HELLO EVERYONE AND HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Have you got any New Year's Resolutions? A 'resolution' is a promise to make a change in your life.
Read the following extracts taken from the books '
The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole aged 13 3/4', by S. Townsend and '
Bridget Jones's Diary', by H. Fielding. Then answer the questions that follow.
This is what Adrian Mole wrote down:
Thursday January 1st
Bank Holiday in England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales
These are my New Year’s resolutions:
- I will help the blind across the road.
- I will hang my trousers up.
- I will put the sleeves back on my records.
- I will not start smoking.
- I will stop squeezing my spots.
- I will be kind to the dog.
- I will help the poor and ignorant.
- After hearing the disgusting noises from downstairs last night, I have also vowed never to drink alcohol.
(From Townsend, S. (1988) The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13¾. Methuen, London. p. 11).
Here are some New Year’s resolutions Bridget Jones wrote down in her diary:
New Year’s Resolutions
I WILL NOT
- Drink more than fourteen alcohol units a week.
- Smoke.
- Waste money on: pasta-makers, ice-cream machines or other culinary devices which will never use; books by unreadable literary authors to put impressively on shelves; exotic underwear, since pointless as have no boyfriend.
- Spend more than earn.
- Get annoyed with Mum…
- Bitch about anyone behind their backs, but be positive about everyone.
- Sulk about having no boyfriend, but develop inner poise and authority and sense of self as woman of substance, complete without boyfriend, as best way to obtain boyfriend.
I WILL
- Stop smoking.
- Drink no more than fourteen alcohol units a week.
- Reduce circumference of thighs by 3 inches (i.e. 1½ inches each), using anti-cellulite diet.
- Give all clothes which have not worn for two years or more to homeless.
- Improve career and find new job with potential.
- Save up money in form of savings. Poss start pension also.
- Be more confident.
- Be more assertive.
- Make better use of time.
- Not go out every night but stay in and read books and listen to classical music.
- Give proportion of earnings to charity.
- Be kinder and help others more.
- Eat more pulses.
- Get up straight away when wake up in mornings.
- Go to gym three times a week not merely to buy sandwich.
- Put photographs in photograph albums.
- Learn to program video.
(From FIELDING, H.(2001). Bridget Jones’s Diary. Picador. pp. 2-3)
QUESTIONS:
- Have you made any New Year's Resolutions? Which ones?
- Are they similar to the ones made by Adrian Mole and Bridget Jones?
- Did you stick to the resolutions you made last year?
- Do your resolutios have to do with personal appearance, behaviour, school, home, hobbies, voluntary work or any other aspects? Which ones?
- When do you make your resolutions: at the beginning of the school year or when the New Year begins?