The end of the menu

[kake]

So it's been nearly a year since I last posted, and it's time for me to admit that the Chinese menu project has run its course.

There are a number of reasons for this, but perhaps the main one is that I lost someone very important to me at the start of 2011, and have spent much of the time since putting my life back together. Everything has changed; nothing is the same. I live in a different area of London now, where good Chinese food is hard to find. But also, my feelings about the menu project are inextricably tied up with the person I lost — he was my primary cheerleader on this, and every time I think of it, I think of him.

I've made myself a new life, full of so many good things, and I think it's OK now to say that I'm not writing a Chinese menu blog any more. The old posts will, of course, stay up, and I will continue to respond to any comments.

(If you like my writing style, and want more, you can always head over to The London Road Tour Project, a series of articles I'm writing for the Croydon Citizen online newspaper The Past and Present of Croydon's London Road. It's a kind of hybrid of local history and city guide, and as far as I know nobody else has done quite this sort of thing before.)

Comments

[trouble]

I'm so sorry to hear about your loss, but I'm happy to know things seem to be going well.

[kake]

Thank you. It has been (and still is) hard, but I have made myself a pretty excellent new life.

[emperor]

I will miss your Chinese menu entries. Thank you very much for them.

I'm sorry for your loss, and I'm glad to hear you're building a new life.

[kake]

Thank you. I'm glad you liked the posts, and I'm grateful for your comments on them.

[techiebabe]

Im sorry. :-( I'm glad you've got new projects to get stuck into.

By the way, you said comments are screened and will remain so, but I can see three comments, so you may wish to check the screening is working.

[kake]

Thank you. This is a public post, and comments are not screened.

[tim]

Sorry for your loss, but congratulations on being able to step back and say "I accomplished something, but it's time to move on." For me, at least, that can be hard. And your posts showed a quite impressive amount of effort and attention to detail.

[kake]

Thank you. I'm glad the effort was evident in the posts! A lot of the things I learned while writing them are things that I've been able to carry through to my new London Road project.

[tarchannan]

Thank you for this project! I keep recommending it to people.
I'm also impressed with your new ones.

[kake]

Aw, thank you!

[ashoakandthorn]

Thanks for the time and effort you've put into this project.

I'm sad to see it end, (I know I'll be coming back to this again and again) but when you feel that you have to move on, you do. And I'm happy that you're out there forging your life and going forwards despite the difficulties you had faced for the past year.

[kake]

Thank you — it's good to know that it was worth doing.

[spiralsheep]

Giving appropriate time and space to mourning for the lost is healthy. I hope you eventually find something new and fun/useful to do with this journal again when the time is ripe.

[kake]

Thank you. I hope so too!