SURVIVING JANUARY

For some reason, everyone's congratulating me for getting to the end of January alive.

True, New Year's Eve does feel like it was about a calendar year ago, and certainly, this month has been long and strange - but it's definitely been... survivable... hasn't it?

Even The Trainline wanted me to breathe a big old sigh of relief.

"Congrats, you made it through January (Dry or not)! Why not treat yourself this February to a trip away? Here are some places to visit with loved ones, friends, or family..."

Thanks The Trainline. But your first two suggestions were Paris (which my family would hate) and then Cambridge (which is a weird place to take anybody, and also, where I once had a horrible experience... oh yeah, I remember... on a train)...

And anyway, what you really mean, under the cheery guise of relief... is that now we've all been paid, and the long dry and cold month of dreadful sparsity is over, we can blow a load of cash on expensive train journeys to places you suspect we might think are romantic. But we're not falling it for it, are we? Because the best way to celebrate having no money for several weeks... is definitely not... to spend a whole load of money.

February is shorter, yes. But you can only pull this trick once a year, The Trainline. And we'll be onto you in March. Or perhaps you mean that because millions of us (not many of us) took up "dry veganuary", we're ready to chuff away to Paris on the Eurostar and fill our flaky faces with red wine and le bifteck? But what would be the point of that? That's like fasting chocolate for a month and then suddenly hitting the chocs like Augustus Gloop.

Well. In any case, for me, February just feels like it's jam-packed with birthdays - including mine, and so there'll be no jaunting off to Cambridge or York on a spree, thanks. If anything, navigating my way through the multiple social occasions of February seems like more of a survival-run. Like Gladiators from the 90s:

"Introverts ready!" (Scottish accent)

Anyway, I'll be alright. I will survive, just like I survived my way through January (apparently). It is okay though if I don't get a round of applause for it at the end of the month though.