2010 - A New Year message to my readers

Subject	A New Year message to my readers
DateCreated	1/1/2010 10:43:00 AM
PostedDate	1/1/2010 10:30:00 AM
	And so I say goodbye to 2009 - the worst year of my life. Like any year there have been highs and lows, but the lows couldn't really get any lower than in February when I lost my dad. It wasn't unexpected, but it's still a hard thing to come to terms with. You deal with it - you have to, it's not like you have a choice. Life will never be the same again in our family. It affects me more in that as well as losing my father, I am also losing the family home where I grew up - a house where every room is full of memories. It's time to move on. There have been big changes in my life in 2009, and there are going to be more in 2010. Finding somewhere to live and finding my feet in my new home will be a challenge. I'm hoping to stay in the same area and have looked at a few places already. I am quite fussy regarding things like access and parking though, and also I want to be within easy walking distance of a tube station and Night Bus stop. Beggars can't be choosers though, so I will probably have to compromise on at least one of those things. Being a musician complicates matters and is why I am fussy about parking - I need to be able to park close to my front door for loading/unloading of heavy equipment, and stairs aren't good either. Also, I have a lot of stuff - guitars, amps, PA equipment, etc so I need somewhere that has space for all this gear, and hopefully room for me as well! I've had to put the band on hold for 2009 as I simply had too much other stuff to deal with, but I hope to get things going again early in 2010. I didn't want to try getting the band going again with an impending change of address for me as all the chaos that will entail that will destroy our momentum. I want to wait until I know I will be able to properly devote my attention to the band - not do it in a stop/start way and mess people around with cancellations, etc. I thought I was going to be out of 'Dark Towers' by Christmas, but New Year finds me still here here and probably for a few weeks more while the legal stuff involved with the sale of the house drags on... So 2009 was a very sad, and also frustrating year for me. However, there were some good things too. I got to see AC/DC, ZZ Top, Alice Cooper, Motörhead, Girlschool, The Damned, The Wildhearts, and AntiProduct to name just a few of the more well known acts, plus countless underground and up and coming bands. And of course there was Sonisphere - big thanks again to Helen T for enabling me to go to that - and I'm sorry I didn't see more of you over the weekend. There were a few other things I had to pass up on over the year for family and other reasons, or lack of finance, or simply time. A few things have slipped under my radar in 2009 that would normally have not gone undetected, but that was inevitable in the unfortunate circumstances. I didn't see enough of my friends, but am eternally grateful for their friendship and support over the past year - even if I don't see you, it's good to know you are there. Without my friends I would be nothing and there would be little to stick around for. I may not be very good at showing it, but I value you all enormously. I tend to be quite a solitary person a lot of the time, but I actually like it that way and have always been happy with my own company. That said, I always look forward to going to gigs (or just the pub) and meeting my friends - they, along with the music and bands make it all worthwhile. 2009 was a very difficult year for me personally, and I expect there are more difficult times to come over the next couple of months or so, but things are hopefully going to fall into place soon and I can move on to the next stage of my life, get my new home sorted out, and get the band going again. As my regular readers (thank you both) will have noticed, I have got very behind with my blogging over the past year - up to three months behind at times. Like the band, blogging and forums, etc have had to take somewhat of a back seat since February. I have managed to start catching up a little over the Christmas holidays, but this is the only blog that I'm likely to post in 'real time' for the time being - so expect to see a load more backdated ones appearing as I try to catch up! It's a struggle trying to remember much about gigs I went to 2 or 3 months ago - even without my alcohol ravaged and rapidly depleting braincells losing more information. My memory was always rubbish anyway! For those reasons, it's quite possible that the odd gig I went to might get missed out of my blog completely if I've totally forgotten about it! I tend to rely heavily on looking back at the pictures I've taken to remind me what a gig was like - or that I even went. Therefore, if I didn't take any pictures at a gig (very rare) I might completely forget to write a blog on it. My pictures are automatically stored in folders sorted by date on my computer so that's my 'system' (or memory) as far as blog writing goes. Sooner or later someone is bound to ask why I haven't written a blog on some gig or other that I've completely forgotten I was even at, and they'll say "But I saw you there!". Happy New Year everyone - lets hope for a better 2010....