Tuesday, January 02, 2007

weighing up



The best things about New Year

1) Making lists. It is about the only time of year where tradition encourages you to make a list, of resolutions. I suppose, in the past, I've made lists of birthday presents I wanted, but that's seen as slightly selfish, whereas making New Year resolutions is meritorious, and yet nobody expects you to keep them all! Everyone's a winner.
2) Opening new calendars. Okay, so at the moment my only proper calendar is a "South Canterbury Finance" calendar that my father got for free - BUT! I also have the Far Side Off-the-Wall calendar with a cartoon for every ... single ... day! Whoopee! I just love sneaking peeks through calendars to see what pictures are coming up. And it's so exciting tearing a page off my Far Side calendar every day to see what cartoon is up next.
3) New toys to play with that weren't around last year. In my case, a thermometer for use in cooking fudge, as requested. Can't wait to try it out! New books - Don Quixote, Katherine Mansfield's short stories, and a study book on the Beatitudes my dad gave me. Money to spend on CDs, from which I have restrained myself for months.
The worst things about New Year
1) It's ages until the next holidays. I'm guessing Easter is in April this year... that's not too far off. But you don't exactly have huge meals and fun-filled days of present-giving and leisure. No one even buys me Easter eggs anymore. (All the same, hot cross buns are sold from about March on, and I love hot cross buns.)
2) Not too far from now, you have to go back to work. For me, the first semester at university doesn't start until the end of February, but I'm in summer school, which starts tomorrow, and I have to go back to tutoring soon. I like tutoring, and I don't mind uni - but summer holidays are better.
3) For the last two weeks, most people have eaten far too much. Suddenly, this has to change. This probably doesn't need to be elaborated on, as almost everyone knows what I'm on about.
Next issue: resolutions. This will take some thought.

4 comments:

j said...

hey wait, what about Valentine's Day, Martin Luther King day (on second thought, that might just be American...), and who can forget St. Patty's day? Green everything!

Trish Ryan said...

There is a special thermometer for cooking fudge??? Who knew?

Happy New Year :)

Stacy said...

Allie, just how does one add "meritorious" to one's vocabulary? It's a fun word, but I'd never remember to use it.

Allie said...

Trish: well, I asked for a thermometer I could use for cooking fudge... so I think they had to find one that was strong enough. But I can use it for other things too!

Stacy: well, 'meritorious' has always struck me as a very funny word. It has Dalai Lama-type overtones. I suppose it's just stuck in my head!