Mark McLellan - My Year in Status

When I did my Facebook year in status it neatly precised the last twelve months: music, food & drink, cycling, travel.



Music was a rich year with some most entertaining evenings out:

• Tina Turner at the O2 (brilliant!)
• Rick Wakeman at Hampton Court Palace
• New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival in New Orleans (too many artists to list)
• New Orleans festival at the O2 (John Mooney, Dr John)
• Neil Young in Hyde Park (also Seasick Steve)
• James Taylor at the O2
• Sapphire Bullets in a pub in Kingston on Thames
• U2 at Wembley
• Bolan Bop in Golders Green
• T.Rextasy at Epsom
• Bill Bailey's Extraordinary Guide to the Orchestra 
• Bill Posters Will be Band plus Three Bonzos and a Piano at The Bull's Head, Barnes
  

http://blog.mmenterprises.co.uk/search/label/music

Food and drink to many to mention, see:

• http://blog.mmenterprises.co.uk/search/label/wine
• http://blog.mmenterprises.co.uk/search/label/restaurants

Travel is not good for our carbon footprint. The most frequent destination was Scotland to visit Mary's mum and help her with the down-sizing and move to the sheltered accommodation. Of course the Trulli gets a number of hits.

• Scotland (10) - visiting May
• Italy (5) - open up, holidays, close down
• New Orleans (1) - Jazz Fest
• South Africa (1) - Whale watching in Hermanus
• Bowness (1) - walking in the lake district
• France (1) - weekend visiting John and Andrea in Bordeaux
• Dublin (1) - Valentine's Day weekend

Cycling
One charity ride (London Bikeathon in Aid of Leukaemia Research) and load of miles commuting to work by bike.

Health
I had a cataract operation in March in the left eye which went well. As only the one eye was done that left me with mismatched eyes. I cannot now use glasses as the prescriptions are two disparate - I miss the varifocal lenses. Instead I use a long distance contact lens in the left and reading power in the right - leaving the brain to auto-flip flop between the images; odd but mostly works ok.

• http://blog.mmenterprises.co.uk/2009/03/cataract-operation-went-well.htm
• http://blog.mmenterprises.co.uk/2009/05/after-effects-of-cataract-operation.htm
• http://blog.mmenterprises.co.uk/2009/05/one-eyed-man-is-king.htm

Work should get a mention. At the tail end of 2008 I was budget cut out of BT after four years of contract renewals. I then got a contract as "poacher turned gamekeeper" at Wexham Park Hospital. After only two months there the financial axe fell again and, as freelancers are easy meat for the cull, I was out again.

Luckily I obtained a new contract on a really interesting project, with excellent colleagues in a good location (London Bridge) that I cycle to most days that I can. The rate wasn't top of the range but who's complaining with the other plus points.

What is a pain is that the agency through whom I was contracting went into voluntary liquidation owing me three months money. I am unlikely to ever see that but the plus side is that I am now working directly for the client and get the old agency's cut so will gradually claw back the loss. And the work looks set fair to continue for some time.

Christmas: The previous two Christmases were spent in South Africa so this year it was our turn to host Mary's Mum and stay in the UK. We spent a relaxing time as home in Wandsworth with May mostly knitting in the corner. We were joined by my Mum and Dad for Christmas Day goose and on New Year's Eve our friends Bob and Lynne joined us for a meal at a local restaurant.

No New Year resolutions but if I were to make one it would be "to become older and wiser". That way I am guaranteed at least a 50 percent success :-)

PS [14-Jan-10]
Molly the Morris Minor: How could I have missed that other milestone of the year? After 13 years with us Molly the Morris Minor went off to a new home. http://blog.mmenterprises.co.uk/search/label/cars