text: LET’S DRINK TO 2024, or PERHAPS NOT! Well you did take your time getting here 2024, we have waited twelve months. However I am glad you made it, and that I also made it, even though it was decidedly doubtful at times. Now you are here there are a few items left over from 2023 we need to clear up. No, I am not one of those people getting the first of every month mixed up with New Year’s Eve. I am not here to make a New Year wish. For the most part those are normally people making wishes involving wealth, ostensibly for their self. I concede there is nothing new on that front. I am also perfectly aware that the first of any month is ‘White Rabbit’s Day’. It is only on the month of your birth you actually can make a wish in which you are heard imploring ‘White Rabbit s to Come to Me’. The reason most of these wishes fail is the wisher has forgotten the acknowledgment of the White Rabbit has to be the first thing you say on that day. It’s a simple but common error. You should try and remember it for next month. Why this happens I have no idea. As I reside in an upstairs apartment, what I would do with a White Rabbit, if it ever did come, is thought provoking at the very least. Fortunately I can report it has never worked for me, thus it remains a problem averted. Be that as it may, while we can now safely ignore wishes for 2024, we cannot foist the same treatment onto the never ending New Year’s Resolutions, particularly the resolutions related to one’s body shape, smoking or vaping, chocolate consumption or being nice to your in laws. That is why I need to discuss 2023. If ever there has been a year where monumental failure of NY Resolutions exceeded the Gross Domestic Product of several Nations I cannot find it and I wish it would stop. Sorry, it was a slip of the tongue. Back to 2023, the year when shark attacks World- wide decreased but the number of sharks killed increased to over one million. Now that is something I do wish would stop, or at least get the balance right by increasing the number of attacks. Australians are doing their bit but for reasons unknown they were not swimming early morning or late afternoon as much as in previous years. Consequently their contribution suffered a downturn as these are a shark’s normal feeding times. Cigarette sales went up in 2023 while crocodile attacks were considerably down, which is ridiculous. A crocodile attacks a human when it ventures into its domain and becomes headline news while cigarettes and vapes kill hundreds the same week and do not rate a mention. Let the crocs loose I say. We need balance. How many broken resolutions related to giving up smoking? Countless, so no surprise it is the clubhouse leader in 2024 but unfortunately still under the 2023 resoluter’s (is that a word? Probably not but you know what I mean).) endeavors. For every giving up smoking resolution there is a taking up vaping commensurate figure. As most vapes are nicotine based I question the value of any attempt to give up smoking. Another’ I wish they would listen’ wasted. Number two on the Resolution is weight, not the gaining of but ridding oneself of the extra expansive flesh one has acquired during 2023. Well, if you are truthful you will find it was already there as a leftover from 2022 and contributed unfairly to the 2023 resolution failure numbers. If my body is any indication it will also be counted among the 2024 failures. You have to respect consistency. Alcohol consumption is a regular each year although it is more akin to seeing Pink Elephants than White Rabbits. Giving it up altogether rarely features, it is the “I’m cutting down on my consumption’ resolutions that are boosting the failure numbers. Unfortunately the most popular estimate of how much the resolution relates to by each person is confounded by, ‘alcohol will only be consumed on days ending in a Y’. I rest my case, someone must have spoken to my wife . How the next item ever received a mention astounds me. Giving up chocolate? Obviously a typo, everyone likes chocolate. I have never heard anyone say they do not like chocolate. For Heaven’s sake it is good for you, well dark chocolate is, and milk chocolate has to be better for you than chokos. Every food on this Earth is better for you than chokos. In fact giving up vegetables makes more sense than abstaining from chocolate. An obvious left over from2023 and it is certainly not applicable in 2024 in our house. (Yes I will have one more piece thank you, only one though.) The last one on the list is being good to your In Laws. I applaud the thought, however I am not one hundred percent sure this resolution should specifically mention In Laws to be good to. Not the easiest assignment in many cases if restricted to those relatives. I was always taught to be good to my Mother so I did not need to make a resolution to carry out that task. I cannot say the same about my Father and to be perfectly honest my first in laws, I am currently on my second foray into the In Law world, were kept some distance away on from me on New Year’s Eve due to my tendency towards truth telling after my fourth Jack Daniels. So there we have it, the comparison of failures between 2023 and the estimates for 2024 relating to New Year’s Resolutions. Seriously I must point the finger at the statisticians here, particularly in relation to the subjects listed. I would have put chokos on top of the list and encouraged a World wide ban on growing the slimy things. That would be a very useful Resolution AND no doubt the most kept one of any year since records have been kept. Oh they only go back to 2023. Another piece of chocolate please.