Daily Prompt: Stroke of Midnight

Where were you last night at midnight? Would you have wanted to be somewhere else?

What an original question to ask on 1.1.2016, at least it would be if it had not already been asked on 1.1.2013 by the same Daily Prompt people. Yes it was another deja vue, one of many we have been suffering for the past year, at least I have. 

Was I in bed, was I taking a walk in the crisp New Year air, was I at a rip-roaring party for golden oldies perhaps. No, I was at home in my armchair watching the TV.

“You don’t have to wait up if you don’t want to” said Mr. Swiss, noticing my eyes having a sort of far away sleepy look. It was 11.30 and so I decided what difference will 30 minutes make. I will do it, stay up until midnight. I was even too tired to read my new book.

I had finished my Swedish crime book, in german, “Die Menschen die es nicht verdienen” (the people that do not deserve it), by Horth and Rosenfeldt, the fifth in a row of stories concerning a  police department in Sweden, particularly their criminal psychologist Sebastien Bergman. I have now read all five and enjoyed them. As far as I can see these books have not yet been translated from Swedish into English and so I have read them all in german and they are good.

I now have the choice to read something new. My decision had been made in a reading group I belong to online, Bestsellers and Literature. They are having a group read on the book “Ready Player One” by Ernest Cline. Not really my sort of thing but it has been highly recommended. We are in the future world of gaming in 2041 when our world has nothing left because it is all disintegrating. I like a bit of sic fi, and so decided to try this. Mr. Swiss is absolutely not interested, not his sort of thing. I am still trying to encourage him to read something else, but he is a crime fan.

Anyhow I decided to download this book to my Kindle. My Amazon is the German group, .de, but no problem they have it all in english if you find it. Unfortunately now and again I do not find it and by error download the german version. I can read german with no problem, but if the book is originally written in English, then of course I prefer the english. I dowloaded the wrong copy, the german edition, and only discovered this error on the first page. There is no way to return, or undownload,  the book and so I was forced to download the english version as well. Now I have it in two languages and am still trying to persuade Mr. Swiss to read it on my iPad in the original german. Anyhow I have read the first 30 pages and am convinced, this is going to be a good read.

I started the book yesterday evening, but as it was now near to midnight I shifted my concentration to the TV. One of this New Year German music parties was being shown, actors and people celebrating in the studio which was probably already filmed in Summer. I often wonder how people can dance a polonaise with heatwave temperatures and the sun shining all dressed in their New Year party clothes showing laughing and happy faces and toasting with their glass of champagne.

The scene changed on the TV and we were in a Swiss town where the bells were ringing. I looked at Mr. Swiss and said

“Isn’t that Solothurn?”, which is our local town.

“Yes it is, they are bringing the New Year from Solothurn this year.”

At last something worth watching, and so we saw our local cathedral, the streets of the town live at midnight, but almost completely empty, and everything in a pink tinged mist. They took us up to the belfry in the tower of the cathedral, which was very familiar to me as I once did the death defying climb up the stairs and of course took a few photos on the way. Happy New Year everyone, and WordPress please, please do not bring this prompt again next year. After 4 years of writing daily prompts I would like to see something different and original.