Happy New...er...

Well, Hogmanay was something of a damp squib this year. Actually, it was a sopping wet, gale-ridden, torrentially pissed-on squib. I'm rather glad it was celebrated chez Gripes with a Scotch and Wry DVD and a mug of hot chocolate. I can't quite imagine ever wanting to wander into Princes Street to throng among the multitudes, gradually getting colder and needing to pee while drunks go in for a tongue sarnie at midnight. Not that that was even an option this year - Princes Street got cleared while the rain fell horizontally... I did feel a little sorry for those who had travelled across oceans of time/the world to "experience" Hogmanay Scottish-style - but only briefly: after all, isn't part of the whole Scottish experience about getting cold, wet and disappointed?

Anyhow, one of the wannabe revellers was an old schoolfriend. We met up for a pint or two and exchanged tales of ye olde Norwich City FC and other stuff. We haven't seen each other in about 17 years and apart from getting older, rounder and with both more and less hair in various places, he was exactly as I remembered him, only older. It was good to see the old bugger (he was the first boy I ever kissed - well, apart from Glenn Forbes in Primary School, but that really doesn't count...) and good to hear that life was treating him well. It was also good to hear someone speak so lovingly about Norfolk. I miss Norfolk and to be reminded of its culture (yes, it has culture!) landscape and people was a good kind of nostalgia. I also got to meet his wife and friends - who were also good folk- and got told the "romantic" version of how they met, which was typically self-deprecating and gallant. I hope we keep in touch a little better in the future, its good to know someone so grounded and rooted.

In other "news" I start the year broke. Church mice might be tempted to leave me donations. There has been a fuck-up with my benefits payments and god alone knows when I might be getting money into my account. Ho hum. *applies for dog-on-string and begging hat/blanket combo*

Oh yes - and This Life +10. *sigh* As much as it was good to see the old crew back together, I did feel a sense of disappointment. It wasn't crap per se, just less snappy and somehow less "true" than the original series. Or maybe I didn't relate to it as well as I did in the 90s (I'm far less successful and affluent for a start...and my character has developed since then, even if theirs hasn't.) And for fuck's sake - there is no way that Egg would be a best-selling author! "Ooh, let's all rush out and buy a book about selfish, shagging lawyers" let alone one that would garner enough interest to warrant a documentary. But that's fiction for you. Hmm...

Happy New Year folks, should that be what you're after!