That’s all I got.

…to sort a few things out.

A few weeks ago I flew to Moscow for a couple of days and from there, caught the train to Beijing (stopping off for a few nights in Ulanbator, Mongolia along the way). The journey itself was perfect and pretty much exactly what I needed.

To put things in perspective: over the past month I’ve jogged around Red Square in the morning snow, galloped across the Mongolian desert in the afternoon sun and – thanks to a midday downpour – got soaked to the skin deep within the Forbidden City. ‘Spectacular’ doesn’t quite do it justice.

There’s much to catch up on [and a fair amount of moleskinerie to write up] but for now, it’s good to be home.

My little brother has been in town all week and last night, finally, we managed to make some time to sit down and chat rubbish for a few minutes.

The camera gives up right at the end (my fault for not deleting all my #vlomo content off the memory from last year), but I think it ends everything with quite a nice little cliffhanger that perhaps we can pick up on next time…

I will never get tired of making these. Ever.

Messing about with my family in my sister’s back garden – the perfect way to end Christmas Day

— Shot on a Nokia N8, yesterday, somewhere near Dulwich.

Today is November 21st. My birthday.

Last year my other half laid on the best birthday experience ever; including all my friends, all my geekiness and nearly all of London’s Soho district.

It was fantastic.

This year has been – amazingly – even better. Friday night I was out with work for a huge, multi-celebratory knees up. Three birthdays, two leavers and one awesome award win meant that it was the perfect combination for getting the whole company out together. It’s a rarity for all of us to unwind like that and it was definitely well overdue for some of us. I guess I got home about 4ish maybe? But even then didn’t get to sleep until the very early hours (what with deciding to carry on partying with everyone at home way back in the vale). Brilliant.

Last night was my actual birthday party; friends old and new, a few work colleagues, best mates from home, some family (it’s my sister’s birthday today too) and it was one of the best nights out I’ve had this year.

A night of music from the 80s, filthy fairy cakes, beetlejuice-based hilarity, Marmite-flavoured chocolate… the list goes on.

Looking through my phone this morning there’s only a few photos to show off what a great night we all had (I’m sure others took many, many more), however I did find one video. One very special video.

Big love and thanks to Bryce & Camilla for today’s #vlomo10 entry. You guys rock… X

^Turn it up to 720p

For now at least.

I’ve just closed the book on my final moleskine back-story. I am up to date and everything from here on in (unless labelled otherwise) will be up to date and on the money. Turns out the timing was quite nice too…

The entries themselves run across two books and one year; spanning July 2009 to July 2010. In that time I’ve changed jobs (twice), travelled the world (once), moved house (in secret) and, overall, done a lot of growing up.

Here we are at the end of October and tomorrow, Video Blog Post Month starts again.  Once again – I’m going to give it a fair crack and once again, my creative juices will be tested…

Last year I scored 28/30.

Let’s see how it goes this time ’round.

Moleskine entry: July 15th, 2010

It’s not too bad. Today’s date is July 15th 2010. In 20mins I’ll be in Canada which… is interesting. I was upgraded today. Seat 3G. That was nice.

Saying that, I am tired. But to be fair, that’s down to lack of sleep over and above anything else.

Son, Daughter – one day I hope you’ll read this. Read about ‘Dad’s Travels’. I bought my first map last week. Stickers a plenty all over it, yours too one day.

Where was I?

Yes, that’s it; Son, Daughter – take one piece of advice from your old man; Be Happy. There aren’t many things in life that are really, truly worth worrying about. Life & Death, certainly. But that’s it. Your life can be as happy as you want it to be. Good things happen to good people. It’s true! Now don’t mock the cliché, please. I mean it. My endless optimism has seen me all right so far. I hope and hope that, if anything, you get that from me.

Yours,

James
— who one day, will be your Dad, X

Moleskine entry: March 30th, 2010

Two stops from home.

Six months in. Am I allowed to click again? I don’t know. I think I have though – clicked, that is.

A combination of a rather intimate chat with my peers and maybe also a mixture of the achievements of late. A PR Week nod and my recent Marketing Academy nomination… It kind of makes you think.

Reassures maybe?

I think so.

Step up James. Step up.