Basket.

And so yet another New Year's Eve has arrived, and it is once more time to look back on a whole year gone; to wonder what has changed and what has not, total up with has been done and what has not and then come to a final conclusion on how the year has been.

Forgettable, at best, for me. Hellish is a better term.

I greeted it with cautious optimism, but hopes were soon dashed by a brutal January, which included sampling all the delights of Singapore's tropical rainforest in a seven-day field camp. This continued in much the same vein until March, when I finally finished BMT and got off that blasted island for good. In retrospect, that was the best month of them all. I passed through the rigours of the FATA Trade Course after that and served through a very mundane June. All was nice and peaceful until July, which, for obvious reasons, is the month I most want to forget. August was spent on recovering, painful treatments and recovering from painful treatments. The rest of the year was spent half in some sort of administrative limbo and half in boring office work, but after what came before, I was very happy doing it all.

To be fair to this year, it has had its moments and it has provided its cherished memories. Compared to its two predecessors, however, it's been boring at best. But that's not the reason why I've so hated this year. The reason is because this year has shown me that it is foolish to be optimistic, and the whole new world turned out to be a cesspit.

What went some way to salvage the year, of course, were people. Those close to me - where else could all the moments and cherished memories come from? From DOTA with my old 4E mates to dinner with Ao1C and watching fireworks with Winston - it's been things like these that have made a truly difficult year that little easier to bear.

And now, no matter how difficult, the year is all but over. The only thing more important that remembering the past is looking towards the future. 2006 will be a better year. It has to be, because it is the year I ORD. Pink IC, here I come.

Before I forget, here I will go doing my annual thing of thanking everyone who has somehow done something for me this year. To those who have helped me smile when I most needed to, laugh when I thought I had lost my sense of humour, listened when I had something to say, consoled me when I've felt simply hopeless, offered advice that turned out to be invaluable and all in all provided all these memories that will last a lifetime - Thank you. Sincerely, and ever so much.

And for everyone else, Happy New Year. Or so I hope.