Things started strong in January. I finished reading all the books while Finland junior team won the ice hockey world championship. We had fish month and the Humanist Action Group organised a food drive for local homeless shelters. James said goodbye to us and hello to South Korea.
In February we launched the print edition of the Leeds Restaurant Guide while Denver bested Carolina in Super Bowl 50. We rocked out at Sunday Assembly and I took the middle class plunge and bought a stand mixer.
We had a family get-together for Mother’s Day in March. I went fishing for the first time and was cruely cheated in the Sky bake-off. I received my Advanced Communicator Silver award from Toastmasters, but failed to win the Yorkshire final for the first time ever. We had Nordic month and went duck racing.
After three months if waiting, we finally announced that Elina was pregnant: on April Fool’s Day. The wait almost killed me but was completely worth it. A great way to start April. I completed my first 20k run and my novel was published.
May started off cold. It was mostly less than 10 degrees. Except for the day of the Leeds Half Marathon, when it went up to 25. At least it was warm enough to barbeque. Elina had her 20-week scan and I launched a new version of my website. Democracy won in Wales, where the Loony Party achived a record 0.6% of the Welsh Assembly vote, and was defeated when the government announced it was not interested in respecting the will of the people. Ukraine triumphed in Eurovision and Leciester were crowned the unlikely champions of the Premier League. Finland went into the world ice hockey final unbeaten, only to cruelly lose 1-0 to Canada.
We had our honeymoon in June, flying to Iceland in style, relaxing in the Blue Lagoon and taking in the sights of Gullfuss, Geysir, Snæfellsnes, whales and of course the Icelandic Phallological Museum. I came home sun burnt. It was a sad month for politics: Brexit happened and Jo Cox was murdered. West Yorkshire Humanists held their AGM, announcing a big increase in membership, and we once again rocked out at Sunday Assembly Leeds. I released the Word Search PHP library