In Which Simon Attempts to Make up for Not Posting by Writing Something of Excessive Length

Because I detest the idea of boiling down an entire year to into one sentimental blog, magazine article, newscast, or other media type of your preference, this will have nothing to do with today being the arbitrarily selected first day of a new year. I realize my boycotting this holiday may serve the mortal blow to modern use of the Roman calendar, which I think we all realize is only hanging on by a thread, but my recklessness simply cannot be stopped.

I have very little to say because I am home, and while home has the advantages of being generally cleaner than C9, less dubiously constructed than C9, better-functioning than C9, and having a kitchen sink that is distinctly superior to C9’s, the native population tends to be a little sterner, somewhat disapproving, and all-powerful in the way of annoying the bejeezus out of my housebound and increasingly irrational self. In short: I miss home. The other one.

Here is what I have been doing whilst imprisoned:

1) Running. I have not run regularly for so long that it’s torture now, and the only reason I go is because when I get back to my street, I can see my dog sitting outside watching me with a big doggie-grin on her face, eagerly waiting for when I get to the driveway. . . . Once I get there, of course, I am accosted by the Hound of the Baskervilles, a.k.a. Georgie, who lives next door and does not approve of me running, stretching, walking, or breathing without her assistance. She likes to assist by suddenly looming up from her driveway, with which she blends perfectly, and directing several throat-closing barks in my direction. If she could do that before the run, the I-AM-GOING-TO-BE-MAULED adrenaline rush might be helpful. As it is, I do not find myself wanting to be her exercise buddy.

2) Reading. If you have not read Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, you should. If you have not read America: The Book, you should. If you have not read King Hereafter by my beloved Dorothy Dunnett, it might be just as well, but you should not be denied the pleasure of the name “Skeggi,” which will doubtless be the name of my first son. After I move to Iceland.

3) Listening to old A Prairie Home Companion shows. The pre- and post-election shows are comforting:

My feeling is that born-again people are citizens of heaven. That’s where their citizenship is, is in heaven. Not here, among us, in America. If you feel that war in the Middle East is simply prophecy fulfilled, if you believe that tribulation and suffering are just the natural conditions of life, if you believe that higher education is vanity, unnecessary, that there is only one book that one need to read, if you feel that unemployment is God’s way of making you more dependent on him and drawing you closer to him, if you feel that lousy health care is simply a portal to paradise, then you don’t really share our same interests do you no you do not. So if you vote, why not Canadians, why not Scandinavians, they speak English, perfectly well-informed . . . but we have moved on! It’s all behind us. No bitterness remains.

4) Sleeping. I have been going to bed around 2 and getting up at 10. Or 11. Or 12. BECKY HAD BETTER READ THIS.

And as this is now much too long, I think I’ll go back to doing one of the above four things. If you can think of a fifth, call me and tell me.