If 2022 was a year of cautious re-emergence from lockdown for myself and my family, 2023 was an acceleration of that trend. One that came with benefits, but also a personal cost for myself as I’ll get to. It was indisputably a cost worth paying, however. Life was not back to normal, to be clear. Much as there was a permanent demarcation between what travel was like pre and post 9/11, so too is travel in the wake of COVID a fundamentally different activity. There’s a lot more overhead to travel these days, the least of which is masking. But if 2023 was a reminder of anything it was that physical, face to face connections are priceless, and therefore worth that overhead.

Every year involves a certain amount of sickness, loss and tragedy both on the personal and global scale. This year was no exception in that regard, but that was balanced by an appreciation for what I have, both for the time spent with the people close to me and for an opportunity to reconnect with friends I had not seen, in some cases, for decades.

It was a complicated year, then, but a good year. As always then, these are the moments – significant at times but mostly not – that characterized my year personally. Before we get to the pictures, however, a quick check-in on travel and health.

Travel

For better or for worse, my travel in 2023 was a mild escalation from the year prior. While thankfully falling far short of my hundreds of thousands miles a year peak, my 2023 travel schedule ticked up from twenty thousand miles to around twenty five. A couple of extra trips in the fall and spring travel seasons, no more, but the trajectory’s slope was up. That bears watching for 2024, because while my current travel load is sustainable, it’s important to me that it not escalate to anything like my pre-pandemic slate.

Health

Overall, my health and fitness in 2023 was steady. I lost some more weight in the first half of the year, added a bit of it back in the second half and didn’t end up exactly where I wanted to be but I’ve been able to more or less hold the line.

That was possible in large part thanks to my continued love of walking. I was active 334 out of 365 days, and I just missed hitting 3000 miles walked this year at 2,973, a number which was almost 500 miles ahead of my 2022 total. My BFF and I have a joint 3K goal this year, so fingers crossed time, availability, weather and health permit us to hit that goal.

With all of that said, on to the pictures.

January 1

As is my custom, rang in the New Year watching Trading Places and drinking the world’s best beer.

January 2

As literally no one could have predicted, Kate got absolutely hooked on the World Junior Hockey Championships while watching it with her family, so we watched a lot of that.

January 9

A year later, I finally finished rebuilding our basement after it flooded.

January 18

With a “write a persuasive letter” assignment at school, the great dog campaign of 2023 was launched.

January 23

First big snowstorm of the year.

January 24

The dog campaign’s pressure kept ratcheting up.

January 29

First visit of the year to our friends up at Absolem Cidery.

February 4

It got cold. Very cold.

February 12

Ate terrible food and beer with friends for the Super Bowl, then had to walk 12 miles the next day. Suboptimal.

February 18

Borrowing an idea from my friend Lewis, we did a Dad’s “Best Day Ever,” in which we sat around in robes, drank beer and ate terrible food.

February 25

First Red Sox game of the season.

March 4

Saw college friends I hadn’t seen since before the pandemic – at the usual venue.

March 16

Family outing to Bluey’s Big Play.

March 18

Annual St. Patrick’s Day event at our place.

March 25

To all who celebrate.

March 26

Kate’s mini portable projector makes its debut.

March 29

Frogs were back.

March 31

From a still undetermined source, I got COVID for the first time. I was fortunate, first in that it was not too bad for me – roughly 36 hours or so of a very sore throat and mild fever – and second that the girls were in Boston, so I was able to successfully quarantine myself in the basement without them getting it. Oh, and lucky for the vaccines that made my case mild.

April 8

Finally tested negative.

April 22

Kate and I did a spa weekend. No one had told me spas had outdoor hot tubs, saunas and steam rooms. I thought they were just for manicures, pedicures and the like. I like spas now.

April 28

Traded in my Apple Watch for an Ultra because, after testing, it was clear that the former wouldn’t last me through a long distance walk I was planning.

April 29

Missed brush pickup day in town by a matter of hours and had to take all of the winter’s downed pine tree limbs over myself.

May 1

Last training session for my planned long walk, and also my longest distance up until that point.

May 6

First doors off day for the Jeep.

May 12

First Seadogs game of the year.

May 19

Thanks to a strained calf, it wasn’t clear that this was going to happen, but I managed to walk 50 miles for the first time.

