{"id":13465,"date":"2023-12-31T11:58:53","date_gmt":"2023-12-31T16:58:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/?p=13465"},"modified":"2024-03-03T13:34:54","modified_gmt":"2024-03-03T18:34:54","slug":"2023-in-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/2023\/12\/31\/2023-in-review\/","title":{"rendered":"2023 in review"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Last day of the year. Time to reflect on what was good and bad.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Highlights:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Marlene<\/strong>. We made it through an entire calendar year, which made this relationship considerably more durable than the preceding one with Ooma. It wasn&#8217;t all sweetness and light, but it was a lot of fun and a lot of adventure. She is an amazing woman who improves my life.<\/li><li><strong>TCL2<\/strong>. This was a terrific 12-night transatlantic cruise &#8211; the best cruise experience of my life so far. And after the cruise ended I met my new favorite city, Barcelona.<\/li><li><strong>TS9<\/strong>. The trip south with Marlene, featuring New York and the Statue of Liberty, was a great time.<\/li><li><strong>TP1<\/strong>. The 30-night transpacific cruise with Marlene was epic. I got to Japan and Indonesia &#8211; two places I never expected to visit. And Brisbane was a treat. But we lost the opportunity to see both Alaska and the Philippines due to bad weather.<\/li><li><strong>TN9<\/strong>. The ninth trip north &#8211; just an auto trip &#8211; was my first solo long-distance trip. It was memorable primarily because I got to see family both along the way and in Massachusetts. The travel in New England after Marlene joined me &#8211; to Boston, Maine, New Hampshire and Rhode Island &#8211; was fun too. I also enjoyed the visit from my son in August.<\/li><li><strong>Music<\/strong>. Thanks largely to Marlene&#8217;s love of music and dancing I heard a lot of really good rock and country bands this year. And some not-so-great ones too.<\/li><li><strong>Carnival <em>Vista <\/em>cruise<\/strong>. The 6-night cruise to Grand Turk, Nassau Bahamas and Amber Cove was nice but we didn&#8217;t like the ship very much.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Lowlights:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li><strong>Ooma<\/strong>. I can&#8217;t, in a single paragraph, express the depth of my disappointment and anger with Ooma. The outrageous application for a restraining order from her in March was the worst moment I have had with any woman that I have ever dated. The lies and vile she spewed in that document were both stunning and despicable. She instantly went from a woman I loved to a woman I hated. Quite a transformation. I believe she is mentally disturbed. I guess I should feel fortunate that the relationship was brief.<\/li><li><strong>Rusty&#8217;s death<\/strong>. My buddy and companion &#8211; Jett&#8217;s dog initially but mine after her passing &#8211; had to be put down in June.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>I think, overall, 2023 was better than 2022. Lots of cruising. Lots of music. Not a bad year at all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Last day of the year. Time to reflect on what was good and bad. Highlights: Marlene. We made it through an entire calendar year, which made this relationship considerably more durable than the preceding one with Ooma. It wasn&#8217;t all sweetness and light, but it was a lot of fun and a lot of adventure. &hellip; <a class=\"read-excerpt\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/2023\/12\/31\/2023-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-13465","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-commentary"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1VniU-3vb","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13465","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=13465"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13465\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13698,"href":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13465\/revisions\/13698"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13465"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13465"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ourwanderyears.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13465"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}