2020 Retrospective and 2021 Goals
Jan. 1st, 2021 10:15 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chuckroVery long, so under a cut.
• I actually did manage to make progress on my goals, in a monkey’s paw sort of way: I’ve been working from home since mid-March, which has allowed me a more flexible schedule, more natural light, an easier time taking breaks, and even some naps and sleeping a little later in the morning. For that matter, I became part of the equity quant team as of June, which means I’ve had a team to talk to and work on things with and a boss who actually cares about what I’m doing and provides useful feedback. Dropping some of my older, less-fun responsibilities is officially in my work goals for this fiscal year, and we’ve already started on a few of them. For that matter, I have a number of new projects that will hopefully be interesting.
• That said, there’s been a ton of new and exciting stress, also mostly stemming from everyone being at home. Remote schooling does not agree with our family, though we can manage it with careful application of schedules, rewards and timers. ARR got the first few months of the fall in-person, and hopefully we’ll see the return of that in the new year.
• We had to cancel both our cruise to Mexico and the planned trip to Germany to visit my sister. And a long B&B weekend before the pandemic hit because we had strep throat. We did get a ski trip in, though. Besides that, our only other traveling was to Farmingdale or Kennett Square for carefully-spaced visits with grandparents. (ARR spent three summer weeks and one winter break week at Camp Papa & Grandma, the happiest place on Earth.)
• The shift to using Google Meet for game nights (and additional smaller rpg nights) worked out fine. We’ve played a lot of Jackbox, and online versions of Codenames, Cards Against Humanity and Names in a Hat. (And have managed to get attendees we never would have otherwise!) For the smaller groups, I ran a D&D 5E campaign based on The 7th Saga, and have run one-shots of a dozen “minimalist” rpgs I had wanted to try.
• There have also been Meet cooking parties, movie-watching via Teleparty, gaming Zooms hosted by other people, and a couple of middling attempts at Zoom karaoke. I’ve had regular Meet lunches with Ben and hangouts with Erica; and attended my dad’s pizza club a few times.
• But by the same token, I think I’ve managed to not bog myself down with too many social calls; and to step away from ones I didn’t feel up for even though the opportunity was there. Between always having family members nearby and having multiple video calls each day, my social batteries get drained easily. (During the case-count lull in early fall, I was able to go into my office a bunch of times and just sit in the quiet. It was nice.)
• Zoom Princeton Reunions was a big success. Despite some computer problems on my part, I made the Zoom SPAZ reunion go off well. The D+G convention was moved online and I did two panels and a trivia night that went great. We managed various Zoom holiday gatherings with family, and plenty of random hangout nights with distant friends.
• We hosted several rounds of “social distance parties” where our friends took scheduled turns sitting on the far side of our porch, masked, to shmooze with us. And then got sent home with homemade food.
• I successfully introduced ARR to several of my favorite video games series, and to Dungeons & Dragons. We’ve also done more boardgaming and jigsaw puzzles than would ever get crammed into a normal year.
• I started making myself weird breakfast sandwiches in the summer and then it became a thing. I blame Facebook for showing me videos of Korean street toast and Cook’s Illustrated for loading me down with interesting ideas.
• I successfully got LASIK in June, removing my need for glasses for the first time since I was nine. Since then I’ve been heavily leaning on blue-filter (no-prescription) reading glasses for screen time, and I suspect my recovery and need for eyedrops was extended significantly by the concentrated screen time this year has brought.
These goals are only lightly edited from the last two years:
1. Continue to adjust my daily/weekly schedule and activities so that my regular routine is better for me. I expect to continue remote work for at least half the year, and I want to keep some amount of working from home even after it’s not necessary. I need to remain mindful of bedtime, too much mindless social media, how much and what type of social time I’m getting, natural light, etc.
2. Continue to use the changes at my job as an opportunity to make my daily schedule more to my liking. Make good on my work goal of shedding some old responsibilities and improving automation methods, and expanding into things I haven’t done before (likely to be programming and/or project management). Either I haven’t been interested / engaged enough, or I’ve been overwhelmed and stressed (or both) and I need a happier medium.
3. Find activities that I find genuinely fulfilling. I have a list of “potential” hobby things, but like with books I don’t feel like reading or games I’m not in the mood to play, forcing myself to do them is a slog rather than a pastime. I need to actively engage with things more, and that needs to stem from doing things because I’m actually interested in doing them.
