A Year in Review: 2024

This year I thought I'd try sending annual wishes via my blog.  The reason for this is twofold - I want to be inspired to write my blog more regularly AND some of the things I wanted to share with you can be found elsewhere in the blog.  

Christmas 2023:

We bought our most expensive gift to each other at Christmas 2023 when we purchased a 2018 Tesla on Christmas Day!  I'd been looking at purchasing an EV and had gone to the Toyota dealer in Castlegar with a request for information - I wanted a red,  full EV Toyota  in the spring of '24.  Could it arrive then?  Two days later we had a text from our daughter about someone selling a Tesla in Rossland.  We called and thought we'd take it out for a drive on Christmas Eve afternoon.  The owner, Cody, was moving to Iceland in January - the reason it was for sale.  We only mulled it over for a few hours and made him an offer on Christmas Day.  Voila! 

We took possession of it in mid-January and plated it at the beginning of Feb.  We have definitely experienced adventures in Teslaland but Dave has been figuring out how to do most of the required maintenance and repairs.  He successfully changed a wheel bearing and is about to tackle the heater in January - it quit a few days before THIS Christmas.

Gardening:

I enjoyed another year in the garden and I'm pleased that I can still do the work.  We have 3 gardens going - one in Kaslo, one in Trail and one at Kaslo Community Garden.  This year, I put our garden on the Edible Garden Tour in Kaslo and that was a very satisfying experience although BC was experiencing one of those "heat domes" on the weekend of the tours.  It was a hot summer and the garden produced very well, particularly tomatoes.

Reading:  

I still belong to two book clubs and enjoy each one.  Favourite books from this past year are The Dictionary of Lost Words by Pip Williams and Doppelganger by Naomi Klein.  I also read Walter Issacson's biography of Elon Musk and likely would never have bought a Tesla if I'd read it earlier.  I actually do really like the car when it communicates with me in a way that I can understand and it does seem to be a well-made product.  I need a bumper sticker that states:  I did not buy this car from Elon Musk; I bought it through the circular economy.

Bridge:  

I rarely play "live" bridge now and try to have a weekly online game with my brother-in-law, Phil, in Wetaskiwin, AB.  We rarely do well but we enjoy it and it's cheap.  I did play in a "live" tournament about a month ago - it was shocking to see how some of the players have aged.  But they still manage to play a mean game of bridge!

Exercise:

I'm still pretty dedicated to exercise but decided to give up running after a summer attempt at getting back into it.  My knees just DO NOT like it.  I'm still trying to get out for regular fast and slow walks and most of the time it works.  Cross-country skiing this fall is in full swing.  I usually ride an e-bike now and put on 3000 km between March and Nov simply riding to town on it, plus a few holiday excursions.  Definitely trying to follow the axiom "use it or lose it".

Travel:

We went to the Maritimes to visit with Dave's sister and one of his brothers.  It was a good time and we did a bit of hiking and also got over to PEI to see our friends near Montague.  The Island is just as beautiful as it was 40 years ago!  Actually, not much seemed all that different in NS and PEI - it's slow to travel through and totally scenic!

We took a trip to ID, OR and WA in the fall with our camper and bikes and discovered some new areas in Central OR that we had never visited.  That trip is somewhat covered elsewhere in the blog if anyone is interested.  

          

Family:

The NJ folks seem to be fine and we are heading there for a visit at the end of December.  Callie will turn 13 on January 8th. Both girls are into soccer and basketball and Callie plays tennis, while Abby is becoming quite the gymnast.  

Meanwhile, in Rossland, we don't see as much of the boys as we'd like to do but we do try to take them out for a monthly meal so that we can REALLY talk.  They do love to talk.  Atley is heavily into cross-country skiing as well as continuing with downhill.  Miro is completely a downhiller.  And they bike everywhere.  The entire family keeps very active all the time and I feel that we rarely see them.  This seems to be a bit of a thing with our generation.

Wishing you all the best for the next year.  It could be interesting.....and let's hope it is not too eventful.