SFS

The first Friday in January is New Year's Day. However, it seems a bit unlikely that everyone will be up for our regularly-scheduled pub social when they may still be nursing hangovers from the night (year?) before. (Just what am I implying here?)

Ju and I therefore made an executive decision at the Nightingales' party yesterday - Just for this month, we'll make it a Second Friday Social. Hope to see you at the Walkley Cottage on the 8th! :o)

And to my team of junior master builders - I have Doctor Who Lego which will need building...

2015 in review

So, 2015: For me it was a year dotted with quite a lot of amazing times, for which I'm very grateful. I took a personal record-breaking ten flights, which took me 200 miles north of the Arctic Circle for Clare's birthday, to Bavaria for a great 2 weeks with the Chivers, and to Geneva again with work.

Speaking of work, it was an excessively busy year, but one in which I gained a quite sudden and unexpected promotion, which was very welcome. I saw Queen (+ Adam Lambert) in concert in February and a 90% solar eclipse in March (which, when added to the Northern Lights in March and a lunar eclipse in September, made it a great year for celestial phenomena!). I probably spent too much money on Lego and not enough on boring stuff, like the house.

Family-wise, my mum ends the year with two new hips and half an inch taller, while my sister and her family well and truly settled into their new home and came up to visit for a very successful week in the summer.

In the news, 2015 wasn't such a great year for the wider world. The chaos in the Middle East seems to go from worse to even worse, with no end in sight. Politics at home and abroad has taken several nasty turns. Several terrorism attacks and widespread flooding added to the misery. And the world lost too many amazing individuals this year, chief among them Sir Terry Pratchett and Sir Christopher Lee. Let's hope for a much brighter 2016...

Film of the year for me was (no, not the obvious!) Pixar's Inside Out, while book of the year was Andy Weir's The Martian.

Happy New Year, everyone, whatever you're up to this evening. I wish you all a very healthy and enjoyable 2016!