Hello, 2007.

Right.

So, it's the start of a new year, and I'm still reeling over yesterdays Farking. I can't think of a stranger, more surreal way to start a whole new year, and I can't help but think it's a sign of something, though I don't have the foggiest idea what.

I'll confess, I haven't been the biggest fan of New Year's celebrations for the last few years, for a number of different reasons. One of the big ones is that New Year's tends to demand a reflection on the previous 365 days, and given my nature, I tend to focus on the negative while reflecting.

This is not to say that 2006 wasn't without its share of high points. It certainly was. Among them: starting (and getting a good way through) a surprisingly good novel during a month that wasn't November, taking Monkey House to the Zone Drama Festival and walking away with five awards, and potentially shredding my already shaky reputation by proposing a funny but startlingly vulgar play I wrote to be performed during stampede (a propsal which was ultimately, if unsurprisingly, rejected).

However, I've got to be honest and say that, when it comes to the lows, 2006 had some of the lowest I can remember in recent years. So instead of celebrating the end of one year, and the start of another -- as many were, I'm sure -- I spent a quiet New Year's Eve at home, bidding farewell to a year that I was glad to be done with. And trying to make promises to myself that the next wouldn't be anywhere near so bad.

Which, yeah, I know, stupid. Making promises like that is like begging for disappointment. Too many of the things that happen around us are ultimately out of our hands. But I suppose it doesn't hurt to try to improve the things that we *can* control.

Resolutions were made, though after past years failures, I'm keeping these ones fairly close to my chest at the moment. I will confess that the majority of them have something to do with writing, and this blog is included (as is a second blog I fired up yesterday, for no particularly good reason, which will I'll likely get around to linking here at some point in the near future, if I don't completely abandon it in the next few days).

So to those of you who are frequent visitors of this site, and for the few of you who still might be trickling in from Fark -- the brave, the bold, the lovers of Hot Mustard -- I wish you all the finest in this new year.

Cheers.