happy New Year

The plant centre was open today, though we weren't very busy.  New Year's Eve isn't a day you'd expect lots of people to be out buying plants.  I did get myself an Oemleria as planned, and some galvanised lawn edging to try and keep the running bamboo in check, once I've dug the excess out (another pick axe job).  I hope the lawn edging will slow the bamboo's progress down, if not stop it, and at least it will give me a demarcation line to patrol and cut back to.

This is my last post of 2011.  I have done what I set out to do, to post something every day.  Most were written on the day, some in rather a hurry if I had things on.  A couple of posts were written the day before and copied in on the day because I knew there'd be no time at all to write anything, but no more than two.  I've enjoyed it, most of the time.  Why not give it a go?  Blogspot is free, and you will sharpen up your skills with the written word while you reflect on your life.  I'll read yours if you read mine.

You could say it was a record of a year in a dull life.  I haven't been the chief executive of a FTSE 100 company, or even a divisional managing director, or founded my own business.  I haven't published any learned academic papers, let alone run my own highly acclaimed research laboratory.  I haven't signed a book deal or got my own byline in a national newspaper.  I haven't become even remotely famous or achieved the faintest whiff of celebrity.  I haven't earned much, and so I haven't spent much.  I haven't bought an iPod, or an iPad, or an iPhone, or an It bag.  I haven't eaten in a restaurant reviewed by Giles Coren.  I haven't been on an exotic holiday or even a series of weekend breaks, apart from one night in Hitchin.  Clever people who are paid to write columns about their lives, instead of doing it as a hobby, would probably consider it a life so dull and obscure they would rather eat their own faces than live like that.

There again, I have spent a great deal of time working with plants and in the open air, which I like, and the conclusion at the end of Candide is that we must learn to cultivate our gardens.  I have been able to spend time with friends and family, and am still married to the same person as at the start of the year.  I've had the mental energy to read some books other than blockbuster thrillers, looked at some good pictures and listened to some first class live music.  I have (mostly) eaten proper food, and not suffered from any eating disorder, or felt the need to have my body surgically enhanced for cosmetic purposes.  I have slept well, most of the time, and not felt that my self-worth was threatened by driving a five year old Skoda Fabia.  I have managed to extract a honey crop from my bees, and enjoyed the company of my cats, and seen a robin sitting on her nest and a newt swimming.  I've done some work for charity.  That's not too bad, all in all.

The Systems Administrator and I aren't going to a party tonight.  Actually, we weren't invited to one, but I don't think that means that our friends are deliberately excluding us from the fun, more that none of them are holding one, or at least not within driving distance.  When I've been to New Year's Eve parties in the past I've mostly found them rather depressing, since I don't like forced jollity, or being socially obliged to stay up until midnight in order to see the New Year in after I'm tired and just want to go to sleep, or singing Auld Lang Syne while holding hands with strangers, or being kissed by anybody I don't already know and like a great deal.  The SA has made a posh beef stew, which we will eat, and then see how we go.  We might last until midnight, we might not.  My favourite way to spend New Year's Day is always, always to be able to get out and do some work in the garden, and not to start the year with a crashing hangover.

Happy New Year, everybody.