new year, low key

[jazzfish]

A couple of months ago, ex-coworkers N-- and S-- quit the still-imploding ex-workplace and moved to Seattle. They came up for a couple of days around Xmas, which was nice; we did a bit of the touristy thing on the 25th, including dim sum at that one place in Chinatown that's open on Xmas Day.

They also came by for Orphan's Boxing Day, along with a few other folks. (We even got a James, which I regard as a minor victory given that he spent over a decade in retail and has a strict policy of not leaving the house on Boxing Day.) Much food was cooked and eaten, including another turkey; many games were played; a great deal of Good Times were had.

I worked two days last week, which was kind of fantastic: quiet office, little pressing that Needed Doing, and a chance to sink my teeth into restyling the online documentation. Didn't finish it but it's better than it was. I remain baffled by the styling on the numbered lists, and not sure whether I'm going to be able to fix it. Stupid Flare.

Advancing the Year Marker (party name shamelessly stolen from Bob A-- in Virginia) went off quieter than in the past, which I'm also okay with. By the time the new year actually rolled around we were down to semilocal J-- and ckd, who'd come up from Seattle for the occasion. CKD stayed over until yesterday. I fed him pancakes and did *not* go do the touristy thing, on account of being slightly overpeopled and overtired.

Today has been a day of Not Much. I've missed those. I've a year-in-review begun but not finished; will endeavor to post it tomorrow.

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101 in 1001 update (the list)

Completed:
27) Host a non-local friend in the spare bedroom. 2015-12-31, ckd
71) Update budget with new-job numbers. 2015-11-16
79) Make a list of all absences from Canada since landing, for citizenship application. 2015-12-27
85) Purge unwanted DVDs. 2015-12-29

In progress:
9) Visit Blacksburg. Laying plans for next fall.
41) Write, revise, & submit story #3. Bloodmagery, in progress.
54) Read or purge one-quarter of the books currently tagged "unread" in LibraryThing (8/60). Read (and then purged) Dervish is Digital by Pat Cadigan. Purged Dune Messiah + Children of Dune. Read Tales of Neveryon by Delany.
64) Play 50 18xx games (13/50). 1817, 2015-11-08. 1846, 2015-11-15. 18SW, 2015-11-18. 1817, 2015-11-20. 1846, 2015-11-21. 1867 and 1860, 2015-12-06. 1817, 2015-12-20.
65) Play 20 different 18xx titles/scenarios (7/20). 18SW, 2015-11-18. 1867, 2015-12-06. 1860 with Locomotives expansion, 2015-12-06.
76) Get some financial advice from a financial advisor. Planned for February.
77) Develop a Five-Year Plan with real numbers in. In progress; will revisit in February.

Comments

[novel_machinist]

good luck to you and yours in the future!

[ckd]

As it turned out I didn't do the touristy thing, or at least not the usual touristy thing. My hotel room was available when I got there (even though it was hours before the official checkin time); I took advantage of that to sit down for a bit of a rest and catch up on email. (Not counting the one I sent you, which I sent as soon as I sat down on the SkyTrain and realized my omission.)

After that, I went out looking for food and/or Ingress portals. The hotel area was massively dominated by green (I guess the local ENL are dedicated and/or the local RES are a bunch of slackers), which made it tough for me to pick up the unique portal captures I was looking for to bump my Pioneer badge. I found a few blues at Canada Place and stomped them, went to Tim's because that's how I know I'm in Canada, then looped back. Later I walked over to CF Pacific Centre and back, which let me hit a few more portals, acquire dinner, take shameful advantage of the lag between exchange rate shifts and shops' ability to reprice certain items, and hit my Fitbit 10K steps.

(I forgot how much stuff would be closed or shorter hours because of the holiday.)

Since I hadn't really had a plan for the day anyway, that was a pretty good outcome.

[jazzfish]

Ingress-ing is a *kind* of touristing. :) Sounds like a pretty good wander; am glad it worked out well. And it was quite good to see you.