I always feel I should hit the New Year with some new and vibrant post, possible the one that establishes me as one of Britain’s premier modern philosophers and sees me offered lucrative offers to write a national column and establish myself on the reality TV circuit. After some of the cooking disasters I’ve had, a couple of weeks in the jungle eating antipodean animal genitalia wouldn’t be a problem.
Looking back, I see I have started with a variety of styles. The first post of 2022 was about twenty words long, published with four minutes to spare and was followed, a day later with a list of unrealistic tosh about reading more.
2021 started with a post which vowed to get rid of some of my irritating writing tics and Unnecessary Capital Letters. I was also going to read Waugh and Dickens. It was published 5 minutes before midnight – another rush. I have, needless to say, accumulated more annoying writing tics and not yet opened a book by either Dickens or Waugh.
That takes us back to 2020. It appears to be a review of a tea room. I’m sure we didn’t go there on 1st January. Obviously I was catching up.
I’m not doing anything so I thought I might as well start blogging for 2019.And with those words I think it can be accurately said that I didn’t exactly start 2019 with a great deal of enthusiasm.
In 2018 I made two resolutions and kept to them, which is quite unusual.
The 2017 post was published on 2nd January. Tch, tch, tch . . .
The year before that, 2016, didn’t see a post until the 4th January. Things were less well planned (or I was busier) in those days. This post has three of my favourite farm photos on it.
And that brings us to the first post of 2015, which was also the first New Year post on the blog. It’s far from the way I do things these days, though I have to say it’s probably more interesting. It was published on the 5th.
And that’s it. The history of my recent life in 9 blog posts.
I think it’s safe to say that they are all part of a long tradition of writing posts that fail to inspire and won’t lead to the life of champagne, coke and chicks that I often claim to aspire too. I don’t really. I’m happy sitting at home in flannelette, eating chocolate and watching TV with Julia. That’s how I am passing New Year’s Day, and how I intend passing the rest of my life. Happy New Year everybody.
And no, I’m not going to be this cheerful tomorrow, so no need to adjust your expectations.
Happy New Year!