It's that time of year again! (And no, I'm not speaking of my annual car-wash, that comes in September). I'm talking about my birthday! Which is today! And has been great so far, in spite of the fact that it's a Monday, and I'm at work! And this post really doesn't need all these exclamation marks!
So as of this morning, I can refer to myself as "Just shy of 30", or, when I'm feeling all of my 29 years, as "Not Yet 30!" Last year, I wrote a post about all the things that had happened in my life since my previous birthday. I thought it was such a good idea I decided to make it an annual blog post. Even though this year might not measure up to the extremely busy nature of that previous year, it's still one worth looking back on and remembering all the good (and not so good) things that happened.
Over the past year I:
-
Sat at my wife's side while she had a c-section and brought our 2nd daughter into the world
- Spent 5 weeks in Pune, India doing a system checkout for work
- Saw a severe drop-off in amount of blog posts I've written (mostly due to dealing with 2 kids now, but procrastination and laziness have had their toll on my posting schedule, too)
- Began running again
- Stopped running again
- Began running again (ok, ok, I know I need to keep this up – it's just been so HOT outside lately!)
- Read some good books
- Joined the local synagogue
- Wrote a sestina
- Attended my first ever NFL football game (ok, it was a preseason game, but still fun)
- Celebrated my other daughter's 3rd birthday and my wife's __th birthday (I have still not been given permission to release this information to the general public)
- Set up a personal website (and then promptly did almost nothing with it for 8 months)
- Took some golf lessons (enough to make me dangerous, I think)
- Took a trip to the UK for work and continued my streak of getting-sick-while-out-of-the-country
- Got my first ever speeding ticket (16 years without a ticket, not bad, eh?)
- Became the Electrical group leader for a new project at work
- Discovered my cholesterol makeup was NOT good, and began diet/medication changes to alter that fact
- Learned how to code for Greasemonkey and made some random scripts for Vox / Twitter
- Booked a trip to Playa Del Carmen, Mexico, for January of next year!
- Made an effort to be a better person, husband, and father (and think I've succeeded)
In the coming year I expect I will:
-
Travel here and there for work (but hopefully most of the trips will be in-country and of a shorter duration than they were last year)
- Get behind again on all the home-improvement projects I've got lined up
- Make at least one big fatherhood blunder that everyone will laugh at in hindsight
- Start creating and managing my Homeowners Association website (oy vey, what have I gotten myself into??)
- Spend as much time as humanly possible with my wife and kids
And finally, in the upcoming year I hope to:
- Bring smiles to the faces of every one in my family as often as I can
- Get back into running regularly
- Do a good job as the lead on my project to show everyone that I'm ready for this responsibility
- Start attending more synagogue services
- Get out with the golf clubs occasionally
- Get my cholesterol down without resorting to eating (only) rabbit food
- Continue to post regularly on Vox
- Enjoy every day – Time's a one-way street and I don't want to miss any of the sights along the way