May 25

Got to see some old friends in Colorado.

May 28

Eleanor got to run the bases at Hadlock. She came in dead last, all because she wanted to help a little friend.

June 8

Chaperoned Eleanor’s schools’ Beach Day. I was responsible for keeping an eye on a mere four kids, and my big takeaway was that teachers should be paid seven figure salaries.

June 10

Eleanor had her first Irish step dance recital and was great, in spite of one of her fellow dancers who almost tripped her up.

June 21

I had to meet him via Facetime because I was traveling in NYC, but the inevitable outcome of the great dog campaign of 2023 – a black lab named Sully – arrived on this day.

June 22

Speaking of NYC, walked the High Line trail there for the first time. Great little park.

June 25

Missed the first day of summer because I was away, but got our annual Jaws viewing in nevertheless.

June 27

Not sure if the video will ever see the light of day, but in one of the more surreal work experiences I’ve had an entire film crew flew into the Portland to shoot a video with me and a client. It was absurd.

July 4

Turns out trying to get someone to come out and address your complete lack of water pressure is challenging on a beautiful 4th of July day – hence the bike pump (worked the first time, not the second). The entire well tank ended up needing to be replaced, and the guy who installed it a week later said he had no idea how the old one had not started a fire.

July 6

Sully was not sad that we live just up the road from a beach.

July 19

We got a wood fired hot tub. Lots more on that addition here.

July 22

As cool as it was to get a hot tub that was how miserable it was to deal with a sewage back up. And as with the well tank situation, trying to get someone to come out and address a septic system on a gorgeous July Saturday proved to be impossible, which is why I now know a lot more than I’d like to about how septic systems work.

August 19

Last time Ferd and I saw a show together, it was Pearl Jam. This time around it was Sigur Ros in Boston. They’re so good live.

August 22

Made the annual pilgrimage to the falls with my little sidekick.

September 5

Not sure how this happened, but we had a second grader on our hands.

September 7

Like everyone else these days, we got our share of Canadian wildfire smoke.

September 9

A friend turned 40 so it was time for a lakehouse.

October 5

Another Monktoberfest in the books.

October 7

The timing couldn’t have been worse coming on the heels of our event, but I kept a promise and flew down to NJ the day after to attend my high school reunion. And while I grumbled about the flight, it was beyond worth it. Catching up with the first friends I ever had – some of whom I hadn’t seen in literally decades – was an incredible experience. I hadn’t laughed that hard in a long time, and we all picked up as if we’d seen each other yesterday. Just a delight from start to finish as I got lucky with my high school friends.

October 15

Got back up to Bremen for a cider pressing for the first time in a few years.

October 27

Maine is a safe state in most respects, but we are, sadly, no more immune to gun violence epidemic than the next state.

October 28

As with our St Patrick’s Day party, we’ve continued our Trunk or Treat Halloween party begun during the pandemic. The best part was when the costume parade turned into a costume race.

October 31

Speaking of Halloween, no one takes it more seriously than the island.

November 2

Hit my annual walking goal for the a couple of months early.

November 11

Time for the Biggest Little Game in America.

November 20

Last year was the first time I’d walked the distance of the Appalachian Trail. This year it was the Pacific Crest Trail distance.

November 22

Had a fantastic Thanksgiving out in Minnesota with my brother’s family.

December 19

The island got crushed by a windstorm, with trees down everywhere including large limbs in our yard.

December 31

To ring in the New Year, Eleanor had a grammie sleepover, we boarded the dog for the night and Kate and I headed down to Portland. Kate did a cold dip with a friend, which I noped right out of, then we had dinner at Street and Co and a quiet night on the town.

Let me be clear about this up front: we were not hot tub people. If someone had told us a year or two ago that we’d end up buying a hot tub – much less a wood fired one – well, I can’t speak for Kate, but I would not have believed it. Neither of us grew up with a hot tub, lived somewhere that had them or belonged to social scenes in which hot tubs were a regular method of socializing.

Not that there’s anything wrong with being a hot tub person, obviously. It’s just that that was not a descriptor that would have applied to us. And yet we are now technically hot tub people, of a sort. How did this happen?

Three things conspired to turn us into the proud owners of a Goodland wood fired hot tub.

