21 to 22. So it goes!

 HAPPY NEW YEAR

2021 ended with a covid test for me as I have spent the last few days sneezing and snuffling. I tested negative so now I can think about starting 2022 in a healthy fashion. It might have been more dramatic to say I was starting this new year with covid but on the whole I prefer the result I had. 

2021 began noisily. One of our near neighbours was letting off very loud fireworks. We couldn’t see much. Maybe if we’d gone out into the garden we might have seen a fine display. As it was, we simply heard a series of very loud explosions. What the neighbours with dogs and cats thought about it I can only imagine! I do know that my granddaughter, a few miles away in Mossley was complaining about noisy fireworks where she lives. She ended up with a very nervous dog and an equally nervous cat. 

I first remember fireworks like that for Millennium Eve. If my memory serves me well, we only ever had fireworks for November 5th before then. A friend of ours celebrated his 50th birthday on Millennium Eve. A group of us gathered at his house to help him celebrate and to see in the new year. His house, at one of the high points of the area, gave us a splendid view of fireworks going off all over the area - frighteningly reminiscent of a war zone! 

That celebration started a tradition. The same group met every New Year’s Eve to eat and drink and make merry. He would have been 72 this time but he died almost 8 years ago now. We kept up the tradition in his memory until Covid came along and messed up everything!

When I woke this morning, the sky was blue with occasional wispy clouds here and there. The world was bright. By the time I had donned my running gear the blue sky was a thing of past. Still, at least it’s not raining! Yet!

Just up the road, one family has clearly decided Christmas is over. Their Christmas tree is standing forlornly next to their dustbin. Now I imagine them taking all the cards and decorations down and rubbing the dust of celebration off their hands: New Year - new tidy regime!

Goodness! I’ve only just stopped wearing Christmas earrings and reverted to normal ones!

The New Year’s Honours list has been announced. Here are a couple of Michael Rosen comments on that matter:-

speaking as himself: -

“Tony Blair: knighthood? Must be for services to peace, surely.”

and as his alter-ego:-

“Dear Mogg, Every time I have to dish out these gongs, my mind drifts towards that moment in the future when  I shall claim my honour. What title? Baron Boris sounds bloody good to me. You’ll get one too, Moggy: services to being loyal to me. 

Nomenclatura dementia 

Boris”.

In other areas, Boris Johnson has named returning the crown stamps to pint glasses and scrapping a ban on selling goods in pounds and ounces on his list of the “key successes” of Brexit this year. It rather smacks of clutching at straws!

Let’s see what this year brings.

Life goes on. Stay safe and well, everyone!