Happy New Baby

Well I think the year has started off on the right foot. A chilled out New Years eve on the beach, drinking pina coladas, watching the local girls do what was billed as a "Thai exotic dance" (which consisted of doing a madonna style bump and grind whilst waving a carrot in the air), watching the dangerously fun homemade fireworks exploding on the beach and giggling at the ageing hippies who hang out here on the island. My favourite line of the night was an old american hippie guy who was smoking a huge joint suddenly put it out and said "oh I have to go, my kids have just told me its time to get home." And sure enough there were his teenage sons standing nearby telling him it was time to put down the joint and stop partying....an interesting role reversal.

The other auspicious start to the year is thanks to my brand new niece who choose to arrive in this world at 4am on the 1st of the 1st. My brother describes her as "47cm long little girl who started out an angry shade of red and has faded to a nice pinky colour." Lovely, I look forward to meeting her in April.