The #yearly_roundup of things that I enjoyed this year.

1. Getting over the Covid period. It felt good to be able to travel, socialize and play sports again. With the added value that the working-from-home routine continued.
2. Reading. A bit less compared to the last year (according to Goodreads). I particularly enjoyed the “Three body problem” trilogy, which made my imagination run like never before. “In the future people will take neuro drugs that will selectively erase memories of this trilogy in order to be able to read them again for the first time.” #
3. Sticking to a healthy routine. More active compared to 2021. Smashed the 1000 days record for closing the Apple Health rings, kept doing 10.000 steps every day during the same period and played football 2-3 times every week. That’s a lot of dopamines 🙂
4. Driving my Tesla. Almost 5 years in, and it doesn’t get old.
5. Refereeing football games. I still regret not starting this earlier.
6. The wallpapers on my phone. I know, quite silly ? but we need to look for thin slices of joy. The iOS 16 lock screen improvements made me look for colors and emotions and in the process, increased my appreciation for the digital artists.
7. A few card games. Hearts and Spades from the Apple Arcade gave my mind some time off while bringing back some teenage memories.
8. Learning a new foreign language. I’m nowhere near speaking Spanish, but I am quite happy with the progress I made this year in learning new words and understanding the language.
9. A series: For all mankind. Because the third season is just as good as the previous two. And because it accentuates the impression that we’re leaving a new golden age for the space exploration (perhaps soon to be powered by fusion?).
10. Attending the first concert with my daughter. Not planned, but it turned out to be awesome.

For the fifth year running, the periodic roundup of things that I enjoyed in 2021. Might not be 10 in the end…

1. Reading. I made a conscious effort and created the environment to read more books. 5 times more than in 2020, according to Goodreads.
2. Listening. Sonos, Airpods Pro, the in-car entertainment system and more recently, the Sony wh-1000xm4 headphones are great (Sony – probably the only company where engineers get to name the products)
3. Learning more about aviation (from Admiral_Cloudberg, among others) and space
4. Refereeing. A bit ironic, considering my take on non-human football referees 🙂
5. Sticking to a routine. 662 days and counting…
6. Viewing my pictures on the Google Nest Hub.
7. Not worrying too much that there are not 10 things in this list…

Last hours of the year, so it’s time for the periodic roundup of things that I enjoyed over the past 12 months. 2020 has been a really strange year, but not everything was bad.

1. The scientific community for coming up with a vaccine in 2 days. You read that right, 2 days. Here’s for hope that this golden period of breakthroughs will have the same impact in the field of medicine as the Apollo moon landings had in the field of technology. Plus, after all this will be over, we will look back at 2020 and see it as a collective altitude training. Everything else will feel lighter and easier and we will be ready for bigger challenges.

2. Apple Watch and the Airpods for helping me stick to a healthy routine. Just like the previous years.
3. A place: Southern France. A wonderful, sunny place, full of history. To be visited again in 2021.
4. A series: Better Call Saul. I know, it made this list also in 2018. Some things don’t change. Plus, this year we got to see Lalo. Tell me again!
5. Liverpool FC for finally winning the Premier League. The first part of the year felt so good. So good that the rest of the year would not matter. But here we are still, with all the problems and top of the league again 🙂
6. Philips Hue. For the long winter nights and because the lights influence the mood.
7. A book: Andy Weir – Artemis. Quality stuff from the writer of The Martian. Had to take a day off to finish it. I loved the way it made me imagine humans living on the moon.
8. The Starship. If the humans will set foot on Mars this century, it will be in a Starship. Hopefully this will happen during our lifetime.
9. Reddit + Quora. The first one for keeping me informed, the other one for putting me to sleep 🙂
10. Working from home. Because it magically gave an extra hour to all my working days. Here’s for hope that the ‘new normal’ will be nothing like the ‘old normal’.