the 2009 year in review, part one

The first time I did one of these posts in 2006, it was to secretly collect material I was thinking about including in The Happiest Days of Our Lives. It ended up being a lot of fun to look back at the whole year, though, and it created a nice introduction to my writing (which is one of those things we writers kind of need to have) so I did it again in 2008 (I'm not sure why there's no 2007 entry; I guess nothing happened that year and we all slept through it) and here I am, about to do it...