New Year’s Eve

You know that you have had a good New Year’s Eve when the drinks bill is exactly double the food bill – ouch.

Fantastic night last night at The Hale Grill – a lovely birthday dinner with Annie B – enjoying the very best food and wine.

We both love piano bars and the live show was super – a complete songbook for middle-aged romantics.

Lovely, also, to bump into a Facebook friend from Northampton – Judith Husband – who was dining at the next table.

Social media has made the world a much smaller place.

As we approached midnight we were joined by Jon my eldest son and Rachel my eldest daughter – so we just had to let 2013 in the door with some champagne.

One of the things I like about Annie is that she knows when she has had enough to drink – to the minute.

There is a moment where she looks at me, smiles and says “I’ve had enough to drink now, please take me home.”

Experience has taught me that this request MUST be fulfilled immediately – so we walked back with Rachel at about 01:00 – Jon having disappeared back into Hale Village (which means he may not reappear for some time).

That makes us evens for the holiday – she carried me home on Boxing Day after our epic singing and dancing on the tables at Hale Kitchen. I carried her home last night.

Very equitable in my view.

Today I’ve been pottering around in The Bunker for quite some time whilst she and the dog are on the sofa upstairs, under a blanket, fire on, watching old movies on TV (Ben Hur at the moment).

Having fun getting the Get Your Year in Gear gang organised, connected and lined up for an interesting month of coaching ahead.

Equally, a long conversation with Nicola Cairncross this morning, who has done a fantastic job with the back-stage side of the GYYIG programme and with whom I intend to collaborate on further projects this coming year. We were talking about lots of projects and possibilities, the most immediate of which will be to invest in the Coach Barrow web site to make it more easy to navigate, to offer more solutions and (of course) to look cool.

Back to work in earnest tomorrow.