Welcome to a special 8th anniversary birthday issue of The Cud!

Yet another year has gone by and our thoughts turn back to November of 2004. It was then, along with co-founder Oliver Pennington that we launched The Cud at the Hotel Hollywood in Sydney's Surry Hills with a goal to produce a monthly online magazine that could consistently offer 'free-form articles and opinion pieces on subjects from across the spectrum' and engage our readers with the challenge to 'Entertain A New Perspective: Chew The Cud.'

I'd like to think that we've continued to fulfill that goal. As we do each and every year we asked you, our readers, to vote for your favorite articles of the past twelve months. Your choices have compiled an issue that reflects exactly the kind of diversity of thought, writing and subject matter that we envisioned when first launching the magazine.

From May of this year you selected Cameron O'Neill's excellent piece on Australia's Mental Health Challenge. From our annual 'all-lit' issue of January 2012 you chose Dr. George Kanarakis' essay on Women Writers of the Greek Diaspora, and from February 2012 you enjoyed Wilfred Finn's engaging account from Africa, Do They Know It's Christmas Time in Ethiopia. That same month Tony Smith discussed the Australia Day incident at the Lobby Restaurant in Canberra, while in August, Arianne Lakra tackled the controversial issue of genetically modified food in Monsanto- Food, Not Bombs. This type of variety and breadth of subject matter continued on throughout the year.

In 2012 our three recent columnists to The Cud continued to be warmly received by readers, as indicated by your inclusion of some of their work in this issue as well: David M. Fitzpatrick's Cud Flashes In The Pan, Caitlin Cunningham's CC Photo Files, and Mahesh Markus' musical Random Gems. Elsewhere for our birthday edition you've drawn on work by a new addition to The Cud pages, Zend Lakdavala, whose contributions are garnering considerable praise. His article from September of this year, Smoke Signal S.O.S was just one such piece.

All these articles are, of course, but a small fraction of an entire year's worth of material from a great many contributors, bringing together a body of annual work that strives to remain current, put out good, new work, and keep our readers interested. Our thanks go to all of our generous, talented writers as well as to those responsible for maintaining and promoting our website from issue to issue.

Above all, however, our thanks to you, our readers, for keeping us going. Each month we read your feedback and letters with great interest, always hoping to improve and meet your expectations, and we're excited to see that our audience has branched out from humble beginnings in Australia to a readership now primarily based in the United States and yet continuing to grow beyond, throughout the globe. We can't do this without you and hope to keep on going for a great many more years yet...

Thanks, ye Cudlings! Methinks it's time for these happy cows to enjoy some birthday cake...

Evan Kanarakis
Editor, The Cud