A Bracing Freshness in the Air

First of all, an apology. I hadn't meant to leave it a month to write a new entry, but technology defeated me. There is some obscure interaction between my firewall and the web software that has conspired against me. Hopefully this will make onto the page.

I'm sure that at several points, I had witty and amusing insights that would have entertained you mightily as you wasted time at your desks, but I've forgotten them all. So, the bare bones account of my Christmas and New Year goes like this:

• Christmas: kiddies, playing Monster Uncle, bike riding lessons, MORE swings NOW. You get the idea. Total exhaustion and too much food.
• New Year: back in London. No big celebration. New Year out in London is the circle of Hell that Dante couldn't bear to mention.
  
• Back to aikido: I've regressed about ten years in the time I've been away. Merrily bashed all over the floor by people who were novices when I left. Depressing.
• Gym/fitness: yeah, right.
• Work, proper: not a sausage. But then I haven't been particularly focussed on getting my cv away. Part of the issue has been deciding on what I want to be. Apparently, it's a bit difficult to get fifty grand a year and generous holidays for reading the newspaper, unless you work for London Transport, which I don't fancy.
• Work, pretend: yep, loads. Stood on the Clipper stand at the Boat Show for four days, trying to persuade people to take part in next year's race, and thinking to myself HYPOCRITE. Actually, it was quite nice to meet the Clipper dudes and hear the gossip - the main part being that the ebullient Simon Rowell has resigned as Chief Instructor, an event similar in magnitude to Alex Ferguson leaving Man Utd, Jeremy Paxman leaving Newsnight and Davina McCall leaving Big Brother all combined.
• Sailing: yep, some of that too. Also in town helping the Clipper effort was Simon Bradley, who skippered us to Cardiff in the summer. He put me in touch with a friendly couple called Rob and Annette who run a huge 95ft classic sailing yacht called Halcyon that was berthed in St Katherine's Dock. I was to help them deliver it down to Cowes this week, but the weather has blown up nastily and we only made it to Eastbourne before being forced to run for cover. There were too few of us to sail it easily, and besides, the wine glasses might have got broken. It's a different kind of sailing. I may rejoin them at a later date.
  

That's it. I suppose I could do a better job and be a bit more expansive about some aspect or other. But the ultra-condensed version is: no job, some messing about the Boat Show, and a bit of rather bouncy sailing. And no job, did I mention that?