BY JACK GODBEY

Columnist

A brand-new year has finally arrived! At times, the year moved so slowly it could be compared to your Aunt Myrtle from Florida with her two snot nosed kids who came to visit and just didn’t know when to leave. Then I blink and the entire year is gone, and folks are singing Christmas carols and planning New Year’s Eve parties. When did this happen? Wasn’t I just complaining about how hot summer was? I take it all back. I’ll take that sunshine now please.

It seems that many people point their finger at the outgoing year as being the source of all their problems and are under the assumption that the new year will somehow bring a whole new life for them. I hate to break it to them, but the problem is not the year, it’s them. I mean, if a good decision to you is starting the year off getting plastered with people you barely know and then walking around with a pounding headache the next day, maybe there could be room for improvement in your decision-making skills. What do you think?

One thing for sure, change is always occurring whether you’re ready for it or not. When I was a child, the change in the year used to mean sitting up until midnight to greet the new Year, popping a big bowl of popcorn and drinking soda until I was about to bust and then sitting back and wait for the ball to drop from Times Square. If the new year came in on a Saturday night, we were still expected to be up bright and early the next morning to go to church. Ole mom and dad didn’t want to hear any excuses on Sunday morning either. I’d struggle to stay awake during the services while my eyes felt like they had bricks tied to them. As I have grown older, I find that New Year’s Eve consists of me falling asleep on the couch only to discover that I wake up at two in the morning and realize I missed the new year change all together. This year maybe I’ll have some fun. I’ll order a pizza five minutes until midnight and then insist it should be free should I ordered it last year for goodness sakes.

What’s the big deal about seeing the new year come in anyway? In reality, nothing changes. It’s just a time set aside to force me to write the wrong date on my checks for the next two weeks. It’s us humans that make it a big deal. Mother Nature is sitting back trying to figure out why everyone picks that day to wake up with hangovers The sun rises and sets the same way on January 1 st as it did a day before.

I have learned the hard way to not make any foolish resolutions as well. If history is any indication, I simply can’t afford to make resolutions. If I make a resolution to lose ten pounds, then I will spend half my paycheck on some new fancy piece of exercise equipment and then huff and puff as I start a new exercise routine. Before two weeks has passed, my new exercise machine becomes a place to hang my clothes as I work to polish off my fourth bucket of KFC and I end up gaining five pounds. I figured that in order to lose weight, I am much better off to not to make any resolutions to begin with.

As we start the new year, I hope you enjoy our fresh start at binge eating, boozing, and slacking off.

As for me, I’ll take a bucket of KFC and call it a year.