State of the Ramblings: Edge of Seventeen

Sean's Ramblings is officially 17 years old. I think that's about 214 in blog years! It's been an odd year. When I wrote the State of Ramblings in January 2021, my kids were still attending school from home virtually, vaccines were only beginning to roll out, and my work-life balance of working from home with everyone here was a disaster. I mean, although everything got done, it came at the expense of sleep and my writing. The beginning of the year on the blog focused on things at home. I watched the Biden inauguration, played Just Dance with my kids, and attempted to potty train Luigi.

Then, things started to open up. The older two kids went back to school and all of the kids went to camp this summer. We drove thousands of miles on I-95 for vacation, everyone returned to school/preschool and work this fall, and the kids played organized baseball and soccer. I also went to Nashville where I shared an elevator with Robert Plant and visited the Grand Ole Opry.

I wrote a lot about anniversaries this past year. The 20th anniversary of 9/11, the 20th anniversary of my less than 24-hour trip to see the Pittsburgh Penguins face the Buffalo Sabres in a game 7 playoff game, and the one-year anniversary of my dad's passing.

I started a brand new series called "Hills I'm willing to die on." I wrote two whole posts, so apparently there aren't many hills that I'm willing to die on. Hopefully, I'll find more hills in 2022.  

I still like pretending that I'm a sports blogger sometimes. My 2021 Pirates predections post was quite thorough and included a fantastic group of contributors. I also continued to write draft recaps of the Pirates and Steelers, which are always fun.

My favorite posts may have been the ultimate list of famous Ithaca College grads and an interview with Jake Rosenberg of the Israeli national baseball team.

Overall, I wrote 100 posts in 2021. That's the first time I've reached triple digits in blog posts since 2016. For 2022, I want to do something big. I don't know what that is yet. I've talked about covering the Oscars or Emmys or even a sporting event but that seems unlikely thanks to COVID. (And the fact that the Academy Awards people have not sent me an acceptance or denial response for this year's ceremonies. When I applied, they said I would receive a reply in 2 business days. It's now been almost two months. Maybe they're waiting to give me the VIP media credential!)  Anyway, I have an idea for a huge interview which probably has a 2% chance of happening. That might be high. We'll see.

Thanks to all of you for reading my blog and for your support over the years. I have no idea how I've written this for 17 years!