Student's killer on parole
Charges after investigation
Hostage was on captor 
Regulating power prices
Gen X is raking it in
LeBlanc laying groundwork
US vetoes UN resolution
$100M Nassar settlement
12 Trump jurors picked
Rates slow green economy
Vicinity hires president,
Record housing starts
Warriors ready for Round 2
Kalamalka Bowl cancelled
Rockets live to fight on
Rihanna's parenting ‘hack’
Tarantino scraps film
Munn talks cancer battle
Ho ho ho! It’s time once again for the Christmas column, bringing you good cheer and ways to use all that technology you’re craving to enhance your Christmas experience.
Tracking everything
StatsCan reported in 2013 that Canadians spent $18.9B online in 2012. StatsCan report
Not all of that was spent at Christmastime, and not all those packages were being shipped and delivered before yours, but it sometimes seems that way.
You can easily track a package you are waiting to receive or that you have sent once the tracking number enters the carrier’s system. You can do that by visiting the website for each carrier, or you can do it with PackageTrackr Most of the time you don’t even need to know who the carrier is. Simply pasting or typing in the tracking number is enough information for PackageTrackr to locate your shipment.
You can return again and again to check, or you can sign up for a free PackageTrackr account and set up alerts to notify you of deliveries, exceptions, and other changes in status. It’s an awesome service, and I’ve been using it for several years.
Now that you know where your stuff is, what about the people you care about? Are you meeting anyone at the airport? Are you flying somewhere yourself? Check out FlightAware, which will track the progress of any flight. Like PackageTrackr, you can set up alerts for email messages and/or your phone.
One last thing you might need to track this Christmas is the progress of Santa himself. The original NORAD Santa Tracker is still going strong. Visit the website or download the app for your smartphone in the Google Play Store or the App Store for you iOS users. Google does Santa now, too. Here is the Google Santa Tracker and there’s an Android app as well, but you iOS folks are out of luck.
Wrapping everything
I have the utmost respect for people who can start with an object, some paper, ribbon and tape and produce a beautifully wrapped package. I have never been one of those people. But then the Internet happened, and then YouTube happened, and the next thing you know there are a gazillion instructional videos on wrapping packages. I fear my excuses are gone.
If you’re ready to abandon the ‘I’ll just put it in a gift bag from the dollar store’ school of gift wrapping, check out these videos:
Japan gift wrapping hack explained
A slow, clear, understandable version of the famous 'Gift wrapping in 15 seconds' YouTube video
How to wrap 10 challenging shapes
This should really help me with the Quality Street
How to tie a ribbon
Preparation for the next video
How to make a pom pom bow
Impressive
How to make a Dior bow
Also known as a triple loop bow
If you want seasonal music while you wrap, I still think Accuradio’s Holiday Channel beats any other online service available in Canada. There’s plenty of Christmas music on YouTube, too. Here’s a list of just over four million.
Remember when TV specials were, in fact, special? The dailymotion website has a lot of cartoon specials in their entirety, including A Charlie Brown Christmas.Of all the Charlie Brown specials, I think A Charlie Brown Christmas is the Charlie Browniest.
Whatever you celebrate, however you celebrate, we wish you the very, very best.
Links
Canadians spent $18.9B online in 2012
Japan gift wrapping hack explained
How to wrap 10 challenging shapes
Getting Along With Your Computer Column Archives
This article is written by or on behalf of an outsourced columnist and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.
