Life - Ramblings

2016 in Review

Every year has its ups and downs, its achievements and its misses. Given this past election season, and the anxiety I harbor about the year ahead, I thought I would take a moment to remind myself of all the awesome in my life in 2016.

Concerts & Shows

This year I attended more concerts and shows than I have in any year of my life

  • March 30th – Attended Ask Me Another show/ recording in Orlando with Karen
  • May 5th – The Play that Goes Wrong – with Toby
  • May 6th – Lush concert – The Roundhouse – with Toby
  • June 3rd – Weird Al Yankovic Mandatory Fun World Tour – with Toby, Ron, Dave, Tessa, Zachary and Leo
  • July 7th – Welcome to Nightvale show Ghost Stories, Tampa – with G.W.
  • December 2 – Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain – University Auditorium, UF – Allyson, Nick, Lila, Kendra, Carlos, Allison
  • December 11 – A Night with Amanda Palmer, Jason Webley, and Jherek Bischoff – Culture Room, Fort Lauderdale – With Toby and Ron

Travel

Places I went – Some for work, some for fun.

  • Hattiesburg, MS- IRDay (April)
  • London, Paris – Concert and vacation (May)
  • Orlando, FL  – ALA Annual conference (June), FL- Scholarly Communications Interest Group conference (June), visit friends (Various)
  • Alaskan Cruise with Melson family (July)
    • Seattle
    • Juneau
    • Skagway
    • Glacier Bay
    • Ketchikan
    • Victoria, BC
  • Indianapolis, IN – GenCon (August)
  • Columbus, Ohio – USETDA conference (September
  • Bok Tower Gardens, FL – day trip on Homecoming holiday (October)

Books Read

Over on Goodreads, I set up a challenge for myself to read 40 books. I met my goal, and you can see Goodreads’ summary here. It’s a very pretty visual. There are some books I feel are worth highlighting:

Learn and Grow

  • Attended Mindfulness Retreat weekend in January
  • Attended two Writing The Other masterclasses, transcribed a third
    • Writing Native American Characters: How Not to Do a Rowling!
    • Writing Deaf and Blind Characters
    • Writing for Trans and Non-Binary Narratives
  • Read from a banned book at ALA for Banned Books Week series videos
  • Walked with PFLAG in Pride Parade
  • Attended UF Quest conference
  • Became board member of PFLAG
  • Attended PFLAG Transgender symposium

Celebrations and Connections

  • Treated myself to a spa day in January for my birthday
  • Visited friends who live in England when they were in Orlando
  • Attended Toby’s godson’s HS graduation party
  • Attended Bobby and Lee Kirby’s wedding
  • Attended Stephani and Vince’s wedding
  • Attended Birthday lunch with Tempest
  • Went with Allison to get her tattoo
  • Went to the 30th anniversary showing of Labyrinth in theaters for Karen’s birthday
  • Went with sib to start the legal name change process for them
  • Hosted Thanksgiving for my family
  • Visited Toby’s family for Christmas

Random Tidbits

  • Attended the UF home Gymnastics season
  • Attended several UF home Football games
  • Started office hours as IR Manager – Fall term
  • Early Voted
  • Got rid of a lot of paper in my office – scanned a bunch then recycled
  • Created shelf / necklace holder
  • Created art for Amanda Palmer, gave it to her, and got a kiss on the cheek in return

Live at 1:45 12/31; I’ll come back later and add photos.