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The wider question involves the commitment we make to maintaining our foothold on the internet - do we build our own island, or entrust the content we create to others? The rational part of my mind tells me that maintaining more than is absolutely necessary is somewhat foolhardy. Why try to own any facet of my online existence?

Moving back to a blog hosted by Automattic (owners of Wordpress) would also absolve me from maintaining the latest version of the software. Something else I can offload to others, freeing me to concentrate on content, and sharing my thoughts and experiences with the community.

Talking of community, I have also been swayed recently by a return to LiveJournal, and unlikely new friendships. Where blogs are very much an island inhabited by the individual, LiveJournal has fostered “the community”, and feels very different because of that. Sure, it’s clunky and idiosyncratic, but it’s strengths outweigh it’s failings. The same can be said about Twitter - a community that seemed to explode around me in the last weeks of this year. Twitter shouldn’t succeed, and yet it does - and it’s fun. It doesn’t try to do too much.

So.

The coming weeks could well see the end of “The Enormous Waste of Webspace” in it’s current form. It will no doubt continue as “jonbecket73.wordpress.com“, and notice will be given when (and if) it happens. My output will still be an enormous waste of webspace, but not my webspace. For the forseeable future, one thing is certain - I will continue to write. Granted, my words will continue to carry little or no useful purpose for the world at large, but they will entertain my fingers during the more dull moments of the day, and perhaps your idle mind while reading them from time to time.

Everything changes. Embrace it.

It’s easy while working, commuting, washing up, tidying up, and generally doing your best to not offend, let down, or annoy anybody to forget who you are - what you believe in, and forget that other people exist who share the world-view that you guard so closely.

While reading the outspoken thoughts of others on the internet, I find myself wondering about my own contribution to the pool of wisdom, knowledge, and life experience we all share online. Where once I was an open book, I have now become a keeper of secrets - both about myself and others.

The pursuit of a quiet life free from controversy tends to squash my own opinions of things - some of them important. The action - and inaction - of others passes without comment regardless of the anger or frustration I may feel at the time.

By the same token that I may not speak out against that which annoys or angers me, I also find myself self censored against those who I value, cherish, or admire for fear of communicating incorrect signals to those around me.

Just to complicate matters, I have always got on with, and attracted the attention of women far more than men - and am perhaps fortunate to count several wonderful women (besides my infinitely better half) as my closest friends and confidants.

Of course this year has added several young female charges to the complex web of relationships and guiding rules surround my life, behaviour, expectations and responsibilities. Suddenly I am expected to speak out even less - to become the quiet Yorkshire man my grandfather was. To hear all, see all, and say nowt (nothing).

There is still a brain ticking away inside this quiet, hard working person though - a person who thinks, has opinions, is angered by others, places others on pedestals, and finds beauty in the most unlikely places.

It’s been hard work, stressful, but ultimately very rewarding. We took hours of video, and hundreds of photographs - here are a few I’m willing to let the world see…

Brushing teeth before bedtime…

Falling asleep while Mum reads…

Building Trainsets

The Aftermath

One day soon I promise to start opening up a little with photos of the children. There is news in that department, but until a particular hurdle is cleared in the coming weeks, I don’t want to do anything.

The past year has been hard - wanting so much to share the three beautiful little girls who call us Mummy and Daddy, and not being able to for all sorts of reasons.

If I don’t get a chance to write something before the new year, here’s to us and to you, whoever you might be. Thankyou to all our friends who have supported us, held our hands at times, and been there for us to lean on. You’ll never know how much we think of you all.

• Four year old’s eyes are bigger than their belly.
• When you are walking back from Christmas shopping with a three year old and a four year old, and the three year old throws herself on the floor and starts screaming, it’s not actually that funny when other parents laugh. You do see the funny side later.
• When the four year old says she is bursting for a wee halfway between the shops and home, that’s not funny either.
• Apparently walking fast to get home before weeing yourself becomes hard work - at which point the little girl in question will say “I can’t walk fast - my tummy is asleep!” - I have not deciphered it yet either.

