I consider myself incredibly lucky for having ever visited Yosemite, let alone getting to visit twice within this very strange year, 2020. We originally had a campsite reservation for May, but of course the pandemic happened, and the park closed. Luckily, Alex went ahead and made new arrangements to visit later. Reservations are now required…
Oh, how quickly things change. The hallmark of August was my first-ever backpacking trip, which just happened to coincide with the very unexpected and extreme lightning storms that subsequently lit California on fire. Well, I’m glad to report that we are totally fine. But here’s a look through another wild month of 2020: Garden bounty…
I usually don’t get around to posting these recaps until the end of the following month, which is quite unfortunate, because 2020 is quickly outpacing my ability to remember what these past realities were like. But here goes, a look back to July, a month in which we took four different outdoor excursions around California…
Welcome to the June, 2020 recap. The month felt different, more somber perhaps, than the earlier Bon Appetit youtube videos/ gourmet food projects/ Tiger King portion of quarantine. My attention turned to the struggle for social justice, while protests against racism and police violence spread across the country and the world. For the month of…
Time for the May recap! Still staying at home, mostly, with a couple biking trips around town and one short excursion up to wine country, all very carefully done with only remote hiking and curbside pickups even though restaurants had already reopened in Sonoma. Otherwise, it was all about videochat gatherings, gourmet quarantine, and sewing…
I imagine this is going to be a strange time to look back upon, but April was the month in which sheltering at home really began to feel normal, or at least rather routine. After barely going outside during the first weeks of shelter-in-place, I decided to try and expand my radius and also work…
Well, the month began innocently enough, with meals out with friends, our retreat in Ukiah, and my mom arriving in the Bay. We had already canceled plans to visit Asia but were still considering Paris. Of course things changed very quickly once we entered the second and third weeks of the month. Here in the…
What a strange reality we’ve stepped into. Looking back just one month is like looking at a completely different world. But here goes: my monthly recap of February, a.k.a. pre-Covid19 life. Filled with gatherings of all sorts. We start the month with our weekly bike ride to the Ferry Building for the farmer’s market. …
It’s time for our first monthly recap of 2020! I had a wonderful January in the Bay, with the tail end of our Redwood National Park excursion in the beginning, my birthday party in the middle, and a small road trip to Monterey as well. But otherwise, I spent most of my time right here…
On Christmas Day we flew from Maui over to Oahu for part two of our Hawaii vacation. We stayed with our friends Crystal and Chris near Diamond Head and circled the whole island seeing the beautiful sights and eating all the delicious things. This was my first time on Oahu, and I would definitely come…
We originally thought about visiting Hawaii over the holidays because flights were pretty reasonable. However, as soon as we looked for housing between Christmas and New Year’s we realized the only options left were $10,000/night. So we made alternate plans to visit West Texas instead. But as soon as we did, Alex’s friends Chris and…
56 books is the most I’ve ever read in a year, almost double the 31 I read in 2018. My basic strategy was to convert some of the endless hours of scrolling through social media into time reading books instead. And as always, I check out all of these books as ebooks from the library–…