A few years ago, I unfollowed everybody on Facebook, and it turned out to be a fabulous decision. Our connections run by algorithms on social media are so damn shallow that eliminating the newsfeed made zero difference in how connected I felt with far-flung friends and family. I could still pop into your profiles and see what people were up to whenever I wanted. It turns out seeing your vacation photos a week after the vacation and not in real time while you are on vacation doesn’t ruin anything.

When we were all locked down last year in the initial COVID panic, I loosened up that policy quite a bit, as I didn’t really have anything else to do but scroll through my Facebook feed. Over the last couple of months, I’ve been thinking it was time to do a mass unfollow again. I did it yesterday. I unfollowed everybody on Facebook and LinkedIn. I do a lot of work related networking on Twitter, so I’m probably leaving it alone, although I have been aggressively unfollowing people that retweet crap into my Twitter feed. And Instagram is just looking at pictures of friends out doing fun things, often with their pets, which is sort of what I tried to use FB for, so it’s safe for now too.

I don’t think our brains are really wired to keep up with the torrent of who had what for lunch, who had a positive COVID test this week, and all of that. The day-to-day minutia of life is not something we need to broadly share, and trying to consume all that data is bad for our brains. I’m convinced that social media is ruining our attention spans, and maybe our democracy too. Facebook can’t make money if you spend 25 minutes reading an in-depth article on something. They need you clicking 12 times and refreshing the page 5 times in that 25 minutes. However, reading an in-depth article is unquestionably better for your brain health.

The FB algorithm will probably ensure most of you never see this post, and nobody will notice the change anyway. It’s not like I posted to FB 10X a day and your newsfeed will suddenly feel empty without me. And I’ll still be on FB. The one thing I may share every few days is not the problem. The newsfeed is the issue. The algorithm deciding what I should see next is the concern. The constant context shifting from a friend with a positive COVID test to a concert review from another friend to a climate change article for a third person is the problem. My brain, and really I think all brains, isn’t built to function like that. Multitasking is a lie.

So I guess what I’m saying is that if you expect me to see something you post to Facebook, make sure you tag me in the post.

A few years ago, I unfollowed everybody on Facebook, and it turned out to be a fabulous decision. Our connections run by algorithms on social media are so damn shallow that eliminating the newsfeed made zero difference in how connected I felt with far-flung friends and family. I could still pop into your profiles and see what people were up to whenever I wanted. It turns out seeing your vacation photos a week after the vacation and not in real time while you are on vacation doesn’t ruin anything.

When we were all locked down last year in the initial COVID panic, I loosened up that policy quite a bit, as I didn’t really have anything else to do but scroll through my Facebook feed. Over the last couple of months, I’ve been thinking it was time to do a mass unfollow again. I did it yesterday. I unfollowed everybody on Facebook and LinkedIn. I do a lot of work related networking on Twitter, so I’m probably leaving it alone, although I have been aggressively unfollowing people that retweet crap into my Twitter feed. And Instagram is just looking at pictures of friends out doing fun things, often with their pets, which is sort of what I tried to use FB for, so it’s safe for now too.

I don’t think our brains are really wired to keep up with the torrent of who had what for lunch, who had a positive COVID test this week, and all of that. The day-to-day minutia of life is not something we need to broadly share, and trying to consume all that data is bad for our brains. I’m convinced that social media is ruining our attention spans, and maybe our democracy too. Facebook can’t make money if you spend 25 minutes reading an in-depth article on something. They need you clicking 12 times and refreshing the page 5 times in that 25 minutes. However, reading an in-depth article is unquestionably better for your brain health.

The FB algorithm will probably ensure most of you never see this post, and nobody will notice the change anyway. It’s not like I posted to FB 10X a day and your newsfeed will suddenly feel empty without me. And I’ll still be on FB. The one thing I may share every few days is not the problem. The newsfeed is the issue. The algorithm deciding what I should see next is the concern. The constant context shifting from a friend with a positive COVID test to a concert review from another friend to a climate change article for a third person is the problem. My brain, and really I think all brains, isn’t built to function like that. Multitasking is a lie.