First, and most importantly, was our move to the island. One of the things that happens when you move to a beautiful place is that you’re not inclined to leave it for anything less than exotic destinations. As we shifted away from spending a summer week at cottages on the coast up north, then, we decided to deploy some of that vacation budget to exaggerating the vacation-like characteristics of our existing house. How could we make it even more enjoyable to spend time here during vacations? As we might put it in tech, how could we give our regular house new features? That led us to begin considering various additions like saunas – something we still might do eventually. We did some research, and that’s when social media kicked in.

Second, then, was YouTube. As we started casting about for ways to upgrade our house, YouTube’s algorithm inevitably led me to this video about a family that purchased a Goodland wood fired hot tub. Not only had I never heard of Goodland, I didn’t know wood fired hot tubs existed. The idea of a wood fired hot tub, which is an experience quite distinct – for better and for worse – from a traditional electrically heated hot tub, however, seemed intriguing. They’re not for everyone, as I’ll come back to later, but we were at least in the target demo as wood is our primary heat source for the house in winter.

Last came the unexpected and improbable discount. Knowing what we know now, which is that the hot tub gets basically daily usage, I wouldn’t have waited on a discount. We’d pay full fare, and happily. Not being hot tub people at the time, however, we were intrigued but on the fence, skeptical as to how much we’d use it. Then, having signed up for Goodland’s newsletter, I got this email.

Over a thousand dollars off because it literally fell off a truck and got scratched, and the tub was already here in the great state of Maine. That seemed an awful lot like fate, so we pulled the trigger. And since it arrived in July, at least one of us has been in the hot tub nearly every day that it hasn’t rained. Also, a couple of days when it did rain.

If you’re at all curious about the Goodland, you probably have questions. I certainly did. To Goodland’s credit, they’ve answered a ton of them here. But here’s what I’ve figured out thus far after six months of usage. If there’s anything I missed, drop a comment or email me and I’ll update this. I’ll also do a follow up post on our water treatment process later; that’s involved enough to need its own space.

Why get a hot tub?

Everyone’s reasons here will differ. For many, as mentioned above, it’s socializing. While you can technically fit four adults in this tub, however, that’s not why we bought ours. What we were looking for was an opportunity to spend time outdoors, in all seasons, in a place that is inherently screen-unfriendly. Whether it’s the whole family, Kate and I, or just one of us individually, hot tub time is a time to sit, soak and take in the blue sky or the night sky. Particularly if you’re in a relationship with someone, a hot tub – at least in our experience – represents an opportunity for more focused, less distracted one on one time. It’s an investment, in that way, in your relationship.

I’ve also found that if I’m quiet enough while I’m out there, it’s like being in a blind for watching nature go by. So far I’ve seen foxes, raccoons, deer and several neighborhood cats saunter by no more than twenty feet away – totally unaware of my presence.

Why get a wood fired hot tub?

Part of it is cost. For a traditional hot tub we’d have to have an electrician in to do potentially expensive work. For us, on the other hand, as a household who already deals with firewood on a daily basis, there is no additional cost to a wood fired hot tub. But there is also an almost meditative benefit to using a wood. It’s inarguably less convenient than a regular hot tub where the temperature is maintained constantly – it can take a couple of hours to get up to temp. But the process of building and starting a fire has value in the same way that heating the house with wood does. For me, at least, the ritual of heating the tub is an enjoyable one, a contemplative one. Your mileage may vary on that, of course.

Why buy a Goodland?

For us, at least, it was a couple of things.

• Aesthetics: the Goodland hot tubs are beautiful to look at. Aesthetics are generally more Kate’s concern than mine, but even I appreciate the way it looks.
• Company: the company, which is very small and Canadian (a plus for Kate as her Mom is Canadian), encourages via their products a slower, more thoughtful approach to life – an approach that resonates in a world that gets more sped up by the day.
• Design: the hot tubs are well and thoughtfully designed, and not only are easy to take apart and set up, but can be moved and installed by two people. They’re also built with materials intended to last.
• Price: at ~$6300, the Goodland is not cheap. But given that quotes for a lot of the traditional hot tubs start at $10,000 – and that’s before the requisite electrical work, installation charges and so on – the Goodland was more affordable for us even absent the discount. And it has no impact on our monthly electrical bill either, unlike the traditional alternatives.
• Size: not being hot tub people, as mentioned above, we did not want a huge tub that would seat half a dozen or more people. We also don’t really have the space for that. The Goodland’s size fit our needs best.

