"I particularly dislike pre-ordained happy occasions. I don’t mind Christmas so much, because everyone’s involved, as long as they’re Christians or lazy atheists, or Muslim but into tinsel. But I’ve never had a good New Year’s Eve, and I don’t like birthdays or any other time when you’re meant to be happy. I’m against the prescription of, say, ‘Ooh, it’s Christmas o’clock. Smile everyone!’. For me happiness occurs arbitrarily: a moment of eye contact on a bus, where all at once you fall in love; or a frozen second in a park where it’s enough that there are trees in the world. I don’t like New Year’s Eve. I don’t think bliss could ever be preceded by a countdown and the chiming of a pompous clock, unless that’s what death’s like."