Happy New Year!

Yes, I made it through another New Year without quite destroying me liver. Decided to throw a party at mine because it saves walking home across the city, because the whole smoking ban is making the pub/club thing a complete pain in the arse in this wintertime weather and because the only other party I knew of was in a non-smoker's flat. Goddamn it, these healthy people with their ludicrous idea that cancer-sticks are "bad for you". Feh. Pernicious nonsense, as the mad bloke in REPO MAN says. Pernicious nonsense.

Anyhoo, yeah, so I threw a bash at mine that went swimmingly, despite being a pretty last-minute decision. I'd floated the idea a couple of weeks back, then Neil Williamson offered his place. His flat being not too far from mine, I weighed my slothful dislike of the whole cleaning up afterwards malarky against the imperatives of me smoking addiction, and thought, fuck it. But then, of course, Neil comes down with the lurgy, poor sod, and Plan A of Duncan's Do has to be brought back into play. As it was, given the gale force winds that caused the cancellation of outside celebrations all round Britain, I was pretty damn glad not to have to go outside me own door. And as the bells approached the critical mass of guests was reached for me somewhat poky flat to feel busy. More folk arrived later -- some of whom I hadn't been expecting -- so that was pretty cool. Much loud music was played. I believe I married a mate to a glass of vodka and Red Bull (in my official capacity as a reverend of the Church of the SubGenius (#0 Clench of the Lodge of the Unintentional Conception)). Dougie the Indie Elf got the dancing started, leading to the two of us bouncing around to Rage Against The Machine ("Fuck you, I won't do what ya tell me. Fuck you, I won't do what ya tell me. Fuck you, I won't do what ya tell me. Fuck you, I won't do what ya tell me. MOTHERFUCKER!" Best song for bouncing to EVAH!). After Bob got dragged into it, I'm told I instituted a rule that every party must henceforth have a Dance-Off, though perhaps this was meant more as a philosophical analysis rather than a universal aesthetic imperative -- i.e. as an assertion that a party is not, in fact, truly a party in the absence of a Dance-Off. Either way, much fun was had and the whole thing eventually wound down at some point after eight in the morning.

As a wee chill-out session on New Year's Day, me mate Chris's new girlfriend, the lovely Aoife (I think that's how it's spelled -- it's Irish, pronounced sorta like Eefah but more Gaelic, ya know?) invited a bunch of us round to hers where her lovely mate, Emma, visiting for the holidays, cooked us a smashing "chicken dish", which was sooooo tasty. Entertainment was provided by Andy, with his twelve-string guitar and -- I shit you not -- truly awesome skills. The man is shit hot. Of course, at some point in the night we sorta, well, drank our way through enough alcohol to reinvigorate the party spirit, such that, at Christ knows what time, meself and Emma went ona drink run back to mine to pick up some of the fridgeful of booze which was left over from Hogmanay. More drink was had. In the end pretty much all of us just decided, fuck it, and stayed over, crashing out on various futons and beds around the flat. Though, not surprisingly, me mate Helena and meself were the last to call it quits, having stayed up well after everyone else, whispering drunkenly (when we, occassionally, that is, remembered the fact that four people were trying to sleep in the room where we were still slugging back the booze). I couldn't really tell you when I surfaced, partly because it was a rather gradual and extended process that took several hours, involving a move from bed to couch, the adoption of a foetal position under a small blanket and a slow, slow move to verticality, bolstered by coffee and morning-after breakfast, Scottish-style (a roll with bacon, tattie scone and square sausage -- the latter two ingredients, for the benefit of any non-Scots reading this, coming from the same combination of inventive genius and drunken wastrely that gave us Irn Bru, and being the food part of the same multi-stage hangover cure that Scotland's other national drink is so renowned for).

Having gone straight to me bed when I got back for a wee kip, of course, it's now 2:00 in the morning and I'm wide awake, having utterly and completely fucked any last vestiges of my circadian rhythms. Still, this has given me a chance to check me email and stuff, and -- hoorah! -- my piratical sea shanty, The Ballad of Matelotage and Mutiny now online in the premiere issue of Farrago's Wainscot along with much in the way of goodies from a whole bundle of cool folks.

Also, Gabe Chouinard just sent me the latest version of the cover for The City of Rotted Names, which I think looks great. The colour of the title font is a bit undecided, apparently, so I'll see what happens there. I'm not sure about the blue meself, I guess, but I'm not against it as such. Anyhoo, I'm well chuffed with the design as a whole. Very nice.

Anyway, that's my New Year's stuff. Hope the rest of yez had a good one too.