An abridged list of things I have learned in the past year – the unabridged one is a lot longer, I promise, but I culled it for the exciting stuff (which means you’re missing out on like four dozen obscure Java patterns, so it’s for the best):

  • Time flies when you don’t have the convenient demarcations of semesters and midterms to keep you grounded. (Thankfully, two-week sprints tend to alleviate this somewhat.) You wake up one morning and it’s August 2013, and then it’s August 2014 and you are unsure of what just happened.
  • There is no better way to spend a Sunday morning than getting to La Panier right when it opens, getting a fresh amandine and an americano and something to read, and watching the rest of the world wake up.
  • Installing a sixty-foot whiteboard on my wall is the best $20 I will ever spend.
  • Manhattans are delicious.
  • But not as delicious as a good milk stout.
  • Cooking is science that you can eat and it is the best thing.
  • An equation to graph my monthly Chipotle consumption as a function of how many blocks away the closest location is: f(x) = -.429x + 6.28; when the closest one is ten blocks away (x=10), I’ll only eat there twice a month. When they opened one in South Lake Union that was three blocks away from my office, the number jumps up to five times a month. 1
  • MFDOOM is the best. Ella Fitzgerald is the best. Haruki Murakami is the best. Sharon Olds is the best.
  • Tattoos don’t hurt nearly as much as expected 2, especially when you have someone’s hand to hold/crush.
  • It is optimal to admit you don’t know shit.
  • I will never stop playing Threes until I delete it from my phone.
  • I will never delete Threes from my phone.
  • I read too few books and too much everything else. (I’m working on this, though!)
  • The most valuable – and, apparently, rarest – part of my college education was the ability to send emails well.
  • Iceland is gorgeous, and I need to travel more.
  • I was born into a tremendous, tremendous amount of luck, and it seems to increase at an incredible rate.

The list for 22 has already started. I’m hoping it has more things learned in foreign countries and less things about Chipotle 3.

  1. Of course, this equation asserts that if there’s a Chipotle on my block (x=0) I’ll cap out at a mere 6.28, which is an obvious lowball. [return]
  2. Sorry, Mom and Dad. [return]
  3. That’s a lie. I would never hope for less Chipotle. [return]
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