I realized that I haven’t done an update on what’s going on in my life since I did a small one in Jan 2019, which was supposed to be the first of several for that year. Previously I had done a more detailed one in mid 2018. Looking at that one, it’s almost funny how similar I think it will be for this year.
I’m not going to go into much detail in this post, I’m just going to do high level summaries for several categories and hope that in the coming year I will actually do some more detailed follow up posts for at least some of them.
Life
Generally, life is good. My Mom, Angie Knorr did pass away on Feb 6, 2022 near the tail end of the Covid epidemic, but not from Covid. That was hard, and dealing with her very simple Estate took way longer than I think it should have, but eventually everything got settled out.
Overall, Covid didn’t affect me too badly. Michelle and I were both able to work from home, and continued to after the epidemic was over, which we enjoy. We don’t miss the daily commutes or having to pay for parking.
We did a complete renovation of our kitchen and bathroom over the summer of 2023, which went really well and we were very happy with the results. Our contractor, Luigi was amazing. To quote my sister in-law “He is a national treasure and should be guarded at all costs”
We also finally purchased a new vehicle this year, a 2024 Kia Seltos in green, which we also love.
We took it on a road trip for a Family Reunion on my Mom’s side of the family with my cousins and one of my aunts out at Madge Lake Saskatchwan, which my Grandparents had a cabin at for many years and we spent many summer vacations there when we were young.
We also did a family vacation in October in Nuevo Vallarta with Michelle’s family. Her parents, sisters, and spouses and all the nieces and nephews except one were able to go. It was a great time. I haven’t flown anywhere since our trip to Maui in early 2015, so we were overdue.
Work
I’m still working at the same place, although the name has changed a couple of times. It was “Calgary Laboratory Services”, then it briefly went to “Calgary Public Laboratories”, then the UCP got elected and didn’t like the word “Public” so it changed to “Calgary Precision Laboratories”. As mentioned above, I’ve been working from home since early 2020 and still enjoy my job most days.
Health
I’m doing quite well health wise, have fairly typical issues for an older white guy, Type 1 Diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol, but are all being well managed and I have lost 25 pounds since the 2019 update. I’m within five pounds of the target weight 225 that I set ages ago. I will definitely do a more detailed post, and a page update on some of this later.
Social Media
I’m still the most active on Facebook, so look for me there if you are interested in staying in touch.
I just set up an account on Bluesky and deleted my Twitter/X account. I suspect I will use it more for following and won’t post much there. In particular for relevant news, since Facebook won’t display news site links in Canada anymore.
I do have a Threads account and an Instagram account, but I don’t really use them much. I think my Facebook posts still get forwarded over to Instagram, I should probably verify that.
I’m not sure if it’s considered Social Media, but I’m somewhat active on Discord as well.
Games
I finally started playing 5th Edition Dungeons and Dragons this year and am really enjoying it.
I’m also continuing to run my monthly Star Trek Adventures game, although I stopped posting pages about it here. It was too much extra work and wasn’t getting used.
I’m also still working on and off on my WEG D6 Battlestar Galactica RPG game which I hope to run within a year or possible two. I was excited that D6 System: 2nd Edition finally went into Kickstarter, with pdf’s being available as early as mid February 2025. That’s what I’m going to use as the base and turn the work I’ve done so far into an add on module, which is the approach they are taking for different genres and options. In the meantime, I’ve finally started painting some of the miniatures I picked up years ago, and have printed off using the 3d printer I purchased this year.
I also did a little work on a Basic D&D / Old School Essentials campaign I would like to run as well, but that is on indefinite hold for now. So many games, so little time. I’d also love to run Coyote and Crow now that a set of adventures have been published for it, and a campaign setting is finishing up in Kickstarter.
Websites
For this site, at the top of my To Do List is updating the “Calgary Tropical Fish and Aquarium Resources” page. One site listed is no longer in business, one formerly on-line buisness now has a physical location, and there is one new store, fairly close to where I live, that I need to add.
I also want to go back to my posts about Battlestar Galactica character miniatures and fix some of the pictures that have gone missing, then do an update post about the sites mentioned. I then need to add one site that I missed, and another about some of the 3D prints that I got. Finally, I need to do some updates on how the painting of those mini’s is going.
I should also do an update on my Aquariums. The 140 gallon tank sprung a leak and there was a rapid two day replacement with a new 90 gallon tank.
As for my ICEWEBRING site, I wouldn’t say I’ve abandoned it, but I don’t do much with it other than basic maintainance. If nothing else I should add the new Rolemaster “Spell Law” and “Treasure Law” books to the product list.
Family Tree
I haven’t done a lot with this, although I did have one weekend where I worked through one of the Parish File lists and added a substantial amount of information to the Knorr family treee.
Unfortunately, Morris Knorr died unexpectedly this year, and he was really the driving force on the Knorr Geneology Facebook page that I set up several years ago. I’m hoping to keep it going, even it if is just posting the occasional update that says that I don’t have any updates.
There is supposed to be a “Family Tree Maker 2024” release this year. The last release was “Family Tree Maker 2019” so it will be interesting to see what improvements they have made.
Politics
What the fuck? Okay, I’m just generally disgusted with the state of politcs these day, from the US Election to Canada’s Federal parties, and the UCP in Alberta. I’m reasonably okay with our Municiple government overall, although it could use some improvements too.
I think the worst thing about all of it, and the reason I’m disconecting from most of it is the overwhelming negativity found in just about every aspect. Fear mongering from the Parties involved, the outright hostility of people commenting on anything political, and dragging politics into areas where it doesn’t need to be. This is one category that I probably won’t do any additional posts on, it just makes me angry.
Wrapping up
I’ve hit the time limit I was allowing myself for this post, and I covered all the topics I wanted to hit. Hope you enjoyed it and look for more content in the coming year.