By proxy, the penguin writes, sort of.

The penguin has now gone and I can only pray that he returns safely in late spring. Although we are different species, we may as well be two peas in the same pod; so alike do we think. I promised I would try to continue this blog in his absence. To post the small number of prepared posts which he did before he left and which he wants me to intersperse between my own ramblings on life, the universe and why the answer's always 42, except when I'm asked for my age! I might even manage some QED in the long Christmas break; longer for me this year, no work until 12 January and to hell with them! Except for a run through of a one day course which I may have to teach during my break. Oh well, it's a harder time for the trainer right now to get too upset at losing one day or maybe two out of my break.

It's strange how such a break focuses your mind on the past. As though 'stocktaking' the year ends up making you stocktake your life. After the past five months, I decided I did not want to be around anyone this year. The last time was ten years ago, although for a very different reason. I apologise to my mother unreservedly for not being with her but perhaps she does, as she says, understand. Christmas cannot be much fun with your husband ten years in the ground and no family to share the day with but selfish I can do well, very well. Mugwump (the cat) did however enjoy the duck (that's duck meat, not a whole Aylesbury) that appeared in his bowl alongside the kibble and it did, I hope, make for a refreshing change from all the fish and chicken which he normally gets. He doesn't 'do' toys so that was as much of a Christmas present as it seemed prudent to get him. I just hope he doesn't develop a taste for it. At £13 per duck it's ever so slightly more expensive than kibble and fish/chicken :)

So, 2009 is upon us and while we can only hope it will be better than 2008, on the financial front at least, things are likely to get worse before they get better. Fortunately I'll probably only need to cut out the luxuries to survive a recession, well assuming I keep my job, you know drop the Laurent Perrier Rose Brut champagne, Hine Cognac, fillet steak, monkfish and whole turbot, proper Rocquefort cheese, trips to Mauritius and the Maldives, dinner at Le Gavroche, that kind of stuff, although if the the Russians keep hiking the price of gas, I may need to buy a few extra jumpers and forget about showering in hot water, although lacking a layer of blubber, I am ill prepared to combat hypothermia :) However we must be optimistic and so here are a few of my resolutions for the coming year:

1) Don't work so hard and so long
2) Get married (to a woman)
3) Buy 'Teach yourself to make babies' from Amazon and practise
4) Buy a semi detached mock tudor house in Bromley with a 'farmhouse' kitchen to accomodate aforementioned wife and babies
5) Give up smoking
6) Give up drinking alcohol
7) Read everything written, and in print, by Barbara Cartland
8) Take up extreme ironing*
9) Go to Ikea every weekend
10) Learn to love Monosodium Glutamate
11) Act my age
12) Buy a television and watch all the soaps
13) Get Sky or cable and watch more soaps and stupid sports like off road truck racing and topless darts
14) Learn to love rap and hip hop
15) Stop making new year resolutions that you know you can't keep :)

* extreme ironing - a sport in which you pack an ironing board, an iron and a clean shirt into your backpack and climb to the top of K2 without oxygen and iron your shirt at the summit - seriously! Of course you have to iron it again when you get back to the hotel as no-one makes a 29,000 feet mains cable to attach to the iron and Sherpas, on the whole, baulk at heaving a 240 volt generator and fuel up mountain just so you can properly iron your shirt.

When you put it like that, there doesn't seem a lot of point to the sport, really does there? I mean you may as well stay in the hotel, iron your shirt and spend the rest of the time getting bladdered in the bar. The end result's the same. One ironed shirt. Ah well, there's nowt as queer as folk.

So as we slide into recession, what's everybody doing here? Becoming possessed by a collective insanity to see exactly how much debt it's possible to rack up in as few days as possible by buying originally over priced rubbish that no-one wanted before Christmas but that everyone thinks is cool now. Yes, it's sale time! Buy loads of things you don't need, at vastly reduced prices, with money you don't have, all the while hacking off every shop assistant in the country, and then think about the consequences next week or maybe in two weeks.....or never. Oh well, we all need our little diversions :)

And finally, an 'ah bless' moment. A little head shot of Mugwump (on the bed as usual :) Cute or what?