Hello 2009

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

We spent a quiet night in with the aircon; after a mild Christmas summer has arrived full force. I've just watched the Sydney fireworks on tv, which was strange since although they're on roughly the same latitude they saw in the new year an hour earlier (no daylight saving in Queensland, though I live in hope).

Christmas was good here (though really, any Christmas which adds to my TBR pile counts as a success) but I’m hoping that calamities do not, in fact, come in threes.

Christmas night 07 there was a drive-by further up the street. No one was hit, and I now know that from a distance, gunshots really do sound like fireworks.

Two nights before Christmas 08 we had The Invasion of the Eight-Legged Freak - the appearance, in the house, of the Goliath of huntsmen. I swear that thing had a seven-inch leg span, and it was still moving an hour after being doused with fly spray and sucked into the vacuum cleaner. (Hooray for transparent appliances ... not.) Since my sole contribution to the proceedings - after raising the alarm by shrieking and leaping onto the couch - was to fetch the aforementioned implements, I am exceedingly thankful I was not home alone at the time. And that my mother managed to hoover it to its fate before it set foot on any of my books during its last desperate scramble up the bookcase.

Since I can't recall any similar events from 2006, I'm a tad worried about Christmas 09....

But for now I’m going to stop thinking about Christmas - and stop looking over my shoulder in case there's another giant arachnid - and announce my New Year's Resolutions.

1. Not to let real life, desktop trouble, laptop death, or the delights of NaNoWriMo get in the way of blogging.

2. Finish the year with a smaller TBR pile than that with which I’m starting.

Number 2 shouldn't be too hard because ... drum roll please ... I am almost down to single figures! And by the time the Bookfest arrives in a few weeks, I certainly will be. I’m not exactly sure how I managed such a miracle, but I hope to keep doing it.