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Occasional Update 26-1

Author: Chris ODonnell From https://odonnellweb.com/pelican/ • Jan 9th, 2026
Category: Blog Entries.Local

Yep, I've stopped pretending that these will ever be weekly on a consistent basis. I simply do not have Andreas time management skills. He never misses a week. I'm going with Ryan's approach.

If 2026 came with a 14-day warranty, I'd be asking for money back right now. What a shitty start to a year. It's fucking embarrassing to be an American. It's also exhausting.

I worked about 7-10 hours in each of the last two weeks of the year. So that was a nice little break. It'd have been better to completely disconnect from work, but I'm not that established in self-employment yet that I can afford to just take two weeks off. Maybe next year.

Right before the end of the year, MSNOW (MSNBC) reached out and conducted a 15-minute on-camera interview with me about healthcare in the US. They used about 20 seconds of it in the story. The reporter sent me the video, but I've never found it on their website, and they never said my name, so it's not searchable. I'm anxiously waiting for Fox News to contact me so that I can tell them to go fuck themselves.

In other news, I've been running Waterfox as my daily driver since Dec 26, and it is fine. No issues at all.

Blog

I wrote a few blog posts in my downtime at the end of the year.

The Happy New Year Post

I reflected on 2025, and 30 years of blogging

A silly thing that I do every year. 2025 in selfies

Best Books of 2025

Reading

I've already completed two books this year. The Society of Unknowable Objects by Garreth Brown is a worthy follow up to The Book of Doors. The Comic Book Story of Beer relates beer's impact on history from the dark ages to the modern craft beer revolution. It's a lot of fun, and you will learn some stuff too.

Watching

We watched The Four Seasons on Netflix this week. It's the most GenX show imaginable. But we are from the older end of GenX, so we enjoyed it. We also watched the Reading Rainbow documentary on Netflix. It is wonderful. LeVar Burton is a national treasure. My wife and I realized that somehow, our kids never watched Reading Rainbow growing up. They watched Sesame Street and Blue's Clues, so I'm not sure how we missed it. They both grew up to be enthusiastic readers, so no harm, no foul, I guess.

We tried to watch the movie Wine Country but bailed after 20 minutes. I'm not sure how they got all those talented comedians in a room and made such an unfunny movie. We also tried to watch Derry Girls. It's fine, but we really have to concentrate to understand the accents, and I'm not sure if it is worth the effort. We are also slowly working our way through Star Trek TNG. I bought the box set so we can take our time.

Listening

I discovered Tuck Smith and the Restless Hearts via a blog post, and I've had them on repeat play for the last week. I've bought the new EP and the 2024 album, and I've going to buy some more of their back catalog. It's a throwback sound, kind of a mix of Cheap Trick and The Replacements.

Troubled Paradise

Take the Long Way

Ballad of a Misspent Youth

Future updates as events warrant.

And that is it for this week. Remember, in a world where you can choose to be anything, you can choose to be kind.

Occasional Update 26-1

Author: Occasional Update 26-1 From https://blog.odonnellweb.com • Jan 9th, 2026
Category: Blog Entries.Local

Yep, I’ve stopped pretending that these will ever be weekly on a consistent basis. I simply do not have Andreas time management skills. He never misses a week. I’m going with Ryan’s approach.

If 2026 came with a 14-day warranty, I’d be asking for money back right now. What a shitty start to a year. It’s fucking embarrassing to be an American. It’s also exhausting.

I worked about 7-10 hours in each of the last two weeks of the year. So that was a nice little break. It’d have been better to completely disconnect from work, but I’m not that established in self-employment yet that I can afford to just take two weeks off. Maybe next year.

Right before the end of the year, MSNOW (MSNBC) reached out and conducted a 15-minute on-camera interview with me about healthcare in the US. They used about 20 seconds of it in the story. The reporter sent me the video, but I’ve never found it on their website, and they never said my name, so it’s not searchable. I’m anxiously waiting for Fox News to contact me so that I can tell them to go fuck themselves.

In other news, I’ve been running Waterfox as my daily driver since Dec 26, and it is fine. No issues at all.

Blog

I wrote a few blog posts in my downtime at the end of the year.

The Happy New Year Post

I reflected on 2025, and 30 years of blogging

A silly thing that I do every year. 2025 in selfies

Best Books of 2025

Reading

I’ve already completed two books this year. The Society of Unknowable Objects by Garreth Brown is a worthy follow up to The Book of Doors. The Comic Book Story of Beer relates beer’s impact on history from the dark ages to the modern craft beer revolution. It’s a lot of fun, and you will learn some stuff too.

