It’s that time of year in Sydney. October.

Close enough to Christmas that the stores have started to go mad. Only 10 weeks and all that.

The middle of Spring. Although some of the days remind us that winter was just here, most of them are summer-bound. And occasionally some feel like summer has already arrived.

Exhaustion o’clock. For those of us who haven’t had a holiday this year, it’s when the real tiredness kicks in. I start dreaming of weeks of nothingness under a tree reading a book, the sound of waves lapping the sand not far from my toes.

It’s also the time of year when I think to myself: what have I achieved this year? It’s the time I wonder what of my hobbies might become something a little more than just that?

It’s when the rat race/groundhog day pace makes me yearn for a sea change. A country cottage on the coast somewhere.

It is also the time that I think it’s very likely I will face yet another Christmas period single. Yet. Another. One.

It’s the time I reflect, ponder, contemplate, wonder and hope.