Merry Christmas, everyone. I hope you enjoy the column!

Christmas Music

Even if you have a favourite Christmas song how many times can you actually hear that before you start gritting your teeth? You need more Christmas music!

I recently discovered TuneInRadio for my Android phone. Well, the truth is, my husband discovered it for his iPod Touch, and I found out I could get it for my phone. Even better, you can also get TuneInRadio on your PC. Wherever you get it, you’ll find something like 50,000 AM, FM and Internet radio stations from all over the world, including local stations. How do you find what you’re looking for? Browse by location, or the kind of content you want. Or search. I tried searching for Christmas Music and I got a big whack of it, from all over everywhere. Check out tunein.com (http://tunein.com/) during the holiday season and come back later. There is a lot to explore there.

North Pole Radio (http://www.northpoleradio.com/) bills itself as “Santa’s personal collection of Christmas music.” Check out the website or “Like” them on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/North-Pole-Radio/179384905669.

Still, in my opinion, the best source of streaming Christmas music is Accuradio (http://new.accuradio.com/) with at least forty Holiday channels, ranging from “Old Fashioned Christmas” music to “Wait, THEY Made a Christmas Record?!?” and everything in between. Pick a channel and stick with it, switch to another channel, or make your own mix. Like TuneInRadio, Accuradio had a whole lot of music that has nothing to do with the holidays.

Windows Themes for the Holidays

Windows 7 users can download entire themes including the Holiday Lights theme, here: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows/downloads/holiday-lights-theme. XP and Vista computers can’t handle the theme, but you can get the Desktop Backgrounds (“wallpaper”) from the themes and use it as your Desktop Background or make it your screensaver. Here’s a short screencast that shows you how to do that: http://youtu.be/EGzHLfHnlHc.

If you don’t want to change your theme or your wallpaper, how about just adding some snowflakes to what you’ve got? DesktopSnowOK is a portable Windows program that will work on every version of Windows from Windows 7 back to Windows 98. Make snow fall on your desktop. Grab it here: http://www.softwareok.com/?seite=Freeware/DesktopSnowOK. You don’t have to shovel!

Photo: Contributed

NORAD Tracks Santa

I know I’ve mentioned this before. I still think it’s totally great. NORAD tracks Santa every Christmas Eve (http://www.noradsanta.org/en/index.html). NORAD uses four high-tech systems to track Santa – radar, satellites, Santa cams and fighter jets. This year you can follow on Google Earth, Google Maps, your smartphone, Facebook, and Twitter. Oh, and if you have young children around, they can amuse themselves in Countdown Village (http://www.noradsanta.org/en/countdown.html) while you figure out how the Android tracking app works. Why does NORAD do all this? Read the explanation here: http://www.noradsanta.org/en/whytrack.html. The audio clip on that page is priceless.

I want to take this opportunity to wish each of you the very best during this holiday season. While this week’s column has been a little on the frivolous side, there is some good, practical technology advice in last year’s Christmas column: How to Survive a Tech Christmas. You’ll find that column here: http://rlis.com/columns/column279.htm. I’ll be working through the holidays. Please let me know if I can help you!

Do you need help with your computer? I'm here to help you and your home or business computer get along!

Cate Eales runs Computer Care Kelowna (http://computercarekelowna.com/) a mobile service helping home users and businesses get along with their computers. To arrange an appointment phone her at 250-764-7043. Cate also welcomes your comments and suggestions. Send email to help@computercarekelowna.com.

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