Watching

We watched The Four Seasons on Netflix this week. It’s the most GenX show imaginable. But we are from the older end of GenX, so we enjoyed it. We also watched the Reading Rainbow documentary on Netflix. It is wonderful. LeVar Burton is a national treasure. My wife and I realized that somehow, our kids never watched Reading Rainbow growing up. They watched Sesame Street and Blue’s Clues, so I’m not sure how we missed it. They both grew up to be enthusiastic readers, so no harm, no foul, I guess.

We tried to watch the movie Wine Country but bailed after 20 minutes. I’m not sure how they got all those talented comedians in a room and made such an unfunny movie. We also tried to watch Derry Girls. It’s fine, but we really have to concentrate to understand the accents, and I’m not sure if it is worth the effort. We are also slowly working our way through Star Trek TNG. I bought the box set so we can take our time.

Listening

I discovered Tuck Smith and the Restless Hearts via a blog post, and I’ve had them on repeat play for the last week. I’ve bought the new EP and the 2024 album, and I’ve going to buy some more of their back catalog. It’s a throwback sound, kind of a mix of Cheap Trick and The Replacements.

Troubled Paradise

Take the Long Way

Ballad of a Misspent Youth

Future updates as events warrant.

And that is it for this week. Remember, in a world where you can choose to be anything, you can choose to be kind.

A Morning of Smoke and Silence

Author: David From http://www.musingsoverabarrel.com/ • Jan 8th, 2026
Category: Blog Entries.Local

Most of my enjoyment of cigars takes place at home on the enclosed porch. In the colder months, I am usually alone (not lonely). So when I found myself sitting by myself in John B. Hayes Tobacconist in Winchester this week, it didn’t feel all that odd — surprising, perhaps, but not unusual.

When I arrived for a morning smoke, the familiar early morning crowd was present. They lingered only briefly before heading out, right on schedule. I can be confident it wasn’t me; this group tends to disperse around the same time most mornings, though there’s usually at least one other patron who remains. Even the proprietor spent most of the hour tucked away in his office, leaving the shop unusually quiet.

I selected a La Flor Dominicana Air Bender in the distinctive 6½ × 54 “Chisel” format. I hadn’t smoked anything from the Air Bender line in five or six years and couldn’t recall ever trying the Chisel vitola, so curiosity won out. The dark, oily Ecuadorian Habano wrapper looked especially inviting, while the ligero-heavy Dominican binder and filler promised a suitably robust morning smoke.

The Chisel shape — flattened and wedge-like — does indeed resemble a woodworker’s tool or perhaps the mouthpiece of a reed instrument. The end comes already open, and I’ve read that some smokers simply pinch it to create a larger opening rather than cutting. I opted to cut it anyway, though airflow remained somewhat restricted. After a few minutes, I took a bit more off the tip. Even then, the thin, flattened mouthfeel never felt entirely natural — despite my brief stint with the clarinet in my youth.

The Air Bender delivered exactly what it promised: a bold, flavorful smoke that never crossed into overwhelming territory, despite it being several hours before lunch. Peppery spice led the way, joined by cedar, dark chocolate, and coffee notes in a well-balanced profile. I had stopped for a creamy, vanilla-flavored chain coffee on the way in and its sweetness paired surprisingly well with the cigar’s darker character.

After about seventy-five minutes, it was time to set the cigar down — though it easily had another fifteen or twenty minutes left — and head out for lunch with my wife and a friend before the long drive home. Sitting there in the quiet shop, cigar in hand, watching the steady rhythm of people and cars pass outside, I was struck by how refreshing the moment felt. No conversation, no distractions — just good tobacco, and a pleasant morning stillness. It was a pause that was memorable long after the smoke has cleared.

Cheers!

The Best Cigar Is the One in Your Hand

Author: David From http://www.musingsoverabarrel.com/ • Jan 5th, 2026
Category: Blog Entries.Local

The personalized license plate on my car offers a subtle hint at my enjoyment of cigars. Recently, while pumping gas, the guy behind me called out, “What’s your favorite cigar?” I hesitated, then stumbled through a reply listing a few brands I’ve enjoyed lately. In truth, my usual answer to that question — whether it’s about beer, bourbon, or cigars — is simply, “The one I’m enjoying at the moment.” It may sound flippant, but it’s also the most honest answer I have.

In my 2025 year-in-review post, I went out on a limb and declared a couple “favorites” of the year: the El Pulpo by Artesano del Tobacco and a Woodford Reserve Double Oaked Wegmans Private Selection. If I could distinctly recall every cigar smoked and every whiskey poured over the past year, would I still choose those two? I’m not entirely sure — but they clearly left a lasting impression. Reflecting on that choice, I decided to enjoy them together as my first sip and smoke of the new year.

