Apart from wishing everyone a happy 2017, I’m sitting here being glad the holidays are over. Mostly because the kids went completely ballistic with a lot of holidays in succession in The Netherlands, and the run up to these festivities.

I could go over the goals I set myself last year and wallow in self pity for not really achieving much of these. The biggest things, booze wise, I wanted to do last year is getting the count of open bottles down to some thirty-odd bottles. I got stuck at 40, but that’s pretty okay. I’ve been nagging about this for a couple of years now, but it’s working out slowly, but steadily.

The second thing was to get the amount of samples I still have to go through down. That didn’t work out, although I think the amount has sort of stayed the same over 2016.

I also wanted to do an Armagnac bottle share, but I got that out of the way in January, and it was a pretty fun thing to do. Quite interesting, but Armagnac will not be replacing whisky in any significant manner any time soon.

This year I’m not going to do any non-whisky-bottle-shares. At least, I’ve got nothing planned. Armagnac and Mezcal were on the top of my list and those have been done. Mezcal has been done three times, even. Of the last bottle share I did with Mezcal, I’ve not tried any drinks yet. Somehow I’m not getting around to it.

My main focus for this year is paying my dues. I’ve been receiving samples from several bottlers and distillers and while a lot of them have been reviewed over the last year, I still have quite a few of them lined up still.

I think it’s unfair to the good people that sent me stuff that I postpone the reviews sort-of indefinitely. I know I’ve got stuff waiting from Gordon & MacPhail/Benromach, Wemyss/Kingsbarns, Master of Malt, The Whisky Exchange, Tomintoul, Beacon Spirits/Liquid Art and I’m probably forgetting some brands. Bad Sjoerd!

Let’s say I hope to taste those samples first and get them reviewed on this wee blog in a month or two.

Apart from that I’m not setting any goals since I’ve got some major DIY-ing to do at home for our third kid. That wee crap-canon will arrive in May if everything goes according to plan, and before that we have to redo the entire attic.

2017 is promising to be an interesting year again, but thank the high heavens the holidays are over 😉