My goals for 2020 were to:

• learn how to relax
• tinker on some smaller car/tech/house projects
• lose that new fat
• ride that bike

Covid really helped me nail three of those, hah. But with nowhere to go, I didn’t get on the bike nearly as often as I wanted.

So first of all, Kari and I were incredibly fortunate to have steady work, income, and a spacious home and yard during this pandemic. I absolutely feel for everyone that had their pay scaled back or eliminated, or were cooped up in apartments or city spaces without being able to fully enjoy their local amenities.

The only way that I knew how to stay sane in isolation was to be outside and stay as busy as possible on projects, so I started the pandemic with a lot of yard work and small house projects. Then, we eventually realized how much money we'd been saving by not traveling or going out, so we decided to invest in making our home a nicer place to hang out. This turned into some larger projects and many furniture upgrades.

Here are some lists of what we did in 2020.

Travel

The year started off great with trips to:

• Chicago for work
• Florida to visit Kevi with Jeff
• Arizona to visit Kari's fam
• Minnesota for Bock Fest - the last hurrah...

And then our vacation plans transitioned from cities, events, and resorts to cabins and campgrounds.

• A Colorado snowboard trip turned into Colorado Cabin Quarantine
• We went camping @ Pine Lake with Kari's parents
• Spent my birthday in a tiny house on the Mississippi
• Went camping again @ Beeds Lake with Kari's parents
• A tropical 15 year anniversary trip turned into another Colorado Cabin trip

Guests

Man. We really missed having guests and hosting parties. We started the year with a big NYE party. Then, my dad and his partner, Brian visited, which was nice.

After covid hit, we set some rules and bubbled with Kari's parents, so they visited fairly often... and even stayed with us for a bit after the Derecho knocked out power for several days.

We also co-quarantined with Kari's cousins so that they could visit us for a weekend. It was great, but also weird to have strangers in our house again, haha.

House tech

• Ran more CAT-6 and upgraded our home network to Unifi
• Upgraded our home audio with newer Sonos and a nicer Turntable cartridge
• Added a connected weather station
• Improved the home automation
  • added some circadian rhythm lighting scenes
  • added more motion/door sensors
  • automated fans
  • made Kari's hair straightener smart so that it automatically turns off when she leaves the house (a common concern)
• Got a second TV 😱

Other house projects

• Finally upgraded our microwave to a proper built-in
• Upgraded the garage door to one with windows and rewired the door sensors
• Upgraded the lighting in my workshop
• Added lighting to the front of the house
• Organized the shed a couple more times
• Organized the garage
• Refinished the deck
• Hung some more art
• Added proper ventilation to our bathroom fans
• Finished a lot of paint touch-up from recent remodels
• Added/updated a lot of furniture
  • Added a hammock and built a cup holder for it
  • Updated every piece of patio and deck furniture
  • Added a sun shade and some heaters to the patio
  • Added a big ol umbrella to the deck
  • Added some bookshelves to the office
  • Was gifted some skull adirondacks for the fire pit
  • Turned a keg into a planter
  • Updated the furniture in our guest room/office so that Kari would have a nicer space to work from home
• Yardwork. Lots of yard work.
  • Cleaned up many fallen branches and trees from various storms (i.e. got to play with chainsaws)
  • Pruned literally everything that I could prune... maybe even some of the neighbor's stuff
  • Re-edged the entire landscape
  • Gathered a bunch of Virginia Creeper cuttings from a local forest and tried to start them to cover the fence in our back yard. Most died.
  • Fixed up some dry streams
  • Got a chipdrop and mulched a giant muddy, weedy, wooded area behind our house

Homebrewing

• Upgraded my homebrew system to all-electric
• Built a new kegerator
• Added taps to our rec room wall
• Brewed beer four times and made some awesome experimental batches

Cars

I tinkered with the Jeep a ton and finally got the thing off-road. We spent most of the summer with the top off, and the winters hoonin around in the snow... but I also updated quite a bit on it.

• New wheels/tires
• Bottle openers
• Decals
• Fire extinguisher
• New bumpers and a winch
• A contraption to help remove the top
• Built a door hanger
• An emergency cab cover
• Seatbelt silencers (topless probz)
• Added a bunch of off-road/recovery gear
• Got a storage unit to keep all the stuff in, heh

I also put wheel spacers on the M4 and we traded in Kari’s Velar. She picks up her new one Monday.

Weddings

We missed a few that we were excited to attend and that sucked.

• Kari's cousin Jerry Cozad's
• Our good friend Nathan and Christina Deutmeyer's
• My cousin Gabe and Zillah's

Shows

I went to one. Almost a year ago. And that is a bummer.

Work

Work was wild. It was over the top busy with a bit of drama and became stressful at times. Work-life balance became worse, but it was also steady - so I'm definitely thankful for that.

I spent most of the year building the Venmo Credit Card with a ton of other amazing folks.

After that was done, I got a new job as an Application Architect at Venmo and I'm excited to grow in this position.

Other random stuff

• Added a few bird feeders and got into bird watching (lol)
• Cooked way too many meals
• Made way too many cocktails
• Went to a socially distanced 40th birthday party
• Battled some depression
• Lost a bunch of weight and then gained most of it back
• Got out of and back into yoga. Thanks, Peloton.
• Had a lot of "fancy friday" home-date-nights with Kari
• Did a tiny bit of web dev and built photos.broox.com (which barely works, btw)
• Lost interest in computers
• Had to take my second nipple ring out because it nearly migrated out after ~20 years. Now, both of my nipples are just scarred, huge, and permanently nipping
• Went for lots of drives
• Helped make Trump the only one-term, trust fund, baby boy president to be impeached and lose the popular vote twice. Bitch. Fuck you.
• Managed to not get covid
• More importantly, managed to not give anyone else covid
• Lost our dog, Garth Brooks - which was awful

Like everyone else, I had a pretty tough and lonely year, but it was also incredibly productive. I missed my friends and family, but grew much closer to the person that matters the most.

I also learned a strange lesson, and that lesson is that most people in your life, especially your internet life, are expendable. I have literally no problem writing toxic people off now. This is new to me... and it feels awesome.

I'm excited to come out of this pandemic stronger and more comfortable than ever before.

Goals for 2021

• more yoga - maybe IRL!
• more tinkering
• more biking
• more travel 🤞
• not going absolutely wild if/when things get back to normal