I have never been one to celebrate the New Year. I certainly give the due amount of thought to the past year, and for the year to come, but having a party hasn’t really been my thing. I mean, one minute it’s 1159, the next it’s 0000, and it’s no big deal.

I have been to New Years’ parties, but then the feeling of anti-climax has been doubly strong when people whoop and holler at the appointed hour, and then it’s all over. As I said, it’s not for me.

Moving across the Atlantic, I’ve found that the sense of anti-climax is actually worse here. Quite often bars and pubs don’t open at all on New Year’s Eve, preferring to let their staff have the time with their families. I do get that, but I’m used to pubs staying open for the whole evening, and into the wee small hours. Indeed, so popular are pubs on New Years Eve in the UK that they often have to issue tickets so that the regulars get a look in.

Then there’s the awful “celebration” in New York’s Times Square that has long been lost to the people who want to make money from the occasion. I understand the ball drop, but the lead up to it with pop singers of the day miming to their latest release an a cold outdoor stage, interspersed with inane chatter from a couple of TV “Hosts” and a plethora of “stars”, it’s all just so painful. Perhaps the most awful aspect is that once that ball has dropped, everyone goes home! Twenty past the hour and Times Square is deserted. Contrast that with Trafalgar Square in London, where the party really only gets started at midnight, and goes on for hours, with Transport for London providing free buses and Underground services for when you do decide to head home.

It’s all academic of course, at least for me. It is the start of a new year and with that comes a degree of optimism (like it couldn’t be any worse than last year?), and the days are getting longer, but I can think of better things to celebrate. Or not, because I’m a miserable bugger.