Most sensible people update their diaries in January. Not me. You know how hard it is to find filofax pages that start in Sept 2010 and end in Sept 2011? The people in the shop look at you like you're Rip Van Winkle, and can't comprehend why you didn't buy your pages in the winter. "Have you been asleep since January sir?"

Well, ever since I was a kid, the new year for me starts at the new school year. Oh sure, the Jewish New Year was beaten into me as well as being the start of the year... but really, for me, it's all about new stationary! Autumn equaled a new Mead binder, the smell of new pencils and the sexual purity of a brand-new untouched white Staedtler Mars eraser. I still buy them and try to keep the cardboard protector on for as long as possible, peeling it back slowly... so as to keep as much of the protected bit 'clean' for as long as possible.

The new school year also meant covering textbooks with paper and decorating them voraciously. That tradition hasn't died. Except I no longer have textbooks. I just clean out my filofax and decorate the front with something new.

This is the year of many things, but it felt right to do a 'Mamboesque' painting of Lamington on the cover. I had to paint over Mickey Mouse, but that's how it goes.