Two thousand ten – what a fantastic year. It started out cold and it ended up fucking freezing, and in between it was wonderful.
What happened? How much of it can you remember? Well, let’s see – volcanic ash clouds lamed Europe, Germany’s Next Top Model humiliated teenagers, Lena won Eurovision, Germany didn’t win the WM….then Britain slowly but surely started turning into the kind of country you see depicted in the fairly realistic and thoroughly excellent science fiction movie Children of Men. Thousands – if not millions – of boring, bourgeois pensioners in Stuttgart decided to become revolutionary anarchists because they thought that train station was a tad too expensive. Alice Schwarzer and Kristina “Don’t call me a Kartoffel” Schröder had a bit of a handbags-at-dawn style catfight. Thilo Sarrazin fucked a Vietnamese girl in Friedrichshain. Awright, I might’ve made that last bit up, but I’m sure he would’ve done it, if he’d’ve thought of it.
And now, 2010 draws to an end. All that’s left to think about is, like, you know, New Year’s resolutions and that. I have to admit something now. I have never, ever, in the history of my life, ever, ever kept a New Year’s resolution. Ever.
I wish I was Carrie from Sex and the City coz then I could go, at this bit: “Why don’t I ever keep New Year’s resolutions, ever?” And then I would, like, pause thoughtfully, chewing on my lip, look out the window for a few seconds, and then go: “Suddenly I realized that it didn’t really matter whether I kept New Year’s resolutions at all. All that really mattered was that I was surrounded by people who loved me, and who I loved, and expensive shoe shops.” But I ain’t Carrie from Sex and the City and the truth is, I think it’s total shite of me that I never keep New Year’s resolutions. And I’m too much of a whingeing pussy for high heels anyways.
So. What I’ve decided is: I’m only going to make one New Year’s resolution. Then it’ll be easier to keep, right. Okay. And I know full well that I am not going to stop reading Agatha Christie novels and start reading proper books.
I also know that I won’t, if I’m honest, ever improve my German. I’ll never understand those adjective ending thingies, I’m destined to haphazardly bung an ‘n’ onto the end of 78 percent of the adjectives I use for the rest of my life. I’m also never going to start insisting that all German people speak to me in German. This has been my New Year’s Resolution for the past three years in a row and it’s just never gonna happen.
I’m not going to waste time with crap resolutions I can’t and won’t keep.
But: the next time some grumpy Berlin fucker complains about my kid singing or chatting or just breathing too loudly in the underground, I am going to lick them. No, it’s not a typo. A nice, long, velvety lick. Softly. On the side of their face.
And then walk away, quick-sticks.
Happy New Year, you guys.
