Watercooler Stories

'JINGLE HELL' LOOMS

One in three workers in Britain spends Christmas thinking about getting a new job while one in five considers getting a divorce, a trend dubbed "jingle hell."

Relate, a counseling organization in the United Kingdom, finds calls are 50 percent higher in January than in other months while divorce lawyers also report a flood of post-Christmas inquiries, the Daily Telegraph reports.

Psychologists say many people use Christmas and the end of the year to reassess their lives because, they believe, "there must be more to it than this."

Some people find Christmas hell and have arguments with spouses and family, while others find they've been hanging on to marriages that had not been working for a long time.

MODEL TRAINS GO DIGITAL

Model trains -- a $400 million industry -- haven't changed a lot since they came on the scene more than 100 years ago, but they've added a digital component.

"There is an instant connection that is just as viable with an 18-month-old as with an 8-year-old," John Brady, vice president for marketing at Lionel, tells the New York Times reports.

Some newer model trains have incorporated a digital signaling system called Digital Command Control, which use microprocessors and allows users to operate more than one train on a track.

The digital controls also can be used to add customized sounds -- like horns and lights -- and train makers hope this will help draw young people who had been lured away by video games.

FOOD: JUST WHAT THE DOCTOR ORDERED

Some in the intensive care unit of Harborview Hospital in Seattle call chef Mike Byran a Christmas angel.

About 70 family members who have someone in the ICU got a lavish Christmas dinner courtesy of Bryan and his Palisade restaurant.

The dinners started when Bryan's neighbor was in the ICU last year and the chef was approached by Harborview to make dinner for the families on Christmas Day.

His food was just what the doctor ordered and he did it again this year.

"Providing something as simple as a nice meal can really makes a huge difference in someone's holiday when you're in that situation," Byran says in a statement.

DIGITAL CAMERAS ON THE RISE

For those taking the yearly photograph of family in front of the Christmas tree, the chances are that it will be with a digital camera.

Sales of digital cameras surpassed those of film cameras for the first time last year and the gap will widen this year as prices have dropped for the high-tech camera.

Infotrends, a market research firm, estimates that in 2004 digital camera sales are expected to reach 17.8 million while film camera sales drop to 9 million units, the New York Times reports.

Not only have the cameras gotten cheaper, they have become easier to use since they were introduced in the mid-1990s.