I’m not a big fan of Edward Bellamy’s silly little book, in which the author imagines a socialist utopia and therefore thinks he’s made an argument in favour of it it. Anyone who believes this is the case is welcome to spend the rest of their lives arguing with people who believe Atlas Shrugged is a documentary.
But I’m happy to steal Bellamy’s title for my annual-ish reflection on the year just or almost past.
Things achieved this year:
- Helped mentor FRC team 2809 Kbotics, which won the Engineering Excellence award in the NYC regional, the Innovation and Control award and the Engineering Inspiration award at GTR, and competed in the World Championships in St Louis.
- Had a fabulous time with Carrie in Toronto, Vancouver, Hope and environs, Kingston and somewhere near Westport.
- Launched Songs of Albion with Hilary, whose blog I continue to contribute poetry to, to go with her beautiful images.
- Learned a bunch of new things, from basic celestial navigation–about which more later–to PIC32 programming to–more recently–improving my French, which is ongoing.
- Bought a Laser and had some fun sailing in it and the club Sharks.
- Upgraded my C++ skills in the direction of the latest standard and new idioms. Copy/swap and other exception-safe construction techniques are now comfortably in my range of habits.
- Lost a wack of money in the stock market, but less than last year. Like any good gambler, I never bet more than I’m comfortable losing, and I learned some useful stuff about algorithmic trading in the process.
- Lost 20 lbs. Only 20 more to go!
- Thought hard about plans for the future.
I turn 50 later this year, and both my kids will be off at university. Although it will continue on in a minor way for some years after, most of my job as a parent will be done. I’ll have another quarter century or more of active life ahead of me, god willing and the creek don’t rise.
I find my mind increasingly turning to those years and what to do with them. About which more later.