4. Want things. Express to people that I want things. Accept that is okay to want things.
• I actually did manage to make progress on my goals, in a monkey’s paw sort of way: I’ve been working from home since mid-March, which has allowed me a more flexible schedule, more natural light, an easier time taking breaks, and even some naps and sleeping a little later in the morning. For that matter, I became part of the equity quant team as of June, which means I’ve had a team to talk to and work on things with and a boss who actually cares about what I’m doing and provides useful feedback. Dropping some of my older, less-fun responsibilities is officially in my work goals for this fiscal year, and we’ve already started on a few of them. For that matter, I have a number of new projects that will hopefully be interesting.
• That said, there’s been a ton of new and exciting stress, also mostly stemming from everyone being at home. Remote schooling does not agree with our family, though we can manage it with careful application of schedules, rewards and timers. ARR got the first few months of the fall in-person, and hopefully we’ll see the return of that in the new year.
• We had to cancel both our cruise to Mexico and the planned trip to Germany to visit my sister. And a long B&B weekend before the pandemic hit because we had strep throat. We did get a ski trip in, though. Besides that, our only other traveling was to Farmingdale or Kennett Square for carefully-spaced visits with grandparents. (ARR spent three summer weeks and one winter break week at Camp Papa & Grandma, the happiest place on Earth.)
• The shift to using Google Meet for game nights (and additional smaller rpg nights) worked out fine. We’ve played a lot of Jackbox, and online versions of Codenames, Cards Against Humanity and Names in a Hat. (And have managed to get attendees we never would have otherwise!) For the smaller groups, I ran a D&D 5E campaign based on The 7th Saga, and have run one-shots of a dozen “minimalist” rpgs I had wanted to try.
• There have also been Meet cooking parties, movie-watching via Teleparty, gaming Zooms hosted by other people, and a couple of middling attempts at Zoom karaoke. I’ve had regular Meet lunches with Ben and hangouts with Erica; and attended my dad’s pizza club a few times.
• But by the same token, I think I’ve managed to not bog myself down with too many social calls; and to step away from ones I didn’t feel up for even though the opportunity was there. Between always having family members nearby and having multiple video calls each day, my social batteries get drained easily. (During the case-count lull in early fall, I was able to go into my office a bunch of times and just sit in the quiet. It was nice.)
• Zoom Princeton Reunions was a big success. Despite some computer problems on my part, I made the Zoom SPAZ reunion go off well. The D+G convention was moved online and I did two panels and a trivia night that went great. We managed various Zoom holiday gatherings with family, and plenty of random hangout nights with distant friends.
• We hosted several rounds of “social distance parties” where our friends took scheduled turns sitting on the far side of our porch, masked, to shmooze with us. And then got sent home with homemade food.
• I successfully introduced ARR to several of my favorite video games series, and to Dungeons & Dragons. We’ve also done more boardgaming and jigsaw puzzles than would ever get crammed into a normal year.
• I started making myself weird breakfast sandwiches in the summer and then it became a thing. I blame Facebook for showing me videos of Korean street toast and Cook’s Illustrated for loading me down with interesting ideas.
• I successfully got LASIK in June, removing my need for glasses for the first time since I was nine. Since then I’ve been heavily leaning on blue-filter (no-prescription) reading glasses for screen time, and I suspect my recovery and need for eyedrops was extended significantly by the concentrated screen time this year has brought.
These goals are only lightly edited from the last two years:
1. Continue to adjust my daily/weekly schedule and activities so that my regular routine is better for me. I expect to continue remote work for at least half the year, and I want to keep some amount of working from home even after it’s not necessary. I need to remain mindful of bedtime, too much mindless social media, how much and what type of social time I’m getting, natural light, etc.
2. Continue to use the changes at my job as an opportunity to make my daily schedule more to my liking. Make good on my work goal of shedding some old responsibilities and improving automation methods, and expanding into things I haven’t done before (likely to be programming and/or project management). Either I haven’t been interested / engaged enough, or I’ve been overwhelmed and stressed (or both) and I need a happier medium.
3. Find activities that I find genuinely fulfilling. I have a list of “potential” hobby things, but like with books I don’t feel like reading or games I’m not in the mood to play, forcing myself to do them is a slog rather than a pastime. I need to actively engage with things more, and that needs to stem from doing things because I’m actually interested in doing them.
4. Want things. Express to people that I want things. Accept that is okay to want things.
