So, 2020 is upon us and it is about this this time in January when many of us are a little bit challenged by our New Year’s resolutions. This year, one of mine (yes, I made three!) was to commit to writing a blog at least twice a month – and if I really wanted to exceed my own expectations, I might try and do one blog entry a week. I am a bit daunted by this, to be honest – which may seem odd given that I appear to love writing – but not all of is like putting ourselves online so publicly and hitherto I have found the idea of regular blog posts a bit of a steep hill to climb. However, why make resolutions if we are not prepared to stick to them? So here goes. My first blog post of 2020 – and, fingers crossed, my first of 3 or maybe 4 this January. Okay, I skipped a couple of weeks, but let’s say I was getting myself psyched up.
In truth, I’ve been skiing for the first two weeks of January and that’s my excuse. Wall to wall sunshine, great snow, what an inspiration for a writer. I feel a tad guilty about skiing this year, when so many of my friends and former colleagues in Australia have been suffering acutely with the hideous fires raging out of control. The best news this weekend is that heavy rains apparently have finally arrived on the Australian eastern seaboard. Like so many of us here in Europe, our thoughts have been with everyone who has been suffering the ravages of out of control fires, firstly in California and latterly in Australia. We have to do more to save our planet from over-heating. I worry that we may already have left things too late.
My second resolution is linked a bit to my first in as much as I have promised myself that I must do better with social media in 2020. It’s been one of those things I have picked up, toyed with, not found particularly enjoyable, then left alone for long periods of time. My second resolution is thus to take a more structured and engaged approach to social media. In particular, I thought I might try to do more with Twitter. I am going to get some help with this from someone much younger and more social media savvy than I – let’s see how we go. I will report about this later in the year.
Which leaves the third resolution - that I will try and be much more abstemious in my consumption of red wine. Now that’s a resolution that many will associate with! The truth is, it will be hard. I am not sure the answer is to have a dry January – if it is, I have already failed. However, I am going to try and limit myself to only drinking wine when there’s an ‘r’ in the day of the week. 3 days out of 7. So far, with 20 days of January already gone, I am about on track. More or less. So, wish me luck with the other two resolutions – and let me know what you think of my blog posts. I will be trying my best and it will be a struggle at time. I won’t please everyone all the time – but I am hoping that some of you out there will help keep me on track.