So I guess what I’m saying is that if you expect me to see something you post to Facebook, make sure you tag me in the post.

For Christmas, Colleen gave me one of those iron kindling splitting stands. A couple days after Christmas, I headed out to my wood pile to try it out. In no time I had reduced a bunch of logs to smaller pieces. Placing the log in the stand and letting the weight of a sledgehammer fall on it sure beats swinging an axe. 

Now that I had all this wood ready to go, it seemed a good time to have a fire. Besides the nice weather, it was still early in the afternoon so there was plenty of time for a longer smoke. I'd been eying the 7 ?" x 49 Tatuaje The Frank Redux 1 sticks in my humidor I had not had the time to smoke. I enjoyed one at the lounge at couple months ago so knew it was an 2 + hour smoke. Now was the time.

For Christmas, Colleen gave me one of those iron kindling splitting stands. A couple days after Christmas, I headed out to my wood pile to try it out. In no time I had reduced a bunch of logs to smaller pieces. Placing the log in the stand and letting the weight of a sledgehammer fall on it sure beats swinging an axe. 

Now that I had all this wood ready to go, it seemed a good time to have a fire. Besides the nice weather, it was still early in the afternoon so there was plenty of time for a longer smoke. I'd been eying the 7 ?" x 49 Tatuaje The Frank Redux 1 sticks in my humidor I had not had the time to smoke. I enjoyed one at the lounge at couple months ago so knew it was an 2 + hour smoke. Now was the time.

Back on December 1 I got an early Christmas present, the Aldi beer advent calendar. Photos of every bottle with tasting notes are at https://odonnellweb.com/pictures/Beer_Advent_Cal/.

Overall, I think 2 of the beers were beers I would not drink again, 2 or 3 were beers I would seek out because they were really good, and the rest were for the most part competent examples of their respective styles, but not necessarily particularly exciting.

Although I guess if you factor in buying a six pack of any of these beers at Aldi prices, a good IPA, or Stout, or whatever for $6.99 a six pack becomes something to be a little bit excited about.

Between keeping up with the tastings for the advent calendar and being on vacation for a week in December, I drank at least one beer 24 straight days in December. That is not something I need to repeat anytime soon. I doubt I was ever legally intoxicated during December as most days it was 1 or 2 beers, elevated to 3-4 some days on vacation. If nothing else, that is a lot of excess calories in a month when most of us are already consuming excess calories.

So I'll be starting 2022 with more treadmill, less beer.

Back on December 1 I got an early Christmas present, the Aldi beer advent calendar. Photos of every bottle with tasting notes are at https://odonnellweb.com/pictures/Beer_Advent_Cal/.

Overall, I think 2 of the beers were beers I would not drink again, 2 or 3 were beers I would seek out because they were really good, and the rest were for the most part competent examples of their respective styles, but not necessarily particularly exciting.

Although I guess if you factor in buying a six pack of any of these beers at Aldi prices, a good IPA, or Stout, or whatever for $6.99 a six pack becomes something to be a little bit excited about.

Between keeping up with the tastings for the advent calendar and being on vacation for a week in December, I drank at least one beer 24 straight days in December. That is not something I need to repeat anytime soon. I doubt I was ever legally intoxicated during December as most days it was 1 or 2 beers, elevated to 3-4 some days on vacation. If nothing else, that is a lot of excess calories in a month when most of us are already consuming excess calories.

So I'll be starting 2022 with more treadmill, less beer.

Another year has come and gone. It was pretty much like the one before it. Standby for another one.

I do see some changes coming though. Not much longer will the "pandemic" be the basis for political overreach and profit. The "America is racist and something-phobic" agenda is being exposed. The clouds are gradually being removed from the eyes of even the CNN and MSNBC watchers. Maybe there's a light at the end of the tunnel.

