May, as it does, arrived with the aggressive optimism of a month that knows it's the best month and intends to make sure you know it too. Blossom on everything. The evenings suddenly going light until nine. The city remembering how to be pleasant. April was the bigger month emotionally. But there's a run-up to get through first — Hamburg, Auckland, and a ski trip I am still finding evidence of in my washbag. Here's the year so far.

It's been a year and a bit since the last post, which was not the plan. I sat down to write something in the spring and then again in the summer and both times got about three paragraphs in and thought, this needs more space than I've got this evening, and then didn't come back to it. So: here's the whole thing, the day before Christmas Eve, a glass of something decent at my elbow, the house quiet because Gemma is upstairs packing for Bansko in a manner that can only be descr