Somewhat surprisingly, the Woodford Reserve Double Oaked store pick doesn’t appear to have been mentioned previously in these Musings, though it has shown up more than once on my Instagram feed. Compared to the standard bottling, this pick leans less on peppery spice and more toward a sweeter profile of caramel and oak. It’s an easy, enjoyable pour — and since no trips back to New Jersey are planned (or desired), I’ll be savoring this bottle while it lasts.

The El Pulpo, on the other hand, has been mentioned here before. Although it debuted in January 2023, it wasn’t until the summer of 2025 that I picked up a five-pack — and promptly followed that with a full box in the Robusto size. It’s a balanced and flavorful cigar, offering notes of dark chocolate, coffee, roasted nuts, and earth, capped by a pleasingly spicy-sweet finish.

After revisiting these two “favorites” together, I’m comfortable standing by my 2025 declarations. Still, the next time someone asks, “What’s your favorite cigar?” I'll prepared to answer a bit more quickly — with my usual reply: “The one I’m having at the moment.”

Cheers!

2025: A Year of Recovery and Small Pleasures

Author: David From http://www.musingsoverabarrel.com/ • Jan 1st, 2026
Category: Blog Entries.Local

It’s time for the requisite year-in-review post. Although 2025 marked my first full year of retirement, it was a low-key and, at times, frustratingly sedentary one. After a previous year marked by chronic pain and ineffective treatments, I underwent back surgery — including a spinal fusion — in February. Healing from the procedure and recovering from months of severely limited physical activity has been slow and, to some degree, remains ongoing. Only in the final months of the year was I able to be a bit more active, and even now there is some lingering pain and restricted movement.

Unsurprisingly, that reality is reflected in my shooting journal. In 2025 I managed a meager four trips to the range for practice and just two IDPA matches. On the bright side, that represents a meaningful improvement over the zero outings logged in 2024. I fired my first shots since December 2023 in August and finally made a tentative return to competition in October. With luck — and continued progress — I’m truly hoping for more shooting sports participation in 2026.

Travel plans were also shaped by recovery with most travel in 2025 limited to weekend or overnight outings. We did attend several Virginia Tech Hokies football games. Weekends in Blacksburg, joined by our son and daughter-in-law, were enjoyable, even if the final scores were seldom in our favor.

We did get away for a week centered around a horticultural-focused convention that helped feed my indoor gardening passion. The event was held in New Jersey, which isn’t typically high on my vacation destination list, but I was pleasantly surprised — and pleased — to do a bit of bottle shopping and return home with a couple of excellent store-pick bourbons. Among them was a Wegmans Private Selection of Woodford Reserve Double Oaked, a bottle that may well be my favorite find of 2025.

On the upside, one doesn’t need to be especially mobile to enjoy good cigars and fine whiskey. Despite other limitations, I’ve been able to maintain a fairly regular “smoke and sip” routine, usually on the screened porch that we renovated into a three-season room over the summer. That space has quickly become one of my favorite places to slow down and enjoy an evening.

The one true vacation of 2025 was a week at the beach, taking in the surf and sand, good food, and cigars by the sea. During our stay on North Carolina’s Outer Banks, I paid a couple of visits to the OBX Cigar Lounge. Being able to pair a cigar with a beer or whiskey — while smoking indoors — was a particular pleasure. Under Virginia’s nanny-state regulations, that combination is nearly impossible, save for a handful of exceptions.

We managed to squeeze in two very different musical outings this year. May brought Metallica to Lane Stadium in Blacksburg, while December closed things out with a Tab Benoit show in Leesburg, Virginia — about as big a genre shift as one could ask for.

On the blogging and social media front, I remained fairly active. Despite the limited activity, I managed 156 posts in 2025. In addition to these blog posts, I regularly share cigar and beverage pairings on Instagram. I also added an option for readers to receive these Musings by email, providing another way for readers who follow along to stay connected.

One final note for those who care about such things: my favorite cigar of 2025 was El Pulpo by Artesano del Tobacco. It’s not often I reorder a cigar while I still have some on hand — make of that what you will.

All told, 2025 wasn’t a year of big adventures or bold accomplishments, but it was a year of recovery, small pleasures, and quiet progress. If nothing else, it helped lay the groundwork for a more active and engaged 2026 — and I’ll gladly raise a glass and light a cigar to that hope.

Happy New Year!