That Year...This Year

On the whole, 2011 was not a bad year. As recorded on this here blog, holidays to Kent and Portugal were taken, trips to London, Edinburgh, Newcastle and sunny Shrewsbury were made, cultural things got done, many things got bought. I took a ridiculous amount of photos, blogged a lot, got very bad at commenting (sorry, must improve!)



Did a saucy photoshoot. Embraced the topknot and red lipstick. Increased my Irregular Choice collection. Joined Twitter. Became mildly obsessed with Twitter. Even met people off Twitter (brave eh?). I even became honorary Auntie Alex to young Jack. A lot of the year was very good fun. Not all of it was good though, in fact a certain part of it was very sad and painful, but that's not for me to talk about.

Let us move on to listy type things:


Films seen at the cinema in 2011: 27

Best? Can't pick a favourite. Senna was truly wonderful (and I am outraged it wasn't nominated for best documentary at the Oscars). I went to see The Adjustment Bureau twice so I clearly enjoyed that. Source Code was fantastic. Love and Other Drugs stayed with me for a lot longer than I thought it would. Weekend was brilliant.
Worst? Sorry to my beloved Henry Cavill but even he couldn't rescue Immortals from being rubbish. I blame the 3D.

Books read in 2011: 371.

Not bad eh? There were a fair few novellas in that list but if it's longer than a short story, it counts as a book in my eyes. The list is mostly notable for:

• a massive glom of Suzanne Brockmann's back catalogue at the start of the year
• Beta reading a book for a Real Life Published Author. That was FUN. I shall talk more of it when it's ready to be released.
  
• Barely reading anything at all in October (see below)

Don't even ask me to pick a favourite book because I'm even less capable of that than I am of picking a favourite film, plus there are a LOT to choose from. I will just say that Delirium by Lauren Oliver made me sob with how good it was, Maritime Men and Anchors Aweigh by Janey Chapel have been read and reread and keep improving, A History of the World in 100 Objects is unbelievably interesting and Lady Rose and Mrs Memmary by Ruby Ferguson was simply beautiful.

Books written in 2011:

One, in October. Hurrah for me! I started number two this week.

Comedians seen:

7. All very funny but I must strongly recommend Chris Ramsey.

Theatre trips:

13. I still can't get over how good Michael Sheen was in Hamlet. Unbelievable. Lovesong was chuffing amazing too though and Flare Path was excellent. If only we hadn't been sitting so high up we were practically on the Moon.

Also:

I'm not really a music person but I went to see Ben Folds in February and sweet jesus, he was astonishingly good. I'll take quality over quantity any day.


So, what does 2012 have in store?

I'm not talking resolutions here, for they are dull. I'm talking things that I will definitely be doing.

An Easter holiday to Hay-on-Wye (my version of bookshop heaven), a jaunt to the Edinburgh Festival and possibly an autumn holiday to France. Haven't quite decided on that last one yet.

OLYMPICS! I have tickets for the cross-country day of the eventing and I am most excited. People who are bah humbuggy about it all: I am not listening to you. Wheeeeee!!! I love the Olympics and I'M GOING!

Whilst I'm on the subject of eventing, I've signed up as a volunteer with British Eventing. I want this to be the year I do some fence judging. For the uninitiated, that involves eating a giant picnic and blowing a whistle a lot, possibly a bit of flag waving too. I can totally do that. Or I shall volunteer in some other capacity. I've bought some wellies and a gilet now; there's no going back.


Wearing more hats. It needs to be done. Is anyone with me?

Doing a writing course this month. Should be fun!

Finally working my way through the to-read pile. It just got bigger and bigger last year and I fear the bottom books will turn to mulch if I don't read them soon.

It's grown since that photo was taken...