2010 Review

I've been doing a lot of chatting with friends and family lately, and Jamie Sue recommended I check out The Art of Non-conformity, which I've just gotten into. The author has just done his annual review and I thought it would be valuable to do one for 2010, even though I think 2011 will be a year of much more innovation and change. So here we have it, and I'll try to keep it brief.

Starting right on January 1, 2010, I had a strong focus on exercise. I trained with Chris Wall at Boulder Rock Club for 10 personal training sessions including a handful of private climbing lessons. I did quite a bit of weight lifting on my own coupled with his level 2 group fitness "Cry in the dojo" classes, which feature Tabata-style high-intensity interval training (HIT). Those were both deeply challenging and deeply satisfying. I did them pretty steadily through September when my membership expired and I decide to shift gears to learning new web development tools. I got some good sports psychology experiences out of both the classes and the personal training. My 2011 plans are still being defined, but it's likely that I will get another BRC membership and get back into climbing and the group fitness classes.

In terms of climbing itself I hit a few milestones including a bunch of 5.11 routes in the gym, learning how to set and clean sport anchors outdoors, and getting the gear necessary for outdoor sport leading. I also did my first session of outdoor bouldering. Overall I didn't do that much outdoor climbing though, but plenty in the gym.

My relationship with Michale was the biggest overall change from my past struggles in the relationship department. We had a lot of fun times together in 2010 including trips to Belize, Breckenridge, San Francisco, and Vermont. We watched lots of movies and shows (The Office and Six Feet Under being our staples), went to game nights, tried snowshoeing, went whitewater rafting, attended several Ignite events and TEDx Boulder, did a lot of walks and hikes, did a 10th Mountain Division Hut trip, went "restaurant camping", rode bikes around Louisville and Boulder a bunch, rode the Boulder 360 bike ride, played tons of Guitar Hero/Rock Band, went to Denver Decompression, watched a few plays, and tubed Boulder Creek. We also hosted some friends including my cousins Mike and Ed, Andrew and Sara, Chris and Tina, Monica, and Cecil. Things are good now and hopefully 2011 will bring even more joy and sweetness.

One of my other goals in 2010 was to get plugged into the Boulder tech scene. I think that went reasonably well but I can do better in 2011. There are a TON of tech events in Boulder every month. I've gone to both the Boulder and Denver New Tech Meetups, Denver Hack Nite, Ruby on Beer, the Front Range Pythoneers Unconference, This Week in Startups, Mobile Monday Colorado, Startup Junkies Underground, The DaVinci Institute Inventor's Showcase, Agile the Pivotal Way, and Boulder Open Coffee Club. The most significant connection so far has been with Boulder Community Computers where I've done a handful of days volunteering. In 2011 I'll look to get more specific connections.

In terms of concerts, it was overall a fairly light year but I got to see some shows I really liked. These included Imogen Heap, Zoe Keating, Charlie Hunter, and Erin McKeown. I was hoping the Eigenharp I bought might get me back doing music regularly but no luck so far. It's still on my agenda for 2011, though. On the technology side I will say that somewhat to my surprise I have indeed converted to the Mac. I ran Linux for about 10 years or so and while an Ubuntu laptop is still quasi-viable, the Mac is indeed superior. Sadly it's not something major, it's mostly the fact that suspend/resume work properly and the multitouch wireless mouse and scrolling are awesome.

I won't comment much on work since this is my personal blog, but overall 2010 was sort of "blah". I enjoyed several trips to Cupertino, one to Houston, and another opportunity to travel to Cluj-Napoca, Romania. The big initiative I started in 2008 is progressing along well and is nearing 2/3 completion. I feel like a lot of my overall approach and practices have gelled and my core working habits are solid. More work related news to come shortly, though. Things have been otherwise somewhat chaotic and lacking in clear direction from leadership.

OK, other random things. I still continue to make good use of personal assistants, although unfortunately my main assistant for 2010 turned out to not be trustworthy. The newest edition to my "team", George, is very handy with home repairs and has made some nice improvements including repairing my clothes dryer for $25 as opposed to the $300 replacement cost. He's currently working on built-in shelving for the living room to house my CD collection, which I am looking forward to.

In the health category, I had a weird digestive issue for the early part of 2010 which remains a mystery. I thought maybe I was lactose intolerant but that has since been definitively proven untrue. It ultimately went away after I had a colonoscopy but no specific treatment. My only theory is it was some kind of bacterial infection that was destroyed by the colonoscopy prep process itself. Things have been fine ever since and now I'm back to 100% certified omnivorous which is great.

2011 promises the biggest changes in quite a while so stay tuned for a post with my 2011 goals very soon.