Bye 2020!

...The end of 2020, that is. And good riddance!

What a massively annoying year.

I guess we are lucky that our lives were affected as little as it was. My work is essential, so life went on as usual for me. Some of my classes were converted to online lectures, that's all. I'm not particularly social by nature, so I kept seeing my usual little circle of friends when I have time. Since the Swedish gyms were never locked down, we kept training as usual.

Mr. Igor however has a little IT business and works in search engine optimization, and he works with clients dealing in luxury goods. He got so few orders this year, I couldn't even be bothered to ask him to pool his money with mine for the household. Yikes. I actually feel very ambivalent about this: On one hand, I find it absolutely barf-worthy that there are people out there that can and will spend more money on a single, unnecessary luxury item than I make in one year. On the other hand, destroying this niche industry doesn't affect the rich people who buy the items, it hurts the people who carve out a living in a niche created by capitalist demand. 

Luckily, we do just fine on my salary alone and haven't had to cut down on anything. Others aren't so lucky, so we feel privileged we have that option.

I think the only thing that really, truly was different, is that I was supposed to have has my foot fixed by now. By this point in time, I should have been through the surgery, through the 3 months in a cast, done with the 3+ months in a boot and probably more or less done with rehabilitation. I have no clue when it might be in the future. It's frustrating. Everything was planned out with work and school. 

Also we were supposed to go see the ballet Swan Lake back in.... April? And it has been pushed ahead like 7 times now, with the current date set to May next year. What a weird year.

But the important part is, that no one we know got sick and no one we know have died. Since Mr. Igor's mother has both a lung disease and an immune system disease, we count ourselves lucky.

But this has been a weird year for sure. I don't think anyone will miss it.

So... I've been doing a post like this on and off for some years, so here goes...

Best reads

I have always loved dinosaurs. I thought I would "grow out of it" at some age, but nope. Still love them. My favorites are the massive sauropods for also appealing to my geeky side: How did they manage to grow so massively large? How did the meat machine work with such heavy weight? And for that matter, how did they even manage to get enough nutrition to grow that large? How did they keep from overheating?

Enter Biology of the Sauropod Dinosaurs: Understanding the Life of Giants

This book is everything I ever wanted about sauropods. Seriously. I can't recommend it enough!

/Geekgasm

Worst reads

Nuking the moon. This book baffles me. How do you take a bunch of events like this and just make it... Boring? 

Listverse, The Chive, Bored Panda etc. can do it, why can't this book? 

Am I missing something? Is the authors way of expressing himself just completely incompatible with my humor? 

Best TV

I honestly can't chose: The Boys or The Expanse.

The Boys managed to take one of my favourite comic books ever and just make it way, way better. 

The Expanse managed to take one of my favourite books ever and just make it way, way better. 

Nope, can't chose. I love both.

Worst TV

Watchmen. Yikes. So, I can basically say the same about the Watchmen movie as I said about The Boys: It managed to take one of my favourite comic books ever and just make it way, way better (Going for an Occam's razor/Chekov's gun and framing Dr Manhattan as the enemy, since he was going to leave earth anyways was just brilliant) So naturally I was interested in the series. But nope, couldn't even get through the first episode. And that was after getting the Dr Manhattan twists spoiled and being genuinely curious to see it pulled off. Nope. Boring.

Honorable mention

Some times it can be a huge disappointment to revisit a childhood favourite. Because, obviously, you were a child back then, and your taste have developed and refined. 

But not always.

Swat Kats is still freaking awesome. Two seconds into the intro guitar and I feel twelve years old again, and everything is awesome because Swat Kats is on Cartoon network playing on the Blu-ray. 

I loved this show. I still do. 

Back then, I wanted to be Felina Feral, capable action-girl. Instead I have ended up more like Callie Briggs, equally capable, just minus the action part. Heh. 

(I also might have wanted to learn to weld just because T-bone looked so damn cool doing it in the season 2 intro. Don't judge) 

Dishonorable mention

Some times it can be a huge disappointment to revisit a childhood favourite. 

Some times your changing world view also changes how you see a show.

I think I was like... 17? When I first encountered Daria, and thought it was the smartest show on TV. I idolized Daria. I wanted to be her.

Now?

She's a mean person. A pseudo-intellectual female neckbeard. Really awful to people who are trying to be nice to her. An disloyal friend. A slacktivist of the worst kind: Expecting everyone else to fight her battles for her while she makes mean comments hidden behind a book. Judgmental to people who don't actually deserve it. 3edgy5me.

Basically almost everything I hate in current year, rolled up in an entitled little package. 

Some times you change and grow, some times the times force you to grow. 

Luckily, I borrowed a friends collection before buying it myself, otherwise it would have ended up as 2020's worst purchase. 

Best purchase

I got the Plantronics Poly BackBeat FIT 3200 for the gym, but they have basically become my favorites for everything non-commute related. These are really good, and the little charging station/holder is a convenient one too. I like that I can have one in my ear and the other one charging, instead of the massive headsets I usually wear.

I replaced my old phone with the Nokia 8,3 and have been really happy with it. It's just a good, nice phone. But hey, it get's a coolness factor point for being a Nokia instead of the Samsung's and Apple's that everyone else seems to have.

Worst purchase

Probably the tickets to the Swan Lake. lol. Once we actually get to go, I will probably have forgotten about them.