I have many cafes in many suburbs to choose from. But the one that I settled on as a regular is, or rather was, Gloria Jeans at Thirroul. Gloria Jeans in Australia was once owned by an organisation that I had little time for and associated with outfits that I similarly did not care for. And the coffee was bloody awful. However in 2013 the business was sold. After that I wandered into one of the stores to give them another chance and... woah! Good coffee! How did that happen?

Since then I've often had breakfast at one of the city stores before work since a small skim coffee and a couple of slices of toast help keep the kilojoules down. On the weekends I would sometimes go to the Thirroul one and treat myself to a larger coffee. The view is not superb; you can get some idea of it from yesterday's PAD, though if you sat at the front you could see the sheer rocky and tree scattered face of the escarpment to the west. But the atmosphere was cozy in the winter, and in the summer there were large, open windows all around that allowed a pleasant cross-breeze. Sometimes I'd take the computer, others I'd catch up on my reading; New Scientist, The Economist; I like to keep it light and fluffy. Sometimes I even read the mail from my bankers / super funds, etc.

(Such as the letter we can see here which reads, in part: "Alan, this may come as a surprise, but I'm actually you... in retirement! ... Life is a permanent holiday, and it's all thanks to you (increasing your superannuation contributions)". {Spits on hand...} Right, let's go to work counting the mistakes, shall we? First, though other people call me Alan I never call myself that; I always use my Roman name. Second it is written. With a fountain pen. See your fingers? Are they better designed for punching a keyboard or holding a pen? I do not write, except when doing crosswords. And if I do, it is with a practical Artline 200 pen, not some relic from the Dickensian era. Third, it has a postcard titled "Greetings From Paradise" showing a pier and a tropical island. Yeah, because getting an all over melanoma is really my idea of paradise. If a "rich enough to be permanently on holiday me " had been sending that to me, it would be a photograph of a coffee shop in the Galleria in Milano with a coffee and a pile of physics magazines stacked next to me. Fourth, I know that adding more money to my super just makes the fund managers richer, not me, and that I'd be running a self managed super fund were it not for the chronic obstruction that the government puts in your way to protect the fat cat fund managers and their never ending flow of funds under management. So no, I do not buy that the future me sent me that, because if I had done it would be for damn sure that the winning combinations for the next few Lotto draws would feature prominently rendering the whole concept of superannuation redundant. Oh, and 5th? With retirement ages on the rise (it's up to 70 years old here now) I do not see retirement in my future unless I also see soup, DVDs and a one bedroom hostel there as well. And I do not.)

But back to the subject; here I am sitting by the window, having some buttered toast and a damn fine cappuccino, reading my Christmas edition New Scientist. For the last time. Because the day before this I overheard some of the staff telling a couple of the customers that the store was closing, with this being its last day. Apparently they had been given three days' notice of their impending unemployment.

Damn, on multiple levels.

There are a couple of other Gloria Jeans in neighbouring suburbs, but one is a shambles and the other attracts people whose idea of conversation involves a stuck volume control. And of course there are other alternatives which are not Gloria Jeans, though none of them are exceptionally good in my experience.

So... damn.

And that's it for 2015, a year that frankly I never really came to terms with. For me it was neither horrific (except for losing most of the sight in one eye (PAD of February 12), and hearing a particular bit of bad news about a friend, though hopefully both of those issues shall pass) nor great. For many others, notably in Europe and around the Mediterranean, it was more bad than good. I'm sure that it had some good moments in it, and I know it had some bad ones, but in the end I think for many it'll go down as one of those years that you just lived through and never really think about again.

(I possibly should have HDR'd this shot but decided to just stick with the contrast of sun and shadow instead.)