November Check-In
November was a rather quiet month all things considered.
The month started out a lot quieter than September or October. A few hockey games here and there, but otherwise it was just my normal nothing-out-of-the-ordinary days.
New York City
Mid-November that changed with a long weekend visiting New York City. Lauren and I love going to New York, but haven't been there since right before the pandemic locked things down.
It was a fun trip, we spent a lot of it just wandering around the city. We ended up going over to Bryant Park for the Christmas Village. We went over to Queens to check out some of the local breweries. Overall it was just an enjoyable trip. It was nice to be able to go to events there and know that they were checking vaccination status. Made me feel safer to be out and about.
Killing Spree!
After getting back, I was greeted by being able to download the Halo: Infinite multiplayer beta. It definitely brought me back to my late college and early post-college days of playing Halo 3 online with friends. The game has been a lot of fun. I'm still getting back into it, but I'm definitely enjoying it. If you're playing, let me know and maybe we can hop on and play a few rounds. I'm annoyed at how 343 is handling the customizations in terms of having to pay for just about everything, but it's not pay-to-win, so it's not an absolutely huge deal to me. The gameplay is fun. I'm looking forward to playing the campaign, but am kind of bummed that co-op doesn't come out until May(ish) 2022.
Mr. Otto
Sadly, the month ended on a little bit of a down note. The Wednesday before Thanksgiving we had to take our dog Otto to the emergency vet and found out (surprisingly) that there was fluid build-up around his heart which was preventing his heart from beating properly. Thankfully they were able to drain it and he's back to his old self, but we now need to find out what caused the build-up. Hemangiosarcoma seemed to be the worst-case scenario, but thankfully that's pretty much now ruled out. There still could be a tumor, so we're going to have to bring him back in for more tests. It was just tough leaving him in the hospital overnight and then having to wait throughout the day Thanksgiving for updates. He's home now and happy as ever so if you'll excuse me, I'm gonna go give him some lovin'.
Summary
Staying Active: Wasn't too much hockey this month. 2 of my teams are now down to 2 games a month. Was able to get a bunch of runs in and have continued progressing with my lifts.
Development: Have made some progress in the next phase of my fitness tracker project. Hoping to devote some time over the month to get this next feature set in place.
Reading:
- Finished The Buyout of America by Josh Kosman. It was one of those books that made me a little angry seeing what part of Wall Street has done, but it's also helped me understand the how and why stuff like Toys 'R' Us happens.
- Started The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion by Jonathan Haidt*.* I had started it before but couldn't get into it. Gonna try again.
Write More: Other than my October Recap, nada.