... it's a New Year. 新年快乐 - Kung Hei Fat Choy everyone. Welcome to the year of the Moocow. To celebrate, today is the day MPs debate the Coroners and Justice Bill, which not only will alklow the government to conduct inquests which should be public in camera but also completely disembowells the Data Protection Act.

Also today, cannabis gets reclassified as class B; and extreme porn becomes illegal. Isn't that appropriate? Our dear government emulating the repressive authoritarian regime of China as best they possibly can.

Bless their little totalitarian socks.

Why the hell is ANYBODY still voting for this shower?

My hopes for the year to come are fairly simple, I think.

1. That everyone I care about makes it through without pain or suffering. I know this is unlikely, especially given my nan's current state of health, but I hope for it none-the-less.


2. That Mat and I continue vomit-makingly happy. We have supported each other through a lot of stuff this year (including our first argument!) and a lot of what has happened would have been unbearable without him.


3. That we both learn to plan better. We need to schedule some time each week for tidying, for example. Then we don't have the situation of someone(s) coming to visit and even AFTER shedloads of tidying, discovering that our house is squalid and unfit for human habitation...


4. That I get to speak at Conference, just to see if I can.


5. That I get to keep my job, when all about seem to be losing theirs. Yes, it's not the most glamorous or well-paid job in the world, but it keeps me fit, I get free food, it's a lot of fun, and I am lucky enough to have bosses that I can also consider friends. I'll take low pay for that kind of stresslessness.


6. That Small Person continues doing well at school.


7. That Mat finds a bit more paid work and then we'll be slightly less financially precarious.


8. That, failing Kulvinder Ghir, we get Patterson Joseph for Eleven, and that we don't get shedloads of race wank for either of them.


9. That I have the sense to never, ever, ever get as drunk as I did last night, especially not when The Time of the Moth is starting AND I have a cold. Or if I do, at least remember the statutory glass of water before falling asleep. Today has been a complete write-off. I'm too old for this.

Tis now the year of the Rat. I was born in a snake year. Does this mean I get to eat this year all up?

... I got tagged by James Graham for my Eight for 08. I have been rather lax about reading my f-list recently, James, for which I apologise, but at least I've noticed now ;)

Eight things I can realistically hope for in '08?

1, That my wedding goes off without a hitch, and that I remain as blissfully and vomit-inducingly happy with my wonderful matgb as I am now.

2, That everyone I love is alive and healthy by the end of the year, or at least in no worse state than they are right now at the beginning.

3, That America doesn't have Huckabee for a president in the near future. Because, as burkesworks so eloquently put it the other day, when America farts, the rest of us are stood¹ downwind.

4, That politicians of all stripes start to learn the value of having a decent website, and, more importantly, what a decent website is².

5, That the Labour party's popularity freefall doesn't lead to a Tory government³

6, That I learn to stop procrastinating things which would take no more than thirty seconds (answering emails, a bit of tidying, making sure I eat properly, even going to the loo) in favour of answering memes on t'intarwebz. Yeah, these hopes are getting more forlorn as I go along, aren't they?

7, That I get a nice Trial of a Timelord box set. OK, so I'll admit that the script is (mostly) crap - *shakes fist in the direction of Pip'n'Jane* - but, oh the Sixie goodness. Also on my wishlist of Who DVDs: The Time Monster, Arc of Infinity⁴, Terror of the Autons, The Daemons, Attack of the Cybermen, The Happiness Patrol, and Battlefield.

8, That I get more than 2/4 from what I always say when people ask me what I want: world peace, a large bag of fifty pound notes, a bottle of brandy, and a shag

Dammit, no room for the repeal of SOCPA or the death of the ID-card-and-attached-database project. I have too many hopes all waiting to be dashed...

And now I must tag five people:

Blah. I hate putting people under obligations. Also, I would doubtless tag someone who has already done it, due to the afore-mentioned lax reading over recent days. Therefore, if you want to do this consider yourself tagged. Knock yourselves out.

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¹ stood is a perfectly valid Yorkshire dialect particple of the verb to stand. I would like to see it adopted countrywide over the much more unwieldy standing, but a bit of a forlorn hope.

² In terms of the party I bang on about most, this will mean either them dumping Prater Raines as a preferred option for all their websites, or Prater Raines upping their game massively. I haven't seen a website by them which isn't crap in terms of both design and usability. But especially design. I mean, just look at that homepage! I could do better than that with five minutes in Dreamweaver. With my eyes shut! [/bitchyness] Seriously, people who think website design doesn't matter are like people who think SPaG don't matter, or that you only need to optimise websites for IE because only a minority use other browsers. It's true that good website design doesn't matter to lots of people, but to those for whom it does matter, it matters massively; whereas it doesn't offend the don't-cares if you get it right. Thus, getting it wrong really does matter, because if you get it wrong you offend a small-but-significant minority, but if you get it right you offend not one person. To me, this makes it worth the effort. There will probably be a more detailed post on this in the future... That's FOUR SB's Guide to... posts I need to make now *headdesk*

³ Yeah, that's a bit of a forlorn hope too, isn't it? If it doesn't happen in '08, it'll happen whenever Gordon calls the next election. But if I believed in any Gods my prayers would include please let the next election lead to a hung parliament, and thereafter STV for all! every single night

⁴ How do I love thee, Maxil? Let me count the tights ways.

Hapy new year ti all my readers! YAY! I'd like to take this opportunity to point out thst \Miste r /Mat is the bestest fiance ever, and //////i love him budcjkets. I hope that everybody reading this is as happt for the following year as we are rught nw.

... the long-awaited SB's Idiot's (and Journalist's) Guide to the Constitution, and SB's Guide to Real Ale Etiquette: How Not to Piss Off Your Barmaid.

