In previous years, we spent most of our time outdoors over Christmas. Walking in hilly woodland or enjoying rigorous exercise on the ski slopes. A chance to recover from the hectic pace at TU/e and stretch our limbs. Now, all the exercise we got was moving from the living room to the bedroom and back again, but we did have time to play our favorite game: gift-voucher quartet.

For years now, Christmas has brought us a shower of all kinds of gift vouchers. From one friend we'll get a card from the Bijenkorf department store; from another we'll get a book voucher. And from a third, a Bol.com voucher or an Eigen Huis gift voucher. We have now saved so many of these gift vouchers that we can play the card game quartet with them. “Can I have from you, the Bol.com voucher, the 2019 one?”, followed by, “No, I haven't got it. Can I have from you the 2018 Bijenkorf voucher?”.

Because you never know which gift vouchers you will receive, it is always difficult to make a complete quartet. Luckily, the TU/e Christmas box 2020 was a truly heaven-sent gift. I even had the chance to choose which gift voucher I wanted to receive, and so right before Christmas our gift-voucher quartet was complete. Well, almost complete: in the category ‘travel vouchers’ we still have only one card.

I hope this coming Christmas finds me back out walking or skiing. And that we can spend our evenings playing quartet or another game by the fire. And if all goes smoothly, we might even be somewhere among mountains, on a trip booked with that travel voucher.

I wish everyone a happy and healthy 2021!