Paul Hammond's Blog

Well, 2008 has almost gone.  In just a few short hours I will be welcoming in 2009 with my family and friends.  So now seemed to be a good time to reflect on 2008, and to look forward to 2009.  I am not one for New Year’s Resolutions as such, but there are definitely a few things I’d like to try and do this coming year.

But First, 2008.

Well, as with most years, I travelled a fair amount, some for pleasure but mostly for work.  According to my TripIt.com profile, I made 16 trips and spent 93 days on the road.  I visited 8 countries and 19 cities.  I travelled a total of 93,307 miles on aircraft.  I started the year with a trip to Las Vegas with my wife.  In the summer, my family took a long vacation in which we visited Toronto, Niagara Falls, Lake George NY and Boston MA.  Laura and I then returned to Boston in October for a long weekend in order to attend the fabulous wedding of Tee and Troy.  For work, in between those personal trips, I slotted in 3 trips to Seattle, 3 trips to Shanghai, 5 to Dublin, 1 to Iceland and 1 to Paris.  Phew.

On February 24th, I started a new Photography project after I saw some pictures on an acquaintance’s Flickr account.  It involves taking a self-portrait every day for a year.  As of right now, I have taken 311 pictures without missing a day.  Today’s will be 312.  My Photoshop skills have definitely improved throughout the course of the project, but I am not sure my eye for a picture has!  Wish me luck for the last 54 pictures.

A selection of other things that happened include:

• I had a hard disk failure in April that made me thankful for my backup strategy.  Did you all get your own backups in place yet?
• 2008 was a poor year for live music, but I was lucky enough to see Sara Bareilles live in September.
• I caught a live Red Sox game while I was in Boston.  Boston didn’t win the World Series this year.
• I went skiing at Crystal Mountain in Washington State.
• I grew a Mo for Movember.
• My iPod disk failed, and Apple delighted me with an instant replacement.
• My kids started music lessons – both playing the Steel Pans, Niamh starting Piano, Dylan playing the drums and both of them very recently starting to learn to play Horns (Tenor and Baritone).  I hope they enjoy it and continue on with it.
• I read around 40 books.
• I played way too much Rock Band.  I play guitar on Expert most of the time.
• We had 5 Christmas trees in our house this year.

So, what about 2009?

Well, to be honest, I am not sure what 2009 is going to bring.  Isn’t that half the fun?  As I mentioned, I do have a few things I’d like to try and do this year.  Here are a few of them:

• I’ll almost certainly being visiting Chicago in August for the Agile 2009 conference that I am involved in organizing.
• I have a semi-firm plan for a Shanghai trip in March.
• I have a STACK of business and leadership books that I need to really knuckle down and read (or re-read in some cases).  The fiction books seem to get in the way!
• I’d like to retry learning both Spanish and Mandarin.  I need to figure out a rhythm that will allow me to spend a little time every day on both of these things.  Maybe I should just pick one at first…?
• I’d also like to get some formal jazz piano and spanish guitar lessons, if time and budget permits.
• I’ll probably attempt to write a novel in November again this year (like I did in 2007), for NaNoWriMo.  It will be another novel using the same characters as for my last one.
• I WILL write and record some songs this year.  I’ll plan on an albums worth…
• I have a thought for an alternative Photography project this year, called 100 Strangers.
• I’ll try and actually blog more!

Other than that, I’ll look forward to spending time with my family and friends, watching my kids continue to grow up (too fast) in front of my very eyes, and enjoying the time we all spend together.

Leave me a comment, let me know what your resolutions will be for 2009.

Happy New Year to all. May your 2009 be a hugely exciting, enormously joy-filled and very prosperous year.