Is it worth the money?

Everyone’s answer to that will be different. For us, it was about usage. If we spent that much money and we used it every so often, as a special occasion, that would be a waste of money. If we used it multiple times per week, on the other hand, that would be worth the money.

For us it’s easily been worth the money. Honestly the first time I used it in the dark and the cold – and more recently, the snow – and looked up at the stars while floating in 100 degree water, it was worth it.

If I buy a Goodland, do I need the cover and end covers?

If you’re going to reuse the water at all, you definitely need the covers. Even with them it’s amazing how much crap ends up in the tub. If you’re not going to reuse the water, you probably want them anyway to keep leaves and other debris out of the tub when it’s empty.

They’re an added expense, yes, but it beats having everything the wind blows ending up in your tub.

Speaking of reusing the water, is the hot tub’s water treated with chemicals?

The short answer is that you can do either untreated or treated water. And as the tub is cedar and aluminum, you can also do salt water which is what we do.

Which should I do?

That depends entirely on your situation. In the video I linked to above, they pump water into their tub from a nearby lake when they need it, and drain it when they’re done. So they don’t treat their water. If you have a nearby water source, be that fresh or salt water then, you can just use that. This is much simpler and lower cost.

We don’t live on a lake, and we’re on a well. Our well is good and deep, and the tub’s capacity is comparatively small at ~250 gallons, but we don’t want to run the risk of overtaxing the well at our primary residence so we treat our water.

I’ll save the process for another post, because while it’s simple enough once you figure it out there are a lot of moving pieces. Detailing all of that would take more space than I have here.

How long does it take to heat the tub?

It all depends on your starting temperature. When I’ve got residual heat left over from the day before, and it’s a temperature in the sixties or seventies, it’s maybe an hour and a half. If temps are in the thirties or forties, however, it’ll take several hours. Instead of starting a fire in the afternoon, then, I just do it in the morning.

I’m concerned about the water freezing in the winter: how long does it take for the water to cool down?

Longer than you’d think. If you’re heating the water every day or every other day, it’s not an issue unless you’re dealing with extreme cold. In our case – with only an extra layer of rigid foam insulation sitting under the tub – here’s an example. Firing up the tub one afternoon, the temperature peaked at 103.6F at 2:30 in the afternoon. The low temperature that night was 17F. By 8:30 AM the next day the temperature was down to 65.3F. And that’s a more extreme example; typically if the overnight temps are in the twenties and thirties you might see the hot tub temp the next day in the seventies.

The takeaways, then, are that extreme cold can bleed heat reasonably efficiently, but even in very cold weather a heated tub is not going to freeze overnight. And you can slow that further by deploying insulation on top of the water and/or a tank de-icer (though as I discovered, you can’t use that with salt-water because the stand is not stainless).

What are comfortable temperatures?

Everybody’s tolerances differ, obviously, but speaking personally the sweet spot is 98-101F. 102F is hot, and 103F is too hot for me for more than a few minutes.

To maximize time in the water, however, I’ll get in at any temp north of 90F and comfortably wait for it to warm up.

How do I manage temperature?

There’s a bit of a learning curve here, but it’s not too bad. Generally, you use a Goodland like you would a wood stove. I generally line the bottom of the stove with small logs, light a firestarter like fatwood on top of those and then place kindling strategically around that.

That will typically burn for an hour or two, then I just feed it until I get close to my target temperature and back off. When I want combustion to stop or slow, you can either close the opening entirely or leave a slim crack at the back open.

How do I get the temperatures even at the top and bottom of the tub?

Left to its own devices, any body of water will stratify into layers of differing temperatures. To ensure that you’re not stepping through a top layer of hot water into much cooler water, the contents have to be mixed. In an electrical hot tub, this work is performed by jets. In a Goodland, you have two options.

First, you mix it by hand. Goodland includes with the tub a nicely designed paddle which will ensure the water mixes top to bottom.

In our case, however, because we’re treating our water, we have a filter that sits in the tub and circulates the water as part of its normal operation.

