The Year Meme - 2015
The end of the year is nearly upon us, and I have managed to find a few slivers of time today, in between bits of my 'the flat shall be (mostly) clean and tidy for the new year' frenzy to draft answers for 2015 to the 39 questions in the year meme.
1.What did you do in 2015 that you'd never done before?
Served on a jury; visited York (twice).
2.Did you keep your New Year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
I don’t (officially) make resolutions, but I do certainly have some things which need to happen this year, both on the work front and the home front.
3.Did anyone close to you give birth?
No, not this year.
4.Did anyone close to you die?
Also not this year, mercifully.
5.What countries did you visit?
I’ve not left the UK this year. My various holidays have been in the Midlands (depending on how exactly one defines holiday) or the North. A and I were considering going to Amsterdam recently, but we decided on a second trip to York, instead.
6.What would you like to have in 2016 that you lacked in 2015?
Same as last year: a residence which has no cracks in the walls and no leaks or damp patches.
7.What date from 2015 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
Friday 8th May, because the news the UK woke up to that morning was just so awful.
8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Surviving the autumn term feels like quite an achievement. ;)
In terms of proper achievements one can point to, I successfully completed the Unclutter 365 Challenge. The idea is to remove one thing for every thing you bring in to your house, plus an extra thing for every day of the year, i.e. 365 further things. I actually managed 1-for-1 plus 404, which feels pretty good. I’ve not reached the full William Morris (“Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful”) yet, but it does seem within the realms of possibility, now.
9. What was your biggest failure?
See Q6. Finding a decent builder in London is a nightmare, and the good ones tend to be booked for months ahead. In theory, we and the neighbours have someone booked to sort the outside of our house in the Spring, but I won’t really believe it until it’s done.
10.Did you suffer illness or injury?
Nothing huge, although I did end up with some tests and a bundle of extra-strength painkillers because my period pain got even worse this year. Oh, and I got dangerously close to mental collapse in August, before I finally took my first full week off of the year. (I’m just now coming to the end of my second full week off, assuming I manage to resist doing any paid work this evening. I have *no* intention of letting work drive me that mad again.)
11.What was the best thing you bought?
I bought lots of pretty things, but the best thing was a practical thing: a net lingerie bag so I no longer have to spend time hand-washing bras. I don’t know why I didn’t do it years ago…
12.Whose behaviour merited celebration?
All sorts of people, who are doing what they can to make the world a slightly better place and to help other people. I have to remind myself, occasionally, that the good guys really are in the majority.
13.Whose behaviour made you appalled and depressed?
Ye gods, so many people. Everyone who thought shooting or bombing people was the best response to disagreements. Everyone who made things even harder for the disadvantaged. Donald Trump and the scary number of people who apparently think he’s fit to be the Republican presidential candidate, never mind competent to be president of anything.
14.Where did most of your money go?
As ever, if you leave out mortgage and other non-avoidables, the biggest expense in the average week was probably eating out/takeout.
15.What events did you get really, really, really excited about?
I’m not a particularly excitable type, and I don’t recall any event which would fit this category.
16.What song will always remind you of 2015?
I don’t think I have one this year.
17.Compared to this time last year, are you:
i.happier or sadder? About the same, I would say.
ii.thinner or fatter? Pretty much exactly the same. I don’t have an NHS-approved BMI, but it’s healthy enough that (given decent blood pressure and being a non-smoker) my clinic still let me have another year’s worth of contraceptive pills this week. Importantly, this appears to be a weight I can maintain without harmful yo-yo dieting or making myself miserable about what I’m eating.
iii.richer or poorer? I would guess probably slightly richer, but my income this year exceeded my outgoings sufficiently that I haven't been keeping close enough track of money to be certain of that.
18.What do you wish you'd done more of?
Reading, and making things. I may have to cut back on one or more of clubbing/cinema/TV in 2016 if I’m to make a respectable dent in my book pile or get round to making any clothes. ;)
19.What do you wish you'd done less of?
Being stressed about work.
20. How did you spend Christmas?
With family at my sister’s place (and then A’s family at his brother's on the 27th).
