A HAPPY NEW YEAR

I couldn't buy a proper Letts A4 day-to-a-page diary. Letts unilaterally halved Saturdays and Sundays. I have plenty to say on Saturdays and Sundays. I don't want them halved. A cheap appointments diary from Poundscratcher has had to do. I don't make appointments, so I'll ignore the times down the side. I've also less room to write, so I'll have to cut out the waffle. I wrote half a page of the first entry before starting anything of any remote significance. I started: "On New Year's Day, I was marooned in Wallsend-on-Tyne, victim of relentless snow which made driving as pleasant as appearing naked with Gok Wan, if that isn't in fact Won Gok, or even Gone Wok. Whilst wandering with the old dog in mid-morning, dodging snowballs and people whom I didn't know inanely saying 'Happy New Year' to me, I found that my brown suede boots were taking in water. I'd walked that much in them that I'd completely worn away two of the large rubber squares in the heel. I found to my cost that these were hollow and not solid, which is presumably why the boots only cost £15 when I bought them a mere four years ago. In any case, one of my thermal socks was as wet as organic lettuce. I spent the afternoon at my sister's house, playing board games. I decided I don't like any board game I don't win. I didn't win any. I took the old dog out for another walk after tea. Snow was turning to slush and we stumbled through a disgusting porridge of pizza cartons, newspapers, sweet wrappers and cigarette butts along the High Street. It was as if someone with a sense of mischief had blown up a refuse collection vehicle to see how much detritus could be distributed at a single stroke. Later, we played more games. They were flat. The humming game as usual descended into high farce. I hummed 'Sugar Sugar' perfectly adequately and neither wife nor mother could guess it. As neither of them can hum to save themselves, and in fact collapse into fits of the giggles whenever I tell them to take all of this seriously, I couldn't guess any of theirs. Another case of 'nul points' for me. The final humiliation was to be informed that what I took to be 'Run Rabbit Run' was actually 'Bridge Over Troubled Water.'"
Happy New Year? Bah, Humbug.