This is the most difficult column of the year to write. It being the non-denominational holiday season for the celebration of this and that, I can't suggest that you save money this week. (Nor am I going to suggest that you throw it away, since I expect you'll have that covered.) Instead, I shall devote this column to a collection of things that have been on my mind of late.

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I saw that, in his Ministerial capacity, El James has taken to suggesting ways that people might save money on groceries and so forth. To maintain the balance, I might have to focus on running the country.

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You may have seen a "journalist" in Iraq throw his shoes at President Bush. Actual journalists don't throw footwear, or anything else, at world leaders. Imagine what would happen if I were to start tossing my hippie sandals at our leading politicians. I'd be put in jail, that's what would happen, and I wouldn't get my sandals back. Do you suppose the Bermudian people would march down the street demanding my release from jail? Would insurance company CEOs be waving placards saying "Free Crombie now"? You bet they wouldn't. I'd moulder in jail until some guys came along and beat the living daylights out of me during a card game.

You may not know it, but there is an unwritten pact between journalists and the Government of Bermuda. We don't throw footwear, and they don't throw us in jail. It's a system that has worked extremely well so far. By the way, no sign of the Iraqi Government withdrawing its advertising from the TV station that employed the shoe-throwing "journalist". The pen, of course, is mightier than the shoe.

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I want to talk to you next about raffles. Not the hotel in Singapore, or the gentleman bandit, but, you know, the lottery-style lark where you buy a ticket and may or may not win a prize.

Last week, I bought a couple of tickets for the Christmas Raffle Draw operated by Sandys Rotary. A man was selling tickets outside Miles, which I had ducked into in order to spend three months' salary on a packet of potato crisps. Of all the prizes available in the raffle, the one I had in mind was the 42-inch flat screen TV. I happened to have the car with me when I bought the tickets, so I offered to take the TV home with me there and then. I thought it would save the Sandys people the burden of delivering the thing to the other end of the Island. He wouldn't give me the TV, for some reason.

Then I heard that this very nice woman I know had won it instead, and I'm not getting it, even though I bought the tickets with the express desire of having it. I mentioned this to a friend. He pointed out that I don't have space for a 42-inch TV, plus I hardly ever watch TV. Plus, Cablevision has this plan where they're not going to show any channels, because it cuts into their profit. I understand the logic: why would Cablevision waste money on their customers? But, and here's the point, why should I buy raffle tickets and get nothing in return? Doesn't make any sense, does it?

The Sandys people probably gave my money to the deserving poor. That's very nice. So the poor come out ahead, and Cablevision, and Miles, and that nice lady — and I get nothing but a bag of potato crisps. So much for the spirit of Christmas. See why I don't bother with it?

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I made a comment last week about how putting smokers in the street had led to the financial crisis. I pointed out that the risk-takers were outdoors, and the risk-averse were inside running the country into the ground.

A fellow stopped me in the street earlier this week to point out that the countries that had most viciously applied the antismoking rules were the first into recession: the US, UK and Ireland. The French, who banned smoking only half-heartedly, are only halfway into a recession.

Clearly, I was on to something. I smell a Nobel prize in all this, and if I win one, I'm going to buy a flat-screen TV and two packets of potato crisps with the $1 million prize money.

Finally, a bit of good news in this sphere: Barack Obama is a smoker, so we'll be OK soon.

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The Bermuda Monetary Authority this week released a report on computer models. It contained a lot of sentences similar to this one: "Correlation matrices need to be positive semi-definite to enable some computational approaches, such as Cholesky decomposition." Obviously, no one knows what that means, so the Authority was thoughtful enough to append a footnote to that sentence, by way of explanation. The footnote read: "A matrix is positive semi-definite if it is self-adjoint (Hermitian) with non-negative eigenvalues. This can be interpreted as the matrix being internally consistent and mathematically pliable." So now you know.

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Here's a stock tip for 2009: Plaxico. Could be a shooting star.

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Here is my annual seasonal message to all my readers, which for some reason is not published on the front page along with those from other worthies.

As we reach the national shutdown that marks the non-denominational celebration of whatever-you-call-it, be of good cheer. Enjoy the seemingly endless break from your hard work. Spend time with your families, which will hasten your return to work. And as one of the worst financial years in generations gives way to one that will be even worse, think positive thoughts.

That's it. Smoke if you've got 'em. Oh, and Merry Christmas.