21.Who did you spend the most time on the phone with?
The parents, as they’re pretty much the only people who I speak to on the phone at all.
[22.Did you fall in love in 2015?
23. How many one-night stands?
These questions have been discontinued for repetition]
24. What was your favourite TV programme?
As ever, there was a fair bit of good stuff. Best new things included Humans and Hunted. Returners still going strong included The Walking Dead, Game of Thrones and Orphan Black. I was sad to see the end of Nurse Jackie, My Mad Fat Diary and Defiance.
25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
Hate is a strong word, and I’m not sure it applies even in this case, but there is one particular bullying bigot I could really do without seeing around ever again. It was such a relief when she finally unfriended me on LJ and Facebook (well, after the initial period of worry about whether she was going to try and screw things up for me IRL). I was, at one point, actually considering quitting TLL, and maybe even abandoning LiveJournal altogether, because she was so consistently unpleasant.
26. What was the best book you read?
China Mieville’s Embassytown. Intelligent sci-fi, with the bonus, this time, of a specific focus on how language works. I don’t think it was a complete success, but even Mieville’s errors are more interesting than a lot of people’s best work.
27. What was your greatest musical discovery or rediscovery?
Live, Liqueur, a Cure covers band who surprised me by coming up with my best gig of the year. Recorded, Smoke Fairies, who do a nice line in dark folk/blues/possibly some other genre which I don’t know well enough to identify.
28. What did you want and get?
Many things. On a tangible level, lots of pretty clothes and various good CDs and books. On a more abstract level, lots of fun social and cultural experiences and an easing up of the pressure in one of my jobs.
29. What did you want and not get?
So far, I’ve not had a proper answer to my pointing out that my workload in the other job is simply not possible in my contracted hours. The more senior members of the GB there are supposedly going to be looking at governance issues generally a couple of weeks from now, so I will await the outcome of that with interest.
30. What were your favourite films of this year?
In the ‘serious films’ category, I think Ex Machina just pips Birdman to the post. In comedy, What We Do In the Shadows was streets ahead of anything else I saw. Favourite blockbuster was Mad Max: Fury Road (and yes, I have seen the new Star Wars film…).
31.What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
We were in York for a couple of days, staying in a gorgeous apartment. The day itself was spent partly on book-shopping and vintage clothes shopping, and we also had a look around Clifford’s Tower and Fairfax House.My age? I was a year older than last year. ;)
32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
If I have to pick only one, I’d say less work stress, because without that all the other things I’d have liked would have been more achievable.
33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2015?
Much the same as ever: variants of goth. I made an interesting discovery last week, though, when my sister bought me a rather nice scarf as a Christmas present: it turns out that the deep reds I abandoned last year because they don’t work with my usual red hair actually work reasonably well when my hair is being deep pink/magenta.
34. What kept you sane?
The key thing was recognising when I had far too much to cope with and dropping some things. I persuaded one of my jobs to let me lose my least-loved school, which happened to have by far the fewest meetings but create by far the most work per meeting. I also stood down at the end of my term of TLL modding, am no longer volunteering as a mentor in schools on the other side of London and will not be doing any translation work for the foreseeable future.
35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most/least?
Aidan Turner is rather easy on the eye, although I preferred him back when he was playing Mitchell in Being Human than as Ross in Poldark (too saintly) or as the mercenary in the recent And Then There Were None (suitably dangerous, but such a shame about the short hair…).
36. What political issue stirred you the most?
Once again, where does one start? I guess the most appalling things seen this year related to the hideous prejudice against refugees who have lost pretty much everything, but there’s stiff competition from all manner of other horrible shit going on both here and elsewhere… :(
37. Whom did you miss?
I don’t think I’ve seen Becky-who-is-not-on-Livejournal at all this year, which is a pity…
38. Who were the best new people you met?
I had to rack my brain to think whether I’ve met any new people at all this year, IRL, and there were a couple of new people I met at Dragonmeet who were nice, and a couple more at a party Jon and Maria threw in the summer.
