Month: January 2020

📚 Finished reading: The Road by Cormac McCarthy, ISBN: 9780307386458

What a fucking punch to the gut this was. I knew nothing about this book going into it and I had a more visceral reaction to it than I did to 1984 or Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Dolores Umbridge may be more evil than Voldemort). It didn’t help that the two main characters (The Man and The Boy) are roughly the same age as me and my son. This was a very, very tough read (emotionally). I’m glad I read it, but I’m probably not going to return to it in the future. Not fun.

The Boy and I recently finished watching 30 seasons of The Simpsons (minus 3-4 episodes that were too adult). It took nearly two years at an average of just under one episode per day. He started at Lisa’s age and finished at Bart’s age.

📚 Finished reading: The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin, ISBN: 9781443418195

I enjoyed this. A lot of the specific advice from her project wouldn’t necessarily apply to me or lots of other people, but it’s useful to see this as one possible recipe.

I camped 42 nights in 2019, which was fewer than normal (65 in 2018, 51 in 2017, 43 in 2016), but the locations were definitely more spread out.

📚 Finished reading: The Road to Sparta by Dean Karnazes, ISBN: 9781609614737

Great book. I read it last year, but I decided to read it again with The Boy when he chose this for his school book report. Dean sometimes takes shit from other ultra runners for self promotion, but we think he’s terrific. There’s a lot to like here.

I ran for 24 hours with a new personal best of 117.35 miles. It was a rough night, but in the morning I got to ring the bell when I surpassed my previous best of 112.33.