After living across several continents and making amazing friends along the way, I have also managed to shed them too (and very sadly) through insane schedules and an inability to juggle my schedule sufficiently well to find the space to write emails and letters. Perhaps this new format will lend itself to a better way of connecting and reconnecting.

I have high hopes for 2006. Just retired from a particularly backbreaking and soul-destroying stint (four hour daily commutes - never, ever again). I will work from home now - writing (a book on the pleasures and joys of African fiction); reviewing (let's hope this takes off); more writing (a novel - two paragraphs yesterday, although who knows where it is headed); editing (freelance, for a small socialist press); event co-ordination (more Africa related themes); gardening (yay!); and learning how to keep house (a lot harder than one might think). I hope that by picking things to work on that I actually want to do - except for housekeeping, which can only be viewed as necessity rather than joy (I'm not that far gone yet) - my life will magically rearrange itself into more manageable blocks. I expect my own personal Grand Adventure. The only drawback is that I'm just not cut out to be this organized! I am curious to see what, if anything, I've accomplished by February 2007.