I hate to say it, but this is now the third retrospective in a row where the global COVID-19 pandemic has taken centre stage. Admittedly, this was the year where things started to feel normal again, not a false rushing back into it. Once we had our booster shots, it felt like perhaps getting COVID wouldn’t necessarily end in death or long COVID. Restrictions loosened up but we kept our distance and tested at every little sniffle. To date, Ian’s been tested 41 times. 😮 Tammy’s teaching shifted to a 2 days in the office and 3 at home per week, even though her students are attending remotely. With the kids back in person and me working the odd time at the office, it’s meant that we’ve broken out of our bunker. We even attended the Esri Canada Christmas Party this year.
But then that led to the inevitable. First it was Grandpa B getting COVID. That was scary. But he was triple-shot and got off lightly. And then it was my turn. Again, I had a cocktail of Astra-Zeneca, Pfizer and Moderna in me and I got off lightly. Two days of feeling bad and then three more of isolation. The biggest bummer was that it happened over our 25th wedding anniversary. The biggest and most amazing thing was that Tammy and the kids didn’t get it.
Is it over? In some ways, it seems so. I don’t really wear masks around anymore, but I still choose to stay home over going out. We’ll see what 2023 brings. No more nasty variants, hopefully.
At least the “travel” section of this years’ retrospective wasn’t just an empty echoing space. I even had one trip for work in 2022: to Vancouver. Stephanie and family came to visit, giving us a chance to be tourists in our town. We had a great visit, with lots of activities but still time to unwind and have fun. It would have been better if the weather had cooperated. The windstorms that blew up in the nights put the kibosh on the kids sleeping in the tent. The thunderstorm that Tristan wanted to see came a week late. Just a month later, we were in Victoria returning the visit. The bike riding was a big part of it, but the best bit was having our 25th anniversary dinner at the Keg with Dad, Stephanie and family. I’d wanted to do something nice to mark the date, and that fit the bill. We didn’t get to see Colin and Carol: the timing didn’t work out because they had to be in Mexico to get their permanent residence paperwork done. Maybe we’ll get lucky and see them in 2023.
Miranda turned 18 this year (she’s allowed in the bars, at least in Alberta!). It was the end of her career in the public school system and on to University for her. There were lots of grad activities, from her photo session and the resulting photos, to the pre-grad photo day at Baker Park and the main event itself. It was a great day, and I will admit to having the heebee-jeebees being in the throng at the graduation ceremony. It was the first time being in a crowd in a long time. Miranda even attended the graduation banquet in her awesome green suit. She also got some accolades this year. She was a finalist for the Youth of Distinction Awards and got a nice bundle of prizes, even if she didn’t win. And she also won a provincial scholarship for her exam marks, which helped with the University costs this year. But even will all that going on, she still took time to do lots of reading and drawing (see more on that below) and even trying her hand from time to time in the kitchen. She has kept in touch with her high school friends, and had plans to have a night out with one who had to bail, leaving Tammy to join her going to a drag show. But not everything was roses: Miranda had to have her wisdom teeth out. Never fun.
Ian’s in a time of major changes. His growth spurt that started in 2021 is ongoing. We’ll measure him tomorrow, but he’s only a couple inches shorter than me now. He turned 15 in the summer, and it was great that Zachary and the rest of the gang could be here to help celebrate. His time in middle school came to an end, but not without one more strange day: the kids were locked down because there was an active police incident at the Sobeys. He started school at Bowness High in September. It’s an 8 km bike ride, but he enjoyed it until the weather turned. After a month or so of taking the bus, we got him some studded tires for his bike so he can keep riding even in the snow and ice. He got really sick in November, but it might have been influenza or RSV. COVID tests were negative. It still knocked him out of school for a week. It has seemed that Ian has spent a lot of time cooking. He’s definitely got a desire to create interesting and delicious things. He even got a chef’s jacket as a Christmas gift this year. His braces are off now, so we can see his smile again.
Tammy turned the big five-zero in 2022. If getting the flamingoes in the yard was the only thing that happened to her this year, I think she would have been happy with that. 😁 She really liked that I remembered. But she also got an espresso machine and a waffle iron for stroopwafels, so things just kept getting better. Her 19th Mother’s Day saw breakfast burritos from Ian along with some other tokens of our affection. She has been at Columbia College for five years now, and things keep going well. Perhaps she’ll be happier when she knows the long term situation for remote teaching. It has seemed that every four months, they’re going to go back full time, but then it gets pulled back to mostly online. The social events have started up again at the College, including a Christmas party that we would have gone to except for Tammy knocking herself silly on the ice. She almost didn’t get her massage evening in December when the car battery died, but it happened the following week.
Most of my 2022 highlights are over in the Cycling Roundup, but there were other non-cycling things happening for me like bottling up a second batch of cider and building the Lego typewriter that I got for Christmas 2021. There’s a crap-ton of apples in the freezer from this year’s harvest, so 2023 will see a lot more cider, I guess. I turned 49 (my five-zero is next year!) and Father’s Day was going well until the water line to the refrigerator sprung a leak. I got interviewed at work for the “Esri Canada On-Air”. The company has been creating opportunities for people to connect during the pandemic, as part of our “Connection Hub”. In the new year, I’m going to have a new position at work, but we’ll have to wait until then to see how that works out.
Murphy turned six, and he got a tent for his birthday. He loved it in the summertime. I’m sure he would prefer just being allowed to run free, but this will do.
Early May brought some sad, but not totally unexpected news about Great-Grandma. After a few weeks of being in hospital after a fall, she passed away.
Around our home, the biggest story was the ongoing process of getting solar panels. It’s seemed painfully slow at times. The EnerGuide energy evaluation happened in June, but then it took until September for the solar contractors to get their hands on the panels. It was a good thing that the weather stayed so nice into October, because the installation happened on the last couple of days before the snow flew. It took a bit before I could be certain that it was all working, but it ended up fine in the end. Now just waiting for the federal government to come through with the Greener Homes Grant money. Other things that happened around the house included finally putting Homebridge in place, meaning that the Apple and Amazon devices could talk to each other. As part of the solar installation, I got to improve the network and get better WiFi coverage upstairs. Not everything was fun and games with the house, though. There were potentially dangerous spiders in the storage room, the garage door spring broke and the dryer needed repairs. Who knows, maybe 2023 will see a new washer and dryer.
The reason I was able to get Homebridge running was the addition of a Synology NAS. That was a key part of the new computing devices around here. I got a nice Studio Display for my home office, Miranda got her iPad Pro as a graduation present, and Tammy, Miranda and Ian all got refreshed iPhones 13. The other major anniversary in 2022 was the 20th for the ii News. What started as a pet project has grown to be the definitive documentation of a couple decades of our family.
It seemed like 2022 was the year of wildlife around our house:
- A moose
- Partridges
- A skunk
- A golden weasel
- A whole family of moose
2022 wasn’t quite as rich in art submissions as previous years. Easter eggs from both sides of the Rocky Mountains gave us some colour. Tammy and I participated in Nanowrimo for the umpteenth time in November, which really doesn’t add much colour. Miranda did the heavy lifting adding art with her Inktober challenge. Today is the last day of her December mushroom-drawing challenge, so watch for a super-post about that soon. I only pulled out the pastels once this year, to draw a portrait of Mr. Doos. I still can’t quite believe how well that one turned out. I really should do more.
That’s the story of 2022 around here. Every time I do one of these I’m amazed at everything that happens in 12 months. It was a good year. I hope everyone else’s was as good.
