruns and boring TV but with Youtube there’s no longer any need nor reason to get bored. There are more hours of entertainment uploaded to Youtube every day than the movie industry produces in a year. You can watch everything from the latest X-factor contestant to an explanation of how a rocket engine works, and you can watch it when you choose to watch it. So if there’s nothing that grabs your attention on the TV, power up you PC and have a surf around Youtube. You will be amazed as to what people will film themselves doing!

As a bit of fun, if you reply to this post with your favourite Youtube clip  I’ll share it here (subject to editorial review). One of my favourites to make you smile is below..

5. Check out the sales.
Shopping online has always been about bargain hunting so, for the sales this January, don’t get up early and camp outside in the pouring cold rain; log-on early, grab yourself a nice cup of coffee, turn on your pc and surf in the warmth and comfort of your own home.

‘Etailers’ (online retailers) know that people want to enjoy the sales online and often provide early notices for their registered customers. Get registered for advance notices and get a lead on the other bargain hunters.

So, instead of getting bored with TV and relatives, get online an have some fun. Let me know any great sites or services you come across.

Nadolig Llawen a blwyddyn newydd dda.

Here’s the story. As only the Monty Python cast could tell it…

The serious side of this is the power of free and it’s ability to generate a huge following. The Monty Python’s decision to give away all their archive footage has developed a new generation of Python followers and has relaunched their dvd collection to best seller status.

Whether you’re a fan or not, go grab yourself a coffee and take 15 minutes to browse around their channel. Come back and tell me if you didn’t get a smile on your face. http://www.youtube.com/montypython