A LOOK BACK AT THE YEAR 2010.

TO LOOK BACK on a year filled with accomplishments and happy memories is always a great satisfaction. Today, however, we look back at the year 2010.

In January, we introduced our Practical Standard Letter-Writer, with the avowed hope of improving our young people’s skills in text messaging. January also brought us news of a horrifying nanotragedy that had an immeasurably small effect on some of the world’s most eminent scientists.

We faced the great blizzard of February with some useful suggestions for the snowbound.

In March, we explained in plain language how the ordinary citizen would be affected by health-care reform.

April, appropriately, brought us Highlights of British Parliamentary History.

In May, we heard the minutes from the last meeting of the Society for the Prevention of Joy.

In June, we caught a glimpse of the future as our Scientific Journal gave us a preview of Web 3.0.

In July, by special arrangement, we were able to reprint the front of the centenary issue of the People’s Revolutionary Voice. We also learned about the Language of Flowers.

August brought us one simple rule for graduate study in literature, a rule upon which many academic careers have been built. We also learned where babies come from.

In September, we learned the natural history of the Gryphon, or Griffin, or Griffon, or γρύφων. We also took our final exam in history, and without doubt all passed with exemplary marks.

In October, we heard the Adventures of Backstory Man and Angst Boy, sponsored by Malt-O-Cod. We also read another excerpt from the letters of Udolphe de lEnnui, the celebrated French poet.

November, appropriately for readers in the United States, brought us a lucid explanation of the positions of the various political parties competing for the attention of the American voter. We also read the latest adventure of Admiral Hornswoggle, who met perhaps his most devious opponent in the person of Falsebeard the pirate.

In December we learned to cook chili. We also sat through a lackluster though traditional roundup of the year’s highlights, but there is certainly no need to repeat that experience so soon.