You may remember some previous entries about how things were going for me back in September. I figured that, since we're well into December now, I'm well overdue in giving you an update.

If we're going to stick with this tenuous 'soap opera' analogy that I decided was a good idea back in September, right now I feel like we're at the end of the current series. Although, not entirely positively, there's that lingering inevitability that it'll be coming back onto our screens at some point in the future. Unlike most series, though, my series is coming to a close quietly rather than with a crash-bang-wallop cliffhanger. Suits me fine!

In terms of moving from Leeds to Reading, I've been here a full three weeks now. That part of the drama is, at least, at an end. The physical movement of my stuff, the unpacking, the paperwork and all that other moving-type stuff was fairly intense, but I managed to get nearly all of that out of the way in the first five or six days. Since then I've been back to work, even been back to Leeds once already, had visitors, stayed in, went out - done your regular sorts of things. I'm settled in, properly, already.

I'm enjoying walking everywhere instead of driving around or catching buses. I'm appreciating the difference in pace here. I'm missing my friends back in Leeds, but enjoying spending time with others here and I'm managing to keep as occupied as I want to be in the evenings and weekends.

Back in September I wrote about moving, about how I wasn't particularly excited about moving despite the fact I would normally be very excited, and also about why I was feeling like that. Three months later I'd love to be able to say that I'm past all that, but regretfully I have to report that I'm not. Now that I'm actually here in Reading I'm hoping that I can move on from my disappointment in the summer, but unfortunately (and, personally, surprisingly) right now it doesn't feel like things are improving on that score.

I have to be positive and hope that it will, and that I will start to get a bit more satisfaction from my move and start enjoying myself like I always used to. It's early days yet, and it's not a lot to ask for, so it's definitely within my grasp.

I am quietly and moderately confident about next year. I had such hopes for this year, especially as 2004 rocked. Despite one or two notable highlights, 2005 will probably have to go down as a year that sucked. Maybe 2006 will come somewhere in between - I think I would settle for that.