Once more, tremendous thanks to all those people who voted for us in #32, with special thanks to State of the Ark and Il Regno d'Italofilia for their 12 points. May we extend a huge welcome to everyone who has joined us on PFS for the first (and, who knows, maybe the last) time? As this is a day that many people - including me - thought would never come, I hope you will indulge me just for a minute with a little explanation for the title "New Beginnings".

First and most obviously this is the first contest of the New Year, 2012, and that has to be a New Beginning for us all - Good Luck us! Especially Adam, who is having his own New Beginning in London. Of course, today is the New Beginning for the newly-revamped website. Thank you jw; you are exc! More than that, though, this website was most definitely my New Beginning. Like a few other people (I think), I was really at rock bottom when I first stumbled through the chat room door, but then I found it so hard to stumble back out again. You all helped pull me up from the brink to start again, so Thank You. (Actually just recently I've been plumbing the depths again and jw has been valiantly hauling me back up single-handedly. Not easy, of course, given how obese I am [apparently]. Thank you, dearest.) Finally, and no less importantly, this year will bring new ventures for two of my dearest friends and (hopefully) for me, too: let's hope these New Beginnings are successful and lead to even greater things!

And so to my song for #33. What a terrible responsibility…

Well, this is a song I'd considered sending several contests ago, but I thought it might be a bit quirky for you all (and I'm still not sure it isn't). It is sung in English by a French lady and is taken from her début eponymous album, released in 2003. More recently she has received critical acclaim for a film soundtrack.

I'm afraid that I am not as cold and calculating as Luis, thinking 'this genre bombed… this genre did well…' (although I must admit I have discarded something else I really like which is described as blues - who knew I liked blues so much?) I simply pick songs I like… And I like this one.

I hope you do, too.

But you probably won't. Normal service is resumed on Planet Janet.

Have fun on the Planet, please take all your rubbish with you when you leave, and Good Luck to everyone!

And I'm so sorry. How rude of me; I'm just too excited! Many many many congratulations to Julio for winning X2 with an amazing result! I am so looking forward to Inspireland at Christmas.

Rude again

Well I said I was rude, didn't I?

Ofc, even a blind one could see that.