39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2015…
If you have more control over your working hours than over your actual work, it’s important to be absolutely ruthless about making time to rest once in a while.
1.What did you do in 2015 that you'd never done before?
Served on a jury; visited York (twice).
2.Did you keep your New Year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
I don’t (officially) make resolutions, but I do certainly have some things which need to happen this year, both on the work front and the home front.
3.Did anyone close to you give birth?
No, not this year.
4.Did anyone close to you die?
Also not this year, mercifully.
5.What countries did you visit?
I’ve not left the UK this year. My various holidays have been in the Midlands (depending on how exactly one defines holiday) or the North. A and I were considering going to Amsterdam recently, but we decided on a second trip to York, instead.
6.What would you like to have in 2016 that you lacked in 2015?
Same as last year: a residence which has no cracks in the walls and no leaks or damp patches.
7.What date from 2015 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
Friday 8th May, because the news the UK woke up to that morning was just so awful.
8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Surviving the autumn term feels like quite an achievement. ;)
In terms of proper achievements one can point to, I successfully completed the Unclutter 365 Challenge. The idea is to remove one thing for every thing you bring in to your house, plus an extra thing for every day of the year, i.e. 365 further things. I actually managed 1-for-1 plus 404, which feels pretty good. I’ve not reached the full William Morris (“Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful”) yet, but it does seem within the realms of possibility, now.
9. What was your biggest failure?
See Q6. Finding a decent builder in London is a nightmare, and the good ones tend to be booked for months ahead. In theory, we and the neighbours have someone booked to sort the outside of our house in the Spring, but I won’t really believe it until it’s done.
10.Did you suffer illness or injury?
Nothing huge, although I did end up with some tests and a bundle of extra-strength painkillers because my period pain got even worse this year. Oh, and I got dangerously close to mental collapse in August, before I finally took my first full week off of the year. (I’m just now coming to the end of my second full week off, assuming I manage to resist doing any paid work this evening. I have *no* intention of letting work drive me that mad again.)
11.What was the best thing you bought?
I bought lots of pretty things, but the best thing was a practical thing: a net lingerie bag so I no longer have to spend time hand-washing bras. I don’t know why I didn’t do it years ago…
12.Whose behaviour merited celebration?
All sorts of people, who are doing what they can to make the world a slightly better place and to help other people. I have to remind myself, occasionally, that the good guys really are in the majority.
13.Whose behaviour made you appalled and depressed?
Ye gods, so many people. Everyone who thought shooting or bombing people was the best response to disagreements. Everyone who made things even harder for the disadvantaged. Donald Trump and the scary number of people who apparently think he’s fit to be the Republican presidential candidate, never mind competent to be president of anything.
14.Where did most of your money go?
As ever, if you leave out mortgage and other non-avoidables, the biggest expense in the average week was probably eating out/takeout.
15.What events did you get really, really, really excited about?
I’m not a particularly excitable type, and I don’t recall any event which would fit this category.
16.What song will always remind you of 2015?
I don’t think I have one this year.
17.Compared to this time last year, are you:
i.happier or sadder? About the same, I would say.
ii.thinner or fatter? Pretty much exactly the same. I don’t have an NHS-approved BMI, but it’s healthy enough that (given decent blood pressure and being a non-smoker) my clinic still let me have another year’s worth of contraceptive pills this week. Importantly, this appears to be a weight I can maintain without harmful yo-yo dieting or making myself miserable about what I’m eating.
iii.richer or poorer? I would guess probably slightly richer, but my income this year exceeded my outgoings sufficiently that I haven't been keeping close enough track of money to be certain of that.
18.What do you wish you'd done more of?
Reading, and making things. I may have to cut back on one or more of clubbing/cinema/TV in 2016 if I’m to make a respectable dent in my book pile or get round to making any clothes. ;)
19.What do you wish you'd done less of?
Being stressed about work.
20. How did you spend Christmas?
With family at my sister’s place (and then A’s family at his brother's on the 27th).
21.Who did you spend the most time on the phone with?
