Year In Review: 2008
So far I have 5 resolutions for new years:
1) Never buy parkay margarine again (I swear it smells)
2) See a dentist
3) Save money
4) Help my girlfriend get a newer car
5) Have a kickass vacation
Not a bad list thus far but I thought I’d take a look at last year’s resolutions to see what the standard was and see how many I kept and I was surprised to discover I more or less kept every one. I was also looking at what I was blogging about a year ago and that put me into one of those rare year-end-retrospective moods.
So a year ago I was watching a lot more movies in theatres than I am now but the selections were a little better.
My Christmas wish list included 2 major items I ended up getting for myself in the spring, specifically a new PDA and a new computer.
The primaries and subsequent election became the primary focus for my blog for much of the year; I currently have over 160 political entries in my blog compared to the over 90 entries on the subject of technology and over 70 on travel. As a result I became a frequent visitor of The Huffington Post and decided I love Jack Cafferty, Keith Olbermann, and Rachel Maddow. I turned some of the bigger events into, well, events with friends and pizza and heckling and pennants. Ah, gotta love a good election – especially when there’s someone you really want to win and on their own merits not just because the other guy is worse or crazy.
I spent a lot of time this year playing some awesome games on the Wii such as Conquest, Lego Star Wars (thanks again Jon!), Rock Band, and some great Virtual Console titles like The Secret Of Mana as well as the WiiWare version of Dr. Mario.
February saw the end of the format wars for HD discs, Blu-ray becoming the official successor to DVDs and thus setting in motion my Boxing Day spending spree.
I quit the last of my moonlighting jobs and haven’t looked back.
I scored some points sending cookies on Valentine’s Day (man that feels like way more than 10 months ago!).
Had my first Mr. Mom days and contrary to some expectations the world did not end and everyone made it out not only alive but unscathed.
My son began day care and my pocketbook survived and I truly came to understand why no parent can explain how they make things work but yet they always do somehow make things work.
In March we took an overnight trip to Everett/Seattle which was a lot of fun although the kid didn’t like the car so much – I’m looking forward to making another attempt but the current condition of the car may prohibit that until a replacement is found to say nothing of addressing the kid-hates-roadtrips issue.
After nearly a decade I got rid of my personal cell phone.
I got sick more than usual.
The kid had his first birthday which went well.
My friend Alvin ran for School Board and ultimately lost but it still felt good to be a part of the campaign, even if it did drag me kicking and screaming onto Twitter. Now I get to know every time Wil Wheaton sneezes.
My old friend BOTF had a fan-made patch released that made it completely functional on XP.
Star Trek: The Experience closed its doors on a sad day in September.
The American and global economy tanked but in my opinion not as bad a reported and indeed I think some of the sky-is-falling reporting desperate for a post-election story made some of it worse given the importance of consumer and investor confidence. Thankfully my region is insulated for another year and change. I did my part to keep the economy going with my Vegas trip and Boxing Day spending spree. Unfortunately it doesn’t look like I’ll be able to turn this one around on my own, thank god for Obama. (BTW, the IMF just endorsed his recovery plan)
I got the professional equivalent of a punch to the nuts when one of my staff, a bit of a loose cannon to begin with, quit with no notice or reason and threw me into a bit of a tailspin for weeks on end. My long-suffering family bore it well.
Took another step closer to 30 but at least I had a pretty cool surprise birthday with my favorite restaurant, friends I don’t get to see nearly often enough, and some sweat-drenched lasertag. Ah, good times. Oh and Rock Band.
We had a federal election in which I influenced more votes than an ordinary citizen probably should but still the outcome wasn’t what I had hoped for – even my own riding which went the way I wanted was a nail-bitter.
My blog got a major facelift and now looks utterly fantastic. Check out that handsome guy at the top there. You gotta admit that’s pretty hot right? Okay, how about professional then? Intelligent maybe?
Bah.
I got flipped off at my first company Christmas party at my day job.
I finally figured out how to get my roadtrip videos on YouTube. No, I’m not an idiot they were in an incompatible format. Still have lots of uploading to do.
24 got delayed by a year thanks to the Writer’s Strike. I’m still rather bitter about this.
I carved a Barack O’ Lantern.
And as if that wasn’t enough we got a little constitutional crisis right before Christmas.
And of course one of the biggest things of 2008 was my trip to Las Vegas with Jon and Josh. Finally got to wear that awesome pinstripe suit I bought dirt cheap years ago and had completely forgotten existed. We went to Hoover Dam which I had never seen before, had a near religious experience catching James Darren’s show, saw Wayne Brady and other fantastic shows and sights. Opened up a whole side of Vegas I hadn’t seen before but more than that it was just fantastic being able to take a trip with Jon again; easily my fondest memory and best experience of the year.
That’s right, the guilt trip for a vacation in 2009 starts now.
What a year. Just look at all the stuff. On the whole it was a pretty awesome year.