At least the days are getting longer.

Happy New Year!

Another year has come and gone. It was pretty much like the one before it. Standby for another one.

I do see some changes coming though. Not much longer will the "pandemic" be the basis for political overreach and profit. The "America is racist and something-phobic" agenda is being exposed. The clouds are gradually being removed from the eyes of even the CNN and MSNBC watchers. Maybe there's a light at the end of the tunnel.

At least the days are getting longer.

Happy New Year!

This silly website is now 26 years old. It’s older than one of my kids. It’s older than 99% of the websites alive today. It’s older than the Dole - Kemp 96 campaign website, which, inexplicably, is also still online.

Our 2021 was a lot like our 2020, but with less stress, especially once we were both fully vaccinated by the Spring. I had hoped that by fall 2021 we be into the endemic phase of COVID and not still in a pandemic, but the anti-vaxxers need their freedumb. Personally, I’m hoping their freedumb is served with a ventilator. I’m out of patience of with them. They are literally making life miserable for millions of people. That’s not freedom, it’s terrorism, and should be treated as such.

We had plans to dress up fancy and go out on NYE, but Omicron invited itself to the party, so we opted out of our plans. The band ultimately canceled the show, so we are even getting our ticket money back. Does that count as 2021 going out on a good note? You are deprived of a selfie of us dressed up fancy, though.

2021 highlights include a week in the Smokies, a bunch of weekend camping trips around Virginia, a week between jobs highlighted by Asheville, driving the entire Blue Ridge Parkway over two trips, Purdue Homecoming, and wrapping up the year with a week on the beach on Puerto Rico.

2022 will look similar, except that we are headed north to explore Western NY and Arcadia NP with the camper, some time in WV, and if all goes well, another week in Puerto Rico to end the year. I also plan to work on working from the camper this year, to open up mid-week travel opportunities for us. I can do my job from anywhere, so why not? Hopefully earlier than later in 2022 we can stop thinking about COVID-19, and let it fade into the background noise of life.

So that’s a wrap on 2021, and the 35 blog posts I wrote and 48 books I read over the course of the year. I’ll see y’all in 2022.

This silly website is now 26 years old. It’s older than one of my kids. It’s older than 99% of the websites alive today. It’s older than the Dole - Kemp 96 campaign website, which, inexplicably, is also still online.

Our 2021 was a lot like our 2020, but with less stress, especially once we were both fully vaccinated by the Spring. I had hoped that by fall 2021 we be into the endemic phase of COVID and not still in a pandemic, but the anti-vaxxers need their freedumb. Personally, I’m hoping their freedumb is served with a ventilator. I’m out of patience of with them. They are literally making life miserable for millions of people. That’s not freedom, it’s terrorism, and should be treated as such.

We had plans to dress up fancy and go out on NYE, but Omicron invited itself to the party, so we opted out of our plans. The band ultimately canceled the show, so we are even getting our ticket money back. Does that count as 2021 going out on a good note? You are deprived of a selfie of us dressed up fancy, though.

2021 highlights include a week in the Smokies, a bunch of weekend camping trips around Virginia, a week between jobs highlighted by Asheville, driving the entire Blue Ridge Parkway over two trips, Purdue Homecoming, and wrapping up the year with a week on the beach on Puerto Rico.

2022 will look similar, except that we are headed north to explore Western NY and Arcadia NP with the camper, some time in WV, and if all goes well, another week in Puerto Rico to end the year. I also plan to work on working from the camper this year, to open up mid-week travel opportunities for us. I can do my job from anywhere, so why not? Hopefully earlier than later in 2022 we can stop thinking about COVID-19, and let it fade into the background noise of life.

So that’s a wrap on 2021, and the 35 blog posts I wrote and 48 books I read over the course of the year. I’ll see y’all in 2022.