Even in my pre-fogey days, I wasn't one to eagerly latch on to going out on the town to celebrate New Year's Eve. I typically enjoyed either having people over to the house to celebrate or traveling to friends' houses to ring in the new year.
There were two primary reasons for this: 1) I've pretty much always been a homebody at heart, and 2) Going out clubbing had, on a few occasions, been a recipe for trouble and annoyance for yours truly. Case in point: Many moons ago, there was the New Year's Eve I was out with some "friend-girls" having a good time, and a couple of us got hit on by a rather unsavory character.
Over a couple of Jell-O shots, one of my friends and I discussed what we thought was a surefire way to get the persistent man off our backs, which was to lie and tell him that she and I were a couple. Unfortunately, that only intrigued him more, which only served to make shaking him off a bit more challenging.
Thankfully, the night ended on a positive note, not so much for him, though. But after only a handful of other New Year's Eve "night outs" after that, I pretty much hung up the clubbing spurs for good. It just never really was my scene, and I haven't missed it at all.
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Like a lot of people, as I've gotten older, the more set in my ways I've become on the issue of not desiring to hit the club/bar circuit on New Year's Eve. It's gotten to the point that a "wild" night for me on nights like tonight consists of enjoying some sparkling grape juice and whatever leftovers we have in the fridge, and sometimes falling asleep before midnight.
Got my tickets for tonight. It’s going to be a wild night! 🥳👏 pic.twitter.com/xCo7CDdjew
— Today Years Old (@todayyearsold) December 31, 2025
Over the last few years, however, there's been someone in a nearby neighborhood who puts on a pretty impressive fireworks display in the hour or so leading up to the clock striking 12, and the cool part about it is that if I'm in my room, and mom is in her room, we have an excellent view of the fireworks display (it of course wakes us up, which we don't mind) from our bedroom windows. It's almost like a front row seat, and it's really cool to see.
While others may choose to live their best life by painting the town red on New Year's Eve (which I take no issue with whatsoever - to each their own), my admittedly far tamer version of that is lounging in bed in my comfy jammies, sipping on grape juice, immersing myself in a good e-book with my Dollar Tree reading glasses, dozing off, and then being rousted by an unknown neighbor who has the fireworks planning down to a science.
Not very exciting, to be sure, but it's one little slice of heaven on earth for me in an otherwise hectic life.
This year will only be slightly different, and that's thanks to singer/songwriter/legend Phil Collins, who is promoting a neat way to ring in the New Year that I think would be pretty cool for us old-timers (and even younger folks, too) to try:
Happy New Year's Eve! Join Phil Collins fans across the world in starting the year the right way by hitting play on "In The Air Tonight" at 11:56:20PM tonight. Let the drum fill welcome you into 2026. pic.twitter.com/Fd1pbrk05o
— Phil Collins (@PhilCollinsFeed) December 31, 2025
It almost makes me wish I had the old drum set my mom and dad bought for one of my sisters ages and ages ago, when we all still lived together. I could try to do the iconic drum fill. It'd be a miserable failure, of course, but it would be fun to try.
Start your day with Phil Collins strolling around the stage like he’s speaking at a tech conference before hitting one of the most iconic drum fills ever pic.twitter.com/8VEm2wpuAU
— Ryan O'Connell (@ryanoconnell79) August 22, 2024
Happy New Year, RedState fam! If you're out this evening, please enjoy yourself and stay safe. Onward to 2026...
