2020 Year in Review

December 31st, 2020. In some ways, it’s hard to believe that I’ve already reached the end of this year. In others, it seemed like this year would never end. Although 2020 definitely didn’t end up looking anything like what I had planned, there have been so memorable moments. And so, as is my tradition, here’s a look back at the last 12 months of my life.

The first few months of the year looked pretty standard, for those that have read previous iterations of these posts. I kept busy with work throughout most of January and February, along with my usual volunteering at church, and hanging out with friends for birthday parties, SuperBowl parties, and various small-group-related activities.

Removing Google Analytics

Now that I’ve migrated from WordPress to Hugo, it’s time for Stage 2 of my website redesign. I’ve been wanting to move away from Google Analytics for a while due to the invasive nature of the data they collect, but I’ve never taken the time to set up an alternative. I’ve looked into Matomo in the past, and while it looks promising, at this stage I’d rather not set up a server to host it myself, nor am I prepared to pay for their hosted option. So, after checking that off the list, what other alternatives are left?

Migrating from WordPress to Hugo

A little under 3 years ago I wrote a post entitled Site Redesign and Migration, where I unveiled a full redesign of my website after having moved it off of the Squarespace. Three years before that I started my website on Squarespace, after considering a host of other alternatives. And now, after many months of consideration, and after reading many blogs about why one should or shouldn’t use a Static Site Generator (ex: “Why I Don’t Use a Static Site Generator” by Kev Quirk), I’ve opted to migrate my website from WordPress to Hugo.

100 Posts in 100 Days

Well, I did it. 100 blog posts in 100 days. Were they of much quality? Most of them, no. There were a few that I think turned out okay.

Did I learn anything? Perhaps. Quality blogging takes a time commitment. And that is a time commitment that I am not prepared to make to turn this into a daily blog. However, I do think that I will aim for writing a single quality blog entry weekly from here on out.

The Making Of...

Every once in a while, I get distracted watching a video that goes into detail on how something was made. Sometimes it’s a movie. At other times, it may be a piece of art, or maybe a video game.

Today was the former: the making of Frozen 2. Was I a huge fan of the movie itself? No. It had some good parts, but overall I was underwhelmed. However, I very much enjoyed the first part of the behind the scenes video that I watched, and I look forward to finishing out that set of videos when I have a chance.

Haircut by a Robot?

Long day, so not many personal thoughts. Rather, since I ran across this article + video earlier today while on a break, I decided to share it. While I can’t say that I would want a robot anywhere near my head anytime soon… it’s definitely interesting!

https://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/robotics-hardware/video-friday-haircut-robot

I’m publishing this as part of 100 Days To Offload (Day 97/100). You can join in yourself by visiting https://100DaysToOffload.com.

Congress and Tech

I followed some of the congressional hearings today involving Apple, Google, Facebook, and Amazon. And I must say… I get very worried about the lack of technical understanding by the people that are making the laws. Like, they can’t even keep two different services straight in their head (apparently)!

I didn’t watch enough to have any other immediate feedback, though I’ll probably try to catch up more over the weekend.