Strictly Christmas Stockings

Welcome back! Hope you all had a tasty Christmas.

As promised, we spent part of the break in prison - where my mother-in-law is a chaplain. As you can imagine, Christmas morning with 40 inmates makes for a particularly unique church service. Especially when your (gorgeous) wife is the first civilian woman the men have seen for months, if not years.

But the best moment was when the congregation launched into the Christmas carols. You've never heard Away In A Manger until you've heard it with a sinister undertone of violence.

Aside from prison, we spent most of the holiday with our nieces and their Wiiiii. No Christmas telly at all, which is most unusual for me.

Before we set off for the in-laws, however, we did catch the final of Strictly Come Dancing, which I've become strangely addicted to. This year, justice was done and former Mis-Teeq shouty lady Alesha Dixon took the crown after 12 weeks of knockout performances. Here is one of them:

Alesha Dixon - Argentine Tango


Those of you who have followed Alesha's career will know that, despite a lack of formal training, she had a bit of a head start when it came to the competition, having performed routines both for Mis-Teeq and as a featured performer in NERD's She Wants To Move video. Comme ça:

NERD - She Wants To Move


I was hoping Alesha would use Strictly Come Dancing as a way to revitalise her stalled pop career. Her solo singles last year weren't of the highest quality but they showed a lot of promise. Bruce Forsyth has obviously been paying attention, though. He told Alesha she could be "Britain's Beyoncé", which is a good call for an old duffer.

Of course, this being the UK, the first thing Alesha has done to celebrate her victory is to accept a large amount of dosh to remove her clothes - in this case FHM. In the interests of "research", here are the pics:





So, will Alesha stage the first pop comeback of 2008? Watch this space...

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