{"id":11974,"date":"2022-12-31T11:59:37","date_gmt":"2022-12-31T16:59:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/?p=11974"},"modified":"2023-01-03T07:01:17","modified_gmt":"2023-01-03T12:01:17","slug":"2022-in-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/2022\/12\/31\/2022-in-review\/","title":{"rendered":"2022 in review"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Another year in the books. So let me review what was good and bad about 2022.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Highlights:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Meeting Ooma.<\/strong> Meeting Ooma was, at the time, not just a highlight of the year but a highlight of my life. I said at the time that I was &#8220;smitten&#8221; and that is an apt description. The first two months were two of the happiest months of my life. Sadly, it didn&#8217;t last.<\/li><li><strong>Meeting Marlene,<\/strong> I was fortunate to meet a second wonderful woman in 2022. It is too early to tell if this relationship will last, but we were still having fun as 2022 ended.<\/li><li><strong>The Buckingham Blues Bar.<\/strong> Ooma introduced me to this establishment and I fell in love. Great music and cheap beer &#8211; a winning combination.<\/li><li><strong>The Thanksgiving trip to Oregon.<\/strong> It was a grueling trip both ways, but worth it as I got to meet my sister&#8217;s grandchildren and reconnected with her kids.<\/li><li><strong>The 10-week trip north (TN8 and TS8)<\/strong>. This was a very long auto trip that had a mix of good and bad, but more good than bad.<\/li><li><strong>The trip to Austin (TX1).<\/strong> This was part of the &#8220;good months&#8221; with Ooma. A fun wedding and a chance to see some family for both of us.<\/li><li><strong>The trip to Orlando.<\/strong> This was a fun trip to a book award event &#8211; a first for me &#8211; and a chance to explore the Orlando area.<\/li><li><strong>The weekend in Naples with my cruise (PCL2) friends.<\/strong> A fun weekend with some fairly new friends.<\/li><li><strong>Getting the damage to the truck repaired (finally!).<\/strong> It took nearly 6 months to repair the damage from the tire blowout, but it finally got done. A relief.<\/li><li><strong>A visit from my son Frank.<\/strong> This was a lot of driving, but, overall, a nice visit.<\/li><li><strong>Winter softball.<\/strong> We didn&#8217;t win but my team did pretty well. And so did I.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Lowlights:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Hurricane Ian<\/strong>. It is hard to describe the devastation caused by this storm. The whole southwest Florida area &#8211; which I now call home and have grown to love &#8211; will take years to recover. Heartbreaking.<\/li><li><strong>The breakup with Ooma.<\/strong> Two months of pure joy were followed by 4 months of conflict and, frankly, bafflement. A woman who I thought I knew became an enigma. I still don&#8217;t fully understand what went wrong, but it certainly did go wrong. The most devastating breakup of my life.<\/li><li><strong>COVID-19 for both me and Ooma.<\/strong> Three vaccinations were not enough to keep me and Ooma safe. I got it first and, fortunately, it was mild and I had recovered by the time Ooma got it later in July. Her case was worse.<\/li><li><strong>The floor rot in the RV.<\/strong> This was a surprise but shouldn&#8217;t have been. I should have questioned, when I first discovered the rot several years ago, what was causing it. I should have taken more aggressive preventative measures then, but didn&#8217;t. I think I have dealt with it now, but it was a lot of work and the fix is not flawless &#8211; the slide, when I bring it in, is not as smooth as it was pre-rot.<\/li><li><strong>Dodging tornados.<\/strong> Both hurricanes and tornados are things that I have a desperate need to avoid while living in an RV. But hurricanes provide more warning. Getting a tornado warning, grabbing the dog and escaping in the truck &#8211; twice &#8211; is not fun.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Bottom line: 2022 provided some intense highs and some intense lows. It is hard to say that it was a good year. But it wasn&#8217;t a totally bad year, either. It was a year that I finished. And at my age that is a good thing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Another year in the books. So let me review what was good and bad about 2022. Highlights: Meeting Ooma. Meeting Ooma was, at the time, not just a highlight of the year but a highlight of my life. I said at the time that I was &#8220;smitten&#8221; and that is an apt description. The first &hellip; <a class=\"read-excerpt\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/2022\/12\/31\/2022-in-review\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&raquo;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11974","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-commentary"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1VniU-378","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11974","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11974"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11974\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11976,"href":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11974\/revisions\/11976"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11974"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11974"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11974"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}