The above all came from a visit to town this afternoon to get Christmas presents for Wendy from them. I tried to give them as much freedom as possible, but had to intervene when they chose a football and aftershave set. A big bag of chocolate gold coins also had to be put back, more than once. The shopping trip also entailed buying lightbulbs, bread, and a huge supply of rechargeable batteries (and a half hour charger). We anticipate the Wii being played A LOT this Christmas.

Taking the little ones out for the afternoon freed Wendy up to get some clearing up down around the house for the first time in days. I returned home to an 18ft high pile of ironing, and half a clean kitchen. The kids are off to visit their grandparents for the day tomorrow to afford us the chance to get their presents wrapped and tidy the house up before the great destruction really begins on Thursday. Wednesday is already a write-off because we have friends visiting for the day.

I went to Reading on a mad Christmas shopping run yesterday with our eldest. After walking into the first shop, her coat was too hot, her legs were too tired, and she couldn’t take it any more. After some serious words about me giving Father Christmas a call, and taking off her his list, she shut up for - ooo - five minutes. I finally offered that we could perhaps get her and her sisters something from the Disney Store. Miraculous cure.

Some observations about the Disney Store;

• The High School Musical Cheerleader Costumes look like they came straight off a porn movie shoot.
• Apparently selling 2 movies in one box in the Disney store is a great deal at twice the price.
• Never have badges caused such ridiculous prices anywhere in the world ever.
• Sales don’t exist in the Disney universe.
• The female staff of Disney stores are obviously vetted - there are no fat or ugly girls working there. I’m not sure how legal that is these days.

While walking back from the big play park in the middle of town earlier today, we turned ourselves into a mobile roadblock - getting in the way of the several hundred people trying to pass us in both directions. In the end we went single-file, which I don’t like doing because I can’t watch the girls properly. While craning around in a crowd to see where our four year old way, she piped up “it’s okay Dad - I’m right behind you - don’t worry”.

She is old beyond her years sometimes.

During my final hour this afternoon in the London office I have commuted to for the last two years, I handed in my security swipe card, my laptop, and shook hands with the IT manager.

Instead of casually holding my pass to the door, I had to ask the reception staff to let me exit the building. No longer a contractor at the company. A nobody.

It felt strange - walking towards the station for the final time - heading into the London underground. I sat on the train and took a little more notice than usual of those surrounding me. The mix of cultures and races struck me - Asian, Indian, South American, German, Russian and English people all sharing a train carriage far below the streets of London. It’s easy to forget just how multicultural our society is in comparison to many other countries.

Nothing annoyed me today. Not even the career girl that tried repeatedly to trip me with her trolley bag thing. I became fascinated with the clip-clopping of her shoes on the tiled floors instead, and wondered quite how she managed to move her feet quickly enough to keep such a rhythm.

Following an uneventful trundle home aboard the mainline trains, I walked the final minutes in the cold winter air towards home with Thomas Dolby in my ears. The last line of “Slough” by John Betjeman came to mind…

The earth exhales…

Taken last weekend while out showing the girls some Christmas lights. I know it’s blurry and out of focus, but I like it.

It is the east, and my immune system is the sun.

Yes, finally, today my immune system seems to have begun the fight back. Following several days on the absolute limit of various publicly available drugs, suffering partial deafness and loss of balance as a result, my body seems to have realised it should start helping me out today.

I’ve come off everything, and have spent the evening coughing big chunks of my lungs up - but not consistently. My nose and throat seem to be surviving for an hour or more at a time too - better than the 15 minutes I was lasting yesterday morning.

What I really could do with is a 250g bar of chocolate. I’m sure I can think of a reason why it would help my health too.

In a certain large chemist in Liverpool Street station at lunchtime, a typical career girl in a beret and woolen suit knocked over a display of something or other. Rather than pick it up, she walked off - at speed - completely ignoring the devestation she just caused.

While walking back towards the office, I got caught on the wrong side of a narrow path past some roadworks. In the end I started counting - about fifty people walked past, and none of them gave way to let me out. Not one.

It’s easy to forget however that my normal route to work involves cycling through the middle of a small town - which is typically filled with Mum’s delivering their children to school in various forms of tank, and no regard for the rest of humanity at all.