Hello, and thank you, once again, for joining me. My name is The Honourable Sergeant-Major Professor Lord Sir Elbert Louche, KBE, QC, and I am delighted to welcome you to the refurbished Great Hall for the eighth annual State of the Beans Address.

One of the less-discussed Pouring Beans projects over the last year has been the painstaking work to recover some of the extensive parts of the Beans Estate that were located behind the Character Hatch, using high-speed bricklayers working together with armed guards to relocate dividing walls without letting any of the troublesome characters out of their jail. This work is still in progress, but we have already regained access to this magnificent hall, with its terrific acoustic properties, space for a full orchestra and seating for 3,000 spectators. We have also recovered the cloakroom which is good because wet coats have been hanging on the back of the kitchen chairs since 2014. This ambitious project will continue into 2022, where we hope to reclaim the ceremonial bell tower from behind the Character Hatch.

My colleagues and I, working at the University of the Internet’s newly formed Faculty of Shitposting, have spent the last year monitoring the Beans from our network of over 300 geostatic satellites, and I am now ready to present our findings.

There are grounds for celebration, because 2021 has been a good year for new posts on the Beans. 108 new posts have been made, a reduction of 10 compared to the year before, but still the second highest total in New Beans history. Responsibility for the downturn is shared; Ian and Chris both made one fewer post than 2020 while Kev made eight fewer. However, you can see that post numbers are holding up well compared to historical posting patterns in this graph, where the number of posts is represented by a slab of highly fashionable polished concrete.

However, any celebration should be very short, and followed immediately by feelings of profound guilt. The number of comments posted during 2021 shows a sharp decrease, and the stable commenting pattern of 2018-2020 has come to an end. In 2021, just 1035 comments were made, the third worst year for inane chatter since records began. You can see just how badly comment numbers have crashed in this graph, where each year’s comment count has been specially made out of a large block of varnished wood.

We should now examine the record of each individual Beans member.

Ian	Ian made 47 new blog posts in 2021, a statistically insignificant reduction on his previous score of 48. This kept him well within the rules on the Bean Counter, granting him a full 12 beans for the fourth consecutive year.
Chris	Chris also made 47 new blog posts in 2021, but since the Bean Counter rules are different for him, he only scored 11 beans, ending his three-year full bean run. It may seem harsh that Ian and Chris should be treated so differently for making the same number of posts, but those are the stupid rules they stupidly signed up to.
Kev	Kev made 14 new posts, eight fewer than in 2021 but still his second highest annual post score ever. He carefully targeted them to earn seven beans, by a large margin his second best year ever.

The broad picture this year is that posting rates have been broadly maintained, at both a group and individual level, but commenting levels have been a disappointment. There will therefore be no loose leaf tea provided for free in the kitchen areas from now on, only supermarket budget brand tea and instant coffee. Maybe that will get you all to talk to each other a bit more.

In light of his excellent post count and clean sweep of beans, Ian has been declared the winner of the Beans in 2021. He wins the world’s longest sandwich, which he can either eat now or attempt to fit into a fridge for later.

Chris, on the other hand, had a terrible post count and deserves both the nasty pea that broke his long all-bean streak and also the derision and mockery of all present today. Kev should also be ashamed, having failed to post every month despite having a backlog of over 3,000 hours of podcasts that he could have posted. As a result all their clothes will be tumble dried on a very high setting until they are slightly too tight to wear comfortably.

Thank you for your attention. My assistants will now take your questions while I go for a sauna.