The parents, as they’re pretty much the only people who I speak to on the phone at all.
[22.Did you fall in love in 2015?
23. How many one-night stands?
These questions have been discontinued for repetition]
24. What was your favourite TV programme?
As ever, there was a fair bit of good stuff. Best new things included Humans and Hunted. Returners still going strong included The Walking Dead, Game of Thrones and Orphan Black. I was sad to see the end of Nurse Jackie, My Mad Fat Diary and Defiance.
25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
Hate is a strong word, and I’m not sure it applies even in this case, but there is one particular bullying bigot I could really do without seeing around ever again. It was such a relief when she finally unfriended me on LJ and Facebook (well, after the initial period of worry about whether she was going to try and screw things up for me IRL). I was, at one point, actually considering quitting TLL, and maybe even abandoning LiveJournal altogether, because she was so consistently unpleasant.
26. What was the best book you read?
China Mieville’s Embassytown. Intelligent sci-fi, with the bonus, this time, of a specific focus on how language works. I don’t think it was a complete success, but even Mieville’s errors are more interesting than a lot of people’s best work.
27. What was your greatest musical discovery or rediscovery?
Live, Liqueur, a Cure covers band who surprised me by coming up with my best gig of the year. Recorded, Smoke Fairies, who do a nice line in dark folk/blues/possibly some other genre which I don’t know well enough to identify.
28. What did you want and get?
Many things. On a tangible level, lots of pretty clothes and various good CDs and books. On a more abstract level, lots of fun social and cultural experiences and an easing up of the pressure in one of my jobs.
29. What did you want and not get?
So far, I’ve not had a proper answer to my pointing out that my workload in the other job is simply not possible in my contracted hours. The more senior members of the GB there are supposedly going to be looking at governance issues generally a couple of weeks from now, so I will await the outcome of that with interest.
30. What were your favourite films of this year?
In the ‘serious films’ category, I think Ex Machina just pips Birdman to the post. In comedy, What We Do In the Shadows was streets ahead of anything else I saw. Favourite blockbuster was Mad Max: Fury Road (and yes, I have seen the new Star Wars film…).
31.What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
We were in York for a couple of days, staying in a gorgeous apartment. The day itself was spent partly on book-shopping and vintage clothes shopping, and we also had a look around Clifford’s Tower and Fairfax House.My age? I was a year older than last year. ;)
32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
If I have to pick only one, I’d say less work stress, because without that all the other things I’d have liked would have been more achievable.
33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2015?
Much the same as ever: variants of goth. I made an interesting discovery last week, though, when my sister bought me a rather nice scarf as a Christmas present: it turns out that the deep reds I abandoned last year because they don’t work with my usual red hair actually work reasonably well when my hair is being deep pink/magenta.
34. What kept you sane?
The key thing was recognising when I had far too much to cope with and dropping some things. I persuaded one of my jobs to let me lose my least-loved school, which happened to have by far the fewest meetings but create by far the most work per meeting. I also stood down at the end of my term of TLL modding, am no longer volunteering as a mentor in schools on the other side of London and will not be doing any translation work for the foreseeable future.
35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most/least?
Aidan Turner is rather easy on the eye, although I preferred him back when he was playing Mitchell in Being Human than as Ross in Poldark (too saintly) or as the mercenary in the recent And Then There Were None (suitably dangerous, but such a shame about the short hair…).
36. What political issue stirred you the most?
Once again, where does one start? I guess the most appalling things seen this year related to the hideous prejudice against refugees who have lost pretty much everything, but there’s stiff competition from all manner of other horrible shit going on both here and elsewhere… :(
37. Whom did you miss?
I don’t think I’ve seen Becky-who-is-not-on-Livejournal at all this year, which is a pity…
38. Who were the best new people you met?
I had to rack my brain to think whether I’ve met any new people at all this year, IRL, and there were a couple of new people I met at Dragonmeet who were nice, and a couple more at a party Jon and Maria threw in the summer.
39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2015…
If you have more control over your working hours than over your actual work, it’s important to be absolutely ruthless about making time to rest once in a while.