When I was in the construction business, for many contractors, Christmas was a time to relax and put feet up at least a week ahead of the 25th. No one would resurface until the second week of January. Many of those guys were not a pretty sight after 2 weeks of beer, chocolates and turkey.

On the other hand, we were heavily into painting, and December and early January were usually the busiest months of the year for us, go figure. Many a time, we would be asked to start a big job in early December. We'd tell the customer that the job was going to go past Christmas, and they would still give us the go ahead, because they wanted the place to be nice for the relations and friends! OK.

We never worked out the logic of "Nice for Christmas". Often we would be packing our kit away at 5pm on Christmas Eve. The house would be frozen because all the windows were open in a desperate attempt to clear the place of paint fumes; the lady of the house would be hanging the shivering, complaining kids. It was a joy.

And a couple of days after the big fumey festivities were over, we would be back to paint like idiots until an hour before their New Year's party guests arrived.

We didn't care, it was all good fun and we got paid pretty well. And best of all, we would be able to take time off just as everybody else was getting suicidal about being back in the work groove.

I am well out of that scene now, so I don't know what other contractors are up to these days. If they are anything like the guys I knew, they are probably at home right now, wondering where the housing bubble came from. The ones with panic mode etched into their skulls are now slapping on a coat of paint, trying to make their own places look good enough to sell at knock down prices. Welcome to the buy high sell low happy days of 2008 housing hell.