My ridiculous New Year Resolutions

Recently I made some of the above. Well, it was New Year. I had forgotten my previous coming-to-terms-with-resolutions wisdom and I made the WRONG kind of resolution.

I decided that I must concentrate more on my work and less on the things that I love. The result would be that I would not feel anxious about being behind with my work, which is how I feel pretty much all the time. When I had got into a position of being ahead with my work I could do other things like: read books and newspapers. One of my resolutions was not to get into reading any kind of narrative, because that sort of thing takes over one's tiny mind. OK, my tiny mind. Everyone else's mind holds more equipment and can do many more things. So I thought I would read art books instead e.g. The Tomb of the Unknown Craftsman by Grayson Perry, and The History of the German People by Mr MacGregor of the British Museum. I could pick them up, muse awhile, and put them down, muse finished.

Mobile Shrine to Alan Measles

The significance of this image is explained here: review of Unknown Craftsman

And I decided I would stop "buying" the Guardian when I popped into Waitrose just because it is free if you spend £5 and I always spend £5 because things in Waitrose are somehow slightly nicer than the average foodstuffs and more expensive (what a strange coincidence) without being ridiculously gussied up for the wannabees as they are in Marks. Because I get into the Guardian and find its columnists worth reading as long as you take a bit of time over them. Therefore, the Guardian is wasting my time and my brain when I should be working. (To start with, I found the Guardian impenetrable.  But you get used to it, and the effort it takes to read. You get to like it. Just like the crossword, which is REALLY hard.)

Anyway, I have failed to stick to these resolutions (apart from reading narratives, I have not read a novel or story since the Christmas hols) and I am rather glad, because life shouldn't be all horrid. There should be some changes and developments, and although my idea of narrowing was only temporary (the next 6 months), I can't bear it because my work is OK but not my passion.

My original resolution was: eat mainly soup. This is not a bad idea either because I am very overweight and I never have been overweight before. I have lost the knack of losing weight. Also, I really like soup, so it's do -able. The trouble is, I also have a husband and son for whom I cater and they are not satisfied with soup.

So far this year I have cooked dishes I haven't cooked before (duck with cherry sauce, last night, and something with meatballs (very good idea, meatballs, quick and tasty)) and that's a much better  resolution: cook some new dishes!

And although I really wanted to get involved with the Green Party this turns out to be not do-able either, as my local branch meets on Wednesday evenings, when I teach until 9 pm. I could do without teaching until 9 p.m. Basically, I want to do something worth doing with other people whom I might like, but this longing is being stymied at every turn.

Sad: I never saw the Germany exhibition at the BM (all over now) and I never saw the Rembrandts. Just never took the time out of my busy but meaningless schedule of working and hoovering, etc.