HOWEVER: it's nearly four five six am. I just read a very scary article. WARNING: do not click if you are easily squicked. But DO click if you are in any way unsure if waterboarding constitutes torture, and think that it's OK to use "interrogation techniques" that don't cause permanent physical damage And, you know, it's New Year's Eve now, and that means MEMES!

( Job Satisfaction meme )

( First Post of the Month meme )

( End of Year Quiz meme )

I have lots of things milling around my head at the moment. I have had a very interesting year. My life has gone through huge changes, and I am several orders of magnitude happier than I was at this time last year. But I don't think that this means I can rest on my laurels. in fact, it's an incentive to do more. If there's one thing I have learnt from this year, it's that I'm not helpless; I can change things if I want to, I can make a difference, and there is a point to doing something. This means that when I read things like

How People See Me.

[unflattering picture of people who are not to my taste stylistically, but none-the-less, look happy]

Note, I'm not in the pic; it's just what people see when they look at me.

Yep, as a fat ugly Northern single mother slapper. It's more than likely true as well. It's been on my mind since I was sent it. It doesn't bother me, really; I just never thought that I'm such a figure of fun just because I'm from the North-east. I should have realised when I was at the [event in London] a few weeks ago because every time I started to speak, people either looked on in horror or burst out laughing.

I must have been mad to even contemplate moving down south.

on my friends list*, it still makes me angry, as it would have done before. But whereas before it would have made me angry in a "God, that's awful, the world sucks, I must now get depressed and miserable about how awful the world is" way, now it makes me angry in a "God, that's awful, and shouldn't be allowed to happen, and I'm going to bloody well do something about it" way. I know the feeling that my f-lister is describing there. I felt it when I was training for the bar; at dinners at the inns of court; even at the Lib Dem Connect meeting I went to (which is one of the many things that completely put me off joining the Party of my Fiancé). Being Northern is to be discouraged. One should lose one's natural accent, and poshify if one wishes to get ahead^#. It's one of the few remaining acceptable prejudices. And it annoys me no end. So, yeah, irrational prejudices still exist and affect people and things, and this is bad and must be fought.

I can't promise that I will actually have the motivation to campaign consistently on the stuff I believe in, but at least I now know, from the events of this year, that I can make a difference by doing so.

---

* C&Ped from an f-locked entry, with identifiers removed. The usual "if you are also on this person's f-list, respect their anonymity" thing applies.

^# I have a friend who is ethnically northern but lives in London. He insists that he still has a Northern Accent, and is still in touch with his Lancastrian Roots, because he says "bath" instead of "barth", even though in all other respects he is completely RP. If this counts as a Northern Accent in London, it is not a surprise, although it remains a disappointment, that people who give me respect on the intarwebs give me the OMG you're an ill-educated country bumpkin look when we meet in Meatspace and they hear my accent.

Today, for no apparent reason, I made a resolution to give something up.

Yes, I know, it's not Lent; but nor am I Christian. And yes, I know, New Year is 63 and a bit days away (or more, if you're Chinese, or a completely different number if you're of various other cultures/religions), but I felt the need anyway. Perhaps it's down to my vague interest in NeoPagan things; although I'm militantly agnostic, I still find some comfort in ritual and tradition, and Samhain feels like new year to me. So, yes, I'm making a New Year's Resolution.

Today, I Are Be Mostly Givin' Up Chain Stores.

I had a bit of Stuff to Do in town today, and I thought I'd pick up some shopping while I was there. And it struck me: I don't actually NEED to go to the supermarket at all. I can buy bread from the bakery, and cheese from the cheese shop, and meat from the butcher, and there's a little organic and wholefood shop where I can get milk and extra veg... And to do this wouldn't be any more inconvenient or time-consuming than it is to get to and walk around Sainsbury's.

And then I thought about all the ethical benefits of supporting local business, and reducing my carbon footprint, and all that stuff. And I wondered why it has taken me so long to reach this decision? I think of myself as a fairly ethical shopper, I get my organic veg bag, I don't eat much meat (I think I've eaten more meat in the past week at matgb's Mum's house than I did in the previous five or six months LOL)... So why has it taken me this long to decide to do the obvious thing? What is the mental stranglehold that Sainers has over me, that makes me think of it as easier than going round town? It's not. It's further away, harder to get to, and it's not like it's any quicker to get around.

And then a further thought struck me. It's not just food. It's not just supermarkets. It's everything. B&Q. Woolies. Boots. Argos. The list goes on. All of them have little local equivalent stores that are as good, if not better, for most things. B&Q is a case in point. Yes, B&Q is huge, but that just means you have to carry things further to get them out of the shop. At the charmingly-named Oddjobs, they have a little man in a brown coat who does that for you. And they cut things to size free of charge. And anything they don't stock, they can get. The only reason I go to Boots is to get points on my card. But when was the last time I even LOOKED at the points total, never mind went to spend it?

If I buy the Ecover washing up liquid from Sainsbury's, I spend 3p less than if I buy it at the little organic wholefood shop. BUT, once I've bought it once at the wholefood shop, instead of throwing the bottle away, I can take it back there and they will refill it, charge me less, AND I'm being environmentally friendly by refilling the same bottle instead of a new one. This makes sense.

SO.

I have decided to give up chain stores. This means that, in the name of supporting local business and being green, I will not shop in any store that has more than five branches (this will allow me to keep buying things in the local bakery, which has four branches - two of which are in my home town LOL - but will prevent me going into Ninja Games, which will save me money).

Also, in other New Year-ish news, I have the urge (prompted but not caused by idiot neighbour, but the least said about that the better) to re-arrange the house. It's an odd sort of spring cleany feeling... Go figure.