Another year has passed by, and this has been a very active one. This has been my first full calendar year as a retiree. I’ve been taking advantage of my freedom. More than 30k air miles with trips that included 4 states, 2 countries, and first time visits to Hawaii and Europe. This was capped with traveling on my birthday on my last international trip of the year, my second trip of the year to eastern Europe, and the first time I’ve spent the year-end holidays out of the country. New Year’s Eve rang in 2020 very loudly as they take there fireworks very seriously in Romania.
I’ve enjoyed the traveling this year, but I’m still trying to adapt to the down-time on retirement when I’m not doing some planned adventure. I’ve been saying retirement requires an adjustment, and I guess I’m still continuing to adjust. I have (glacially) managed to clean up and purge some of the accumulated clutter in my house, which feels quite good. In addition to the fun, this year I think I will be undertaking some household refurbishment projects. My house is more than 65 years old and needs some TLC.
This year I’ve also managed to continue pursuing my photography. This included 3 organized photo tours, and 3 individual shoots, 2 of which were at my house, as I’ve identified some decent shooting locations around the place. I shot for the first time in Hawaii and Mexico. I’ve also been posting my work on my new photography website. I’m hoping in 2020 to refine my skills and improve my photographic impact even more.
This year also gave me the opportunity to meet with my cousins on two separate occasions, once in Colorado and once in the Bay Area. None of us are spring chickens anymore. This motivates me repeating my goal from last year to improve my fitness, both for better health and for enabling me to get around on my adventures better.