So here we are fast approaching the end of 2025 and I think it’s time to look back over my year and the blog posts I have published over the past 12 months. It’s almost unbelievable but this is my 699th Blog post. All the links to the posts mentioned below open up in another window.
January
Back in January Liz and I had jetted off as usual to Lanzarote but sadly, a fabulous villa we had found the previous year was fully booked and so we had to settle for another property. On paper it looked like a lovely place and to a great extent it was. A nice living space, comfy bedroom and a nice patio with comfy sun loungers. The pool was a little small but the big problem was that it was an end property at the top of a rise and next door and across the way was a big expanse of empty ground. It looked good but it meant that as Lanzarote tends to get a little windy in the winter a regular gale force wind often seemed to blast across our small terrace which sadly, in the afternoon, tended to be in the shade. Happily, in 2026 we look forward to occupying our favourite villa which not only gets the sun all day but has other properties around which act as a windbreak.
As usual in Lanzarote I was able to combine swimming, sun bathing and blog writing and produced my usual weekly post including January: Don’t You Just Hate it! and The Democratic Way, a post about the election of Donald Trump to another term as president of the USA.
February
In February I wrote Underwater Adventures which was a post about films and TV that involved underwater stuff, things like Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea. I even threw in an anecdote about the time I tried to get my scuba diving licence. Another post that month was one of my favourites, Changing the Narrative, which involved how the storylines of film and TV and even books can change when required. When it comes down to it, there have been times when I wouldn’t have minded changing my own narrative too.
March
In March I was getting a little stuck for ideas and I had to recycle an old post, The Men in White Suits, a post that linked people like Alec Guinness who starred in the Ealing film comedy, The Man in the White Suit and David Essex who used to wear a white suit back in the 1970’s and other similar situations and characters.
April
In April I was reliving some old bus driving memories in Driving the Bus and in Painters and Paintings I published an art post looking at my favourite artists and pictures.
May
In May Liz and I were off to France in our motorhome. We had hardly arrived when I became a little concerned as my brother Colin wasn’t answering my calls or messages. This led to a really upsetting situation in which we had to ask one of his friends to go and check on him and later when he got no response we had to ask him to call the police. A really odd situation began to commence. The police wouldn’t attend but said they would send an ambulance. The ambulance service wouldn’t attend as they couldn’t gain entry so the fire brigade were called. After about two hours the fire service turned up, forced open the door to Colin’s flat and found him dead on the bedroom floor. He was my younger brother and only 64 years old.
June
In June I wrote Sadness and Telephone Menus, about the difficulties faced dealing with the practicalities of death; reporting the death, closing bank accounts, arranging the funeral and so on. I don’t publish much fiction on WordPress but another post was A Genie Called Ralph, a quirky fantasy story. By the way, if you’d like to read more of my fiction head over to the downloads page where you download a few of my stories to read at your leisure.
July
It was a fairly good summer in the UK and most of the time it was sunny and warm; in other words, perfect barbecue time. Heatwaves and Barbecues was a post I wrote in July and in another I wrote about memories of past Saturday Nights as well as linking in films and music on the same theme.
August
I’ve written many posts about books and a regular series is one in which I compare books to their filmed counterparts. In August I added a post about one of my favourite book/film series, the James Bond books by Ian Fleming. I must have been in a pretty nostalgic sort of mood that month because another post was Comfort Food, talking about the memories that my favourite food conjures up for me.
September
In September I was Travelling and Writing in France and another post was Working with AI Images. My latest obsession is making AI pictures and short videos to use on social media, hopefully to tempt more visitors to my blog page and maybe even buy my books.
October
October was another sad time as my late brother’s birthday was on the 10th. I’ve always tried to get him a birthday present, even if it was only just something simple like aftershave or something. Last year I didn’t get him anything but I didn’t feel bad because he rarely if ever got me anything. Even so, he seemed really hurt about it so I picked up something simple from Asda, a toiletry set, wrapped it up and gave it to him. He must have liked it because after his death I found a lot of the same product in his bathroom. Back to my blogs and another film post I wrote in October was one about the films of Ridley Scott.
November
Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor. Image courtesy Wikipedia Creative Commons.
November was the centenary of the birth of Richard Burton. He was born on November 10th, 1925 and I’ve always loved his wonderful speaking voice. Someone else with an interesting voice although hardly in the same class as Burton was Woody Allen and Woody got a mention in a post called Bad Meals, North Roxbury and Woody which was inspired by a remarkable autobiography of Mia Marrow called What Falls Away.
December
The Formula One season finally finished in December and so I wrote a post about the World Champions, McLaren and their champion driver Lando Norris. In another post I remembered the sad death of John Lennon in New York 1980 in a post about 4 Things That Happened in December.
That brings me to the end of this little review. I hope you have enjoyed reading my posts this past year. If they have given you as much pleasure as it was for me to write them then I’ll be very pleased. I hope you had a great Christmas!
Letters from an Unknown Author! 