Surprisingly, however, because most traditional hot tubs come with their own filtration system, it was difficult to find one appropriate for a wood fired hot tub like the Goodland. I eventually settled on this one designed for above ground pools. It’s a little too big and attachment is wonky, but it works and keeps the water clear.

What other accessories do I need to budget for?

Aside from the chemicals if you’re going to treat the tub, and filter system mentioned above, there are a couple of things that we use. Some of which are necessary whether you treat your water or not; others of which are optional.

• Hose Filter: our well water is full of iron, so this screws on to our garden hose and pre-filters the water before it hits the hot tub.
• Water Temperature Sensor: we have an Ambient weather station in our house, and this floating wifi temperature sensor pipes our current temperature into our display at home. As a bonus, you can also check the tub temperature via the Ambient app, and via their API you can pull a JSON feed which I use to display the hot tub temperature on our family dashboard.
• Smart Power Cable: in order to be able to remotely turn on and off our hot tub filtration system and our salt water system, I picked up this smart outdoor power plug. I can schedule them and turn them on and off as necessary from my phone.

Do you happen to know how much a fully loaded hot tub weighs?

The tub weighs approximately 275 pounds with all of its parts, and the 257 gallons of water weighs approximately 2143 pounds, so before any people are in the tub you’re looking at a weight of around ~2450 pounds.

Can my deck support that much weight?

I was curious about the answer to this myself, because a lot of the Goodland videos you see have the tubs deployed on decks of varying heights and design. Because my wife is a lawyer, however, I’ll note that none of the below constitutes advice and I have no idea what your particular deck may hold. But I can at least tell you how I looked at the question.

The first thing I did personally was inquire with an engineering company as to what it would cost to get a professional assessment. Their quote was $2K, which meant that I could spend a third of the cost of the hot tub only to be told that my deck could not support the weight. I opted out of that.

Google research, meanwhile, told me that a deck approximately our height off the ground could support up to 100 pounds per square foot. My conservative math said that the Goodland would represent between 125 and 150 pounds per square foot, so our original plan was to drop in four new posts to over-reinforce the existing area of the deck.

Given that this would have mean trying to dig four foot deep holes under the crawlspace of our deck, however, we decided to punt on the matter and simply set up the tub on the ground. That was a good decision, because I no longer have to worry about load capacities and so on but more because I didn’t have to roll around under the crawlspace under our deck for a week.

What should I know about a wood fired hot tub that isn’t obvious?

The amount of work that goes into it, especially if you treat your water. It’s worth it for us, but if you’re the kind of person that just wants to get in and get out with no work on your part, this tub isn’t for you.

Anything else to add?

Just that we’re very happy with our Goodland and highly recommend it for those willing to put in a little work. For those with Goodlands already, meanwhile, I’ll follow up later with a post on our water treatment plan if there’s interest.

Whatever else it might have been, 2022 was a better year for me than the the one that preceded it. It was a year marred by worldwide tragedies major and minor, struggles on a personal level for myself and of many people close to me, all of which played out against the backdrop of the ever present invisible menace of a pandemic gone endemic. A pandemic that was and remains deeply traumatic, and whose trauma continues to be made manifest across the population in ways both predictable and not.

But while life was not back to its pre-pandemic normal, the reality is that – barring a universal vaccine which is not on the near term horizon – it never will be. What we’re left with instead is a world of constant risk calculations, a world in which, as one doctor put it, before the cautious among us go to an event we have to decide whether it’s worth the possibility of getting COVID to attend.

In several cases this year, for myself and my family, and for the first time in years, that risk was accepted. Which lead to a number of fun adventures, both here in state and out of it, that we’d have ruled out in years past. Whether that’s the appropriate calculation or not is, of course, a matter of perspective. But it’s what we did, and it was a good year. The best year out of the last few.

So as always, these are the moments – significant at times but mostly not – that characterized my year personally. Before we get to the pictures, however, a quick check-in on travel.

Travel

How much I traveled in 2022 depends on what it’s compared against. Relative to my pre-pandemic travel heydey, I traveled virtually not at all. But relative to the last two years, I was a globe trotter. Between my first visits to Colorado and San Francisco in three years (yay!), and my first visit to Las Vegas in the same amount of time (sad face emoji), I had to figure out how flying works again. It’d been so long that I’d forgotten the sequence in which I need to put on the messenger bag and Patagonia backpack I travel with typically, and thus got completely tangled up in them while taking them off to clear security my first flight out.

And not only did I get on a plane, I left the state multiple times again for the first time in years.

I have mixed feelings about this, to be honest. I actively don’t want to resume my prior heavy travel schedule and have no intention of doing so. But it was genuinely delightful to see so many people in person this year for the first time in ages, and the realization that I will not be doing so as often is a bit sad. But as the man says, compromise is about being “halfway happy.”

With that, on to the pictures.

January 1

As is our custom, we spent the New Year’s holiday drinking fine beers with friends.

January 3

Which then necessitated us following up with drive by COVID tests before school resumed.

January 7

Got some good snow and was first out on the trails that morning.

January 14

Pretty nice little sunset.

January 17

Almost got blown off the bridge. Not for the first time.

January 22

Cold enough to mark the opening of the skating pond on the vernal pool next to our house.

January 29

Went out for a walk in a blizzard.

Came back to practice my traditional nor’easter tradition of reading Night Shift by the fire with hot cocoa that may or may not have had bourbon in it.

Also came back – in what is typically referred to as foreshadowing – to some minor water intrusion in our previously dry basement.

February 12

Two weeks later and it was “warm” enough that we went down to the beach.

February 13

A day later, it was cold enough that everything iced back up, I fell (again) while out walking and broke at least one rib.

As injuries go, it could have been a lot worse, but I do not recommend it.

February 17

The good news with broken ribs is that other side of my body worked just fine, and while it took a lot longer not being able to use my left arm at all, I got the firewood loaded with basically no problem. If you’re going to break a rib, I do recommend breaking it on your off hand side.

February 19

Went ice fishing with friends and got to see a bald eagle grabbing fish off the ice not fifty feet away. Did not get a usable picture of it, however.

February 26

She called it a “beauty day,” but I believe the UN considers having things repeatedly jammed under your fingernails torture.

March 9

More foreshadowing: minor water intrusion in the basement shop. It was not a lot of water, but it was a very “ominous portents” kind of day.

March 13

Woke up the next day to full basement flooding. I spent something like two hours hauling it out manually, another three rigging up our brewing pump to pump the water out, but whatever I pumped out flowed right back in. Tried to call our insurance company and couldn’t get through. My only guess was that it was blocked gutters, and I made an emergency visit to rent a tall ladder from Home Depot, which I got home in sleeting rain only to discover that – my measurements notwithstanding – it was a good five feet short of being tall enough.

Eventually I got through to the insurance company who told me to have Servpro come out and pump it out. Servpro started with one truck. Then another arrived. Then a third, and a fourth.

When we went to bed that night, they had had no more luck clearing the basement than I did with my shop-vac.

March 14

As it turned out, the basement couldn’t be cleared, because the end of the french drain system that surrounds our house had frozen. Which mean that as water drained down along the sides of the house and collected in the drain system, it could not exit the system and instead flowed into our house.

Once we figured that out, an excavator punched a bunch of holes in the pipe, there was a geyser of water and Servpro subsequently cleared the house in a half hour.

That was the good part. The bad part was that our insurance company initially told us we weren’t covered at all, and it wasn’t until our broker got involved that they allowed that there might be some coverage. Which there ultimately was, but not nearly enough to cover the damage and it took months for the carpet to be replaced and patching the sheetrock they extracted is still pending, though hopefully soon.

The lesson here is: if you have french drains, check them to make sure they will not freeze. Just trust me on this.

In a fun bonus, it turned out that the first leak was a totally different problem that had to be discovered later: a partially blocked valve in our septic system that overflowed when high volumes of water were passed through it, as in a shower. Not good times, bad times.

April 2

After a long delay thanks to COVID, we finally had a service to celebrate my Dad’s memory. It was as crushing as it was needed.

April 10

The debut of a brand new soft top for the Jeep.

April 15

Red Sox home opener with my little fan.

April 21

Windstorm did a number on the island.

April 24

Sacrificed the beard as part of a birthday present for Kate. This has elicited a wide variety of commentary, the most notable of which was “DUDE! YOUR FACE!” She was appreciative, at least.

May 7

For better or for worse, we’re all in on heat pumps now. Furnace and tank were removed.

May 14

First doors off day with the Jeep.

May 17

First time on a plane in 894 days. As mentioned above, it was a bit of a rough reentry.

May 20

First time seeing my BFF in three years, was immediately Tom Sawyered into demoing a deck.

More seriously, I never again want to go a year let alone three without hanging out again.

May 27

The wait was excruciating, but finally Stranger Things Season 4 dropped. And what a season it was.

June 9

Awful day. What I thought was a minor dental issue for my cat turned out to be a tumor, and I had to say goodbye to my feline companion and friend of almost twenty years. You were loved, Pook.

June 11

Went to my first reunion in years, and got to see the BFF for the second time in a month, my college buddies and a host of other folks over a couple of days in an absolutely bonkers setting.

June 15

Lucky enough to be up the coast a bit for a week with friends at one of the best beaches in Maine.

June 21

First day of summer.

July 4

Fireworks with friends.

July 15

The girls were featured players in the local parade.

July 16

Pretty nice little sunrise.

Followed by a visit to an incredibly cool private island in Casco Bay, one that features WWI and WWII military bunkers including a climbable submarine tower.

July 21

Went to see The National for our first concert in who knows how long.

July 23

Excellent visit with Crazy Uncle Corey in Vermont.

July 29

Went camping with friends. That absurd amount of gear is what we brought for a single weekend.

August 5

Someone made her theater camp debut as a “flying squirrel,” in a costume that she made herself.

August 27

Family outing with my mom, brother and his kids to Splashtown Funtown. Other than the Tilt-a-Whirl, which was a terrible mistake, a good time was had by all.

August 30

Took the best kid in the world to one of my favorite spots in the world, completing my annual pilgrimage in the process.

September 6

Said best kid in the world enters the first grade.

September 17

Our down the street neighbors, whose two little girls have the most adorable tiny beekeeping suits, invited us over for their honey harvest.

September 18

The next day it was time for our annual cider pressing.

October 6

For the first time since 2019, we were able to host our conference, The Monktoberfest. This one was special because my Mom was a guest of honor to commemorate the 10th year, and because my BFF gave a talk about his own event, the Flyathlon, which has raised a half a million dollars for local conservation efforts. It was a lot of blood, sweat and tears holding an event in the COVID era, but it was legitimately incredible to see everyone.

October 22

Hard top: reactivated. Sadly.

October 27

In 2021, I set a goal to try and walk 40 miles a week for the year. It seemed ambitious, but as it turned out I enjoy walking so much I hit my goal two months early. I got up early to get the walk in, and shotgunned a beer to celebrate the mark. If you’d told me a few years ago that any of this would have happened, I would have said you’re crazy. But it did.

October 31

No one takes Halloween more seriously than the island. No one.

November 2

pic.twitter.com/NXhteWFm21

— steve o'grady (@sogrady) November 3, 2022

RedMonk had a significant birthday, which we thought we could sneak past people, but instead which our coworkers conspired against us to generate reactions which were literally overwhelming.

November 8

My daughter’s stuffie Tiana Sprinkles visited San Francisco for the first time and I visited it for the first time in three years and it was so, so good to catch up with work friends I haven’t seen in far too long, and even more to the point one of my best college friends.

November 19

Celebrated the kiddo’s bday at the climbing gym, an inspired idea of Kate’s, clearly, not mine.

November 27

As happy as I was to be back in San Francisco, that’s how sad I was to be back in Las Vegas. The cabana we rented the first day eased the blow, however.

December 20

As I’ve been stretching out the distances I’ve been walking this year, it occurred to me that I might be able to complete a marathon distance walking. After I saw that the training plans maxed out at 38 miles a week – or two less than I’ve tried to average – I decided to try it. Thanks to logistical support from Kate ranging from assuming drop off and pickup duties at school to drive by checkins with me, guidance from my BFF on how to best manage plantar fasciitis and distance events, and advice from coworkers on local footwear options I was able to complete a marathon distance walking.

It’s not running, obviously, but it was still a fun undertaking, and if nothing else I have to be the only person ever to complete that distance on this two square mile island.

December 25

Quiet Christmas at home. Note how my wrapping skills have dramatically improved.

December 27

Went on a post-Christmas ski vacation with our family, Kate’s family and my Mom. A ski vacation that included a lazy river that sold Heady Toppers.

December 31

As is our custom, celebrated the New Year with our friends and fine beers.

I opened the first morning of summer vacation by trying to kill time with Eleanor by making breakfast eggrolls. Not only did she not want to eat them, she managed to repeatedly scald me with molten oil by dropping them in from a foot above the wok.

Not good times, bad times.

Later that afternoon, however, we were up at Kate’s parents’ place for a birthday party and some cousins time.

The next day, she disappeared for an hour and wouldn’t let me see what she was doing until she emerged with some homemade – and hand decorated – armor.

wrote up the experience of putting together a little family dashboard in our kitchen.

if you've got a lot going on in your house, and especially if you've got kids heading back to school, this might be of interest.https://t.co/oWbbo8Jjk7

— steve o'grady (@sogrady) August 16, 2022

Out of both a desire to be productive and a need to begin prepping for school re-entry, I took some time to set up a combination digital calendar/picture frame/weather station/family to do list/tide chart. So far, so good.

With the girls gone for dinner at a friend’s house, I took the opportunity to try and make dumplings from scratch by hand. Unsurprisingly, things didn’t end well and I did not even ask them to try them later.

Apart from the aforementioned light fixtures and curtain rods, the only real home improvement project was building a shelf behind the old, inherited sectional couch in our basement. I cut up the same 2×6’s that once were part of the wheelchair ramp I made for my Dad, stained them, dropped in a power outlet and called it good.

I’m not sure that I’ve ever caught a sunrise while on vacation before – in fact, I’d bet against it. But I was there for a couple of good ones.

Later, we built a fort.

And she read to me in it.

We rode bikes all over the island, which was mostly fun. Except for the days when it was hot and she’d want to walk the bikes back halfway across it.

Set a walking goal before the start of the year, and after crossing a particular milestone there was only one GIF to talk about what was left.

headed up to my mom's house tonight for a cookout with my brother, who's in from out of town. bright sun when we got there.

this was five minutes after we brought the food outside and fired up the grill. pic.twitter.com/s5HHrNrpNp

— steve o'grady (@sogrady) August 25, 2022

Headed up to my Mom’s place to see my brother and nephews, and, well, the usual weather followed.

The next day the cousins came down to the beach by our house and, well, the usual weather followed.

Two days later, we all went to Splashtown Funtown. It was as advertised, though just take my word for it: don’t get on the Tilt-a-Whirl. Even if your beloved daughter says “Daddy, will you take me on the Tilt-a-Whirl?”

In between our various adventures, Eleanor and I spent a lot of time sitting together on the couch reading while poor Kate had to work.

Then there was the day I was tasked with sewing together “vests” for her stuffed animals, and sewing tiny ferns on to those vests. Turns out I’m a lot better at reading to her than I am sewing.

Another night, one when Kate had to work, Eleanor and I made orange chicken together. The bad news is that she didn’t like it and wouldn’t eat it. The good news is that she didn’t manage to burn me this time.

Arguably the highlight of my vacation was taking Eleanor up to my happy place, one I’ve visited every summer for well over a decade. We were supposed to do this as a family, but the weather and schedule didn’t cooperate the week Kate had off, so instead I just took my sidekick.

Over the weeks I was out, I got a lot better at making cardboard weapons.

To the point that I ended up having to create an assembly line of sorts to manufacture them at scale.

By the end of vacation it was cool enough for firepits, and we got to deploy the new Solo heat deflector for the first time. Early verdict is that it does work and deflect heat to the sides, but you have to be close.

Vacation nights, I’d close the day by watching the kinds of movies that I hadn’t seen since a sleepover at a friend’s house when I was a kid. And probably didn’t need to see again because they were awful and should never have been made.

And then, on one of our last beach days of the summer, Eleanor got to make her paddle board debut thanks to an incredibly kind neighbor.

All in all, while it wasn’t all sunshine and unicorns – there were some rainy days in there – it was a summer of adventures that Eleanor hopefully will remember for a long time. And worst case and she forgets, I can always send her this.