I know it’s late in the day (or month) but I have made my New Year’s resolution. I am going to try to be less annoyed.

I’m definitely going to be less judgemental of the people in my apartment block who think requests to not put plastic bags in the re-cycling do not apply to them.

Add to them, the people who are so exhausted by carrying their empty wine bottles to the recycling that they don’t have the energy to walk two metres further to put their food scraps in the composting bins.

I am going to be less irritated by the drongos who think it’s a form of public protest to knock over rental e-bikes and leave them scattered all over the pavements.

Do they hate e-bikes in particular or cyclists in general? Either way they should have their licences endorsed so that they are never allowed to drive white vans on city streets.

I am going to not look twice at the parents of grown kids who can and should walk around under their own steam – and often do when it suits them – rather than requiring mum and dad to push them around in strollers which they have clearly outgrown.

What kind of entitled, lazy adults they will grow up to be is none of my concern. Their teenage years will be all the punishment their over-indulgent parents require.

I am not going to be upset by people in cafes who play videos on their phones at full volume, or shout at their screens during video calls.

And as for the morons who play their music on Bluetooth speakers at full volume as they walk along the street, I am not going to fantasise about tackling them from behind like a third-division football defender on the wrong end of a six-nil hiding, to leave them sprawling on their faces while their plastic shopping bag pumps deafening bass beats into their ears.

I’m not going to glare laser-focussed hostility at young people who occupy the mobility seats on trains and pretend they haven’t seen the oldies and pregnant women barely able to stand in front of them.

I am not going to correct waiters who say brooshetta rather than broosketta when they are trying to say bruschetta. And neither am I going to roll my eyes when people write or say “myriad of” rather than just “myriad” or “begs the question” when they mean “prompts a query” rather than “makes an assumption”, which is what it actually means.

To be fair, I am frequently reminded that English is an organic beast and words mean whatever most people think they mean, rather than what pedants like me believe they should. So I won’t get upset when people use “I” instead of “me” when they say things like “that is for my wife and I”.

I won’t move a muscle when people say “most well-liked” rather than best-liked, “calmness” instead of just calm or “at this moment in time” rather than simply now. In other words, I will keep my nit-picking to myself.

Meanwhile, I am not going to stand in the middle of the pavement and force groups of four or five friends and families who insist on walking line abreast to make way for me.

I am not going to sigh loudly when baristas put so much coffee in my cup that there’s no room for the milk that I have ordered on the side.

And I am definitely not going to take umbrage with people who say “First World Problem” whenever I complain about any of the above.

Have a happy New Year – I plan to have a less grumpy one.

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