I haven’t posted a blogpost in a while. Life happens. I do not want to force a post if I am not into it. But hopefully I can change that in 2021.

By now, everyone has heard about how bad 2020 was and how glad it is over. Personally I do not get this mentality, as COVID does not care about the change of year, and we still have a long way to go to resume what we consider normal if that is even possible. But if I had to say something about 2020 honestly it has not been overly bad for me. I was still able to perform my job via teleworking, and did not get COVID. I do realize my case is not typical for everyone and this makes me feel both fortunate and probably lucky.

I was able to run 1122 miles in 2020, which shatters my old yearly mileage record by about 400 miles. If I had not signed up for the Baltimore Marathon that was ultimately cancelled, that increased mileage and running consistency would have probably not happened. This consistency allowed me to set a personal best in the 5K back in October, beating my old record (set 3 years ago) by about 40 seconds. Since I deferred my marathon registration to next year (no way I was running my first and only marathon virtually), I feel that I will have a better base for when I actually begin training.

I started branching out in my cooking, mostly my subscribing to the Dinnerly meal kits for the second half of the year. The variety of recipes and ingredients has lead to me being more confident in the kitchen with respect to both cooking and with prepwork. I have also been periodically reading Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat by Samin Nosrat which has helped me understand why my food tastes the way it does and how the four aforementioned elements are utilized in cooking. When I go to the grocery store, I now feel much more comfortable picking out produce for prepping and cooking rather than relying on frozen bags of pre-cut veggies. When I’m in the kitchen, I have an idea of how to make a substitution in a dish if I do not have the ingredient on hand.

So for 2021 New Years Resolutions…

I do not put too much stock into them to be honest. Last year I said that I wanted to improve my balance (fitness-wise), but my goals evolved as the year went on and I never worked on that. So while I make some specific or broad goals, I do not feel pressure to keep them as long as I show progress as a person in general.

  • I would like to write more. This essentially extends to posting more on my site. I’d like to generally make more use out of the site besides cataloging which video games I beat or books I read, and I am pretty sure that writing, no matter the topic, will make you a better writer and can serve as a meditative tool. In 2020, I read Mini Habits for Weight Loss and I may employ the “mini-habits” strategy just to get something in text, and revel in the small victories.
  • I would like to watch all the movies in my Netflix queue. I’m limiting this to just movies, not TV shows since I would never finish that. I have a tendency to prioritize show episodes over watching movies due to the shorter length, and I feel that the number of movies in my queue is not large enough to where I can embrace the challenge of zeroing them out.
  • Keep the good momentum from 2020 going. Continue to knock out my game and book backlog. Keep my running game strong. Don’t squander some of the healthy food habits I’ve developed (cut sodas and frozen meals) and keep my weight where it is (of course dropping some is always a plus too).
  • Finally work on and complete my Puzz-3D New York City puzzle. I worked on it during the summer of 2007 and only partially finished it. It would be nice to see it to completion.
  • Learn Javascript to the point where I don’t need to constantly search StackOverflow or documentations for syntax or concepts. This will probably come with my job, but I could work on some tutorials on the side as well. Let’s not forget the potential for extra blog posts too.

So there you have it! A few things I wouldn’t mind shooting for in 2021. Who knows how many I will knock out or work towards, but as I mentioned I won’t beat myself up for failing since I do not consider a lack of completion a failure. I’m looking forward to the twists and turns that 2021 will bring. Happy New Year, everyone!