I have been journalling off and on since 2014, but mostly digitally. I had seen the five year journals and have loved the idea of it. I am weirdly sentimental about knowing what happened a year ago or even ten years ago. I looked through my notes and decided I had enough to backfill a five year journals since 2020, a very interesting year given the pandemic. I purchased a Midori Five Year Journal in May of 2023 and started on my quest. I was able to get several months through the journal, but then frustration got the best of me. I started to wonder who I was doing this for and why I am bothering. I eventually fell so far behind and I quit altogether. I was further irritated with the hubris of the whole idea of taking notes on the day that I just deleted everything.

Last night we watched the Yacht Rock Dockumentary on HBO. This was recommended by a friend who knows we enjoy listening to Yacht Rock on SiriusXM. I learned quite a bit about this genre, but also it really gave me joy to watch.

I love writing things in my Field Notes. I have an expert system for creating a monthly notebook to help hone in on the right things to focus on for each day. I am able to record reminders in the future. I keep track of important happenings of the day. I have plenty of extra pages to record insightful thoughts, random lists, doodles, or schemes.

With Apple’s new graphs, I was able to see my running stats for the year. It is interesting to compare the last several years. I genuinely feel like this was a far worse year for running than previous. It seems the stats don’t quite agree with that. It is mind-boggling how boggled our minds are at feeling reality.

They were on backorder, but the grill covers all came in and are ready for winter.

True Grit was a book I was compelled to read in high school. Unfortunately I did not complete the assignment and it was discarded to the past. The book has come up again and again so I added it to my list. It is a short, but very compelling novel. I see the main character as being very wise and full of grit for her age. There is also something fascinating about the thirty year time period leading up to the 1900’s. The amount of violence that existed, but the monumental change in society and technological advancement is unparalleled.

A confluence of events has resulted in me expanding my gentleman’s hobby of smoking meats.

This dog is tired of visitors and disruptions to his routine.

Sit down with your favorite holiday beverage and enjoy.

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We had the pleasure of joining our good friends in Paso Robles, California last week. We had to arrange this trip close to the holidays, when the oldest was out of college and could help at home with driving and dog responsibilities as work and dog walking and bathroom schedules were melded together into a multi-page todo list for the kids to tackle. They did great and did not burn the house down, microwave plasma issue notwithstanding.