anuary






I was thinking today about the months of the year and the meanings they have for me.

So here follows a dissertation on the month of January.

By the time the last week in December rolls around I am ready to move on and looking forward to the start of a new year; after all it’s good to make a fresh start and hope springs eternal that the year which is just starting will be better, if needs be, than the year that is just finishing. Right, that deals with the delusional stuff quick smart.

Weather-wise January is a month where you can count on the days being really hot; many people are on holidays and they flock to the beach even on the hottest days and lie in the sun hoping to get the tan to end all tans, their photo in the paper and maybe even a melanoma sometime in the future.

The paper itself falls into holiday format and there is always the obligatory article on books to read at the beach as suggested by well known people in the world of literature and other important places. Time is spent searching the pages of the paper for familiar columns only to find they have apparently taken leave until the end of January.

Some small businesses close in January and I have to remind myself that a loaf of bread is now further away than a ten minute walk if I want something direct from the bake house and a cup of decent coffee may be even further away!!

This year I was looking forward to the traditional breakfast-at-a-posh-hotel followed by a day at the races at Hanging Rock. All that came together nicely, thank you very much. At the end of this month I am looking forward to going to my first ever real live Neil Young concert, a fabulous bookend to the month.

Shops being closed has its upside, temptation is removed and in three weeks I may not even be able to remember where I saw that dust-gathering & totally unnecessary object that I absolutely thought I had to have….

There is always the Australian Open – more commonly referred to in this town as ‘the tennis’; everyone here knows what you are talking about when you talk about ‘the tennis’. More about that later in January.

This year peoples’ optimism may be tempered by the doom and gloom surrounding the finances of the world generally. Hardly a day goes by where there is not a report of another financial disaster on the home or abroad scene and if there isn’t anything to report the papers make sure to remind us there may be some new financial disaster just around the corner.

Since I have pulled out the paltry remains of my superannuation which has taken a bit of a hit by the GFC I am not too concerned about the doom and gloom prognostications; whatever goes up and down in my super money now will be guided by my hand, not some bunch of financial cowboys in some other place.

Even with a sense of uncertainty around, it still looks like a reasonable year ahead from where I sit tapping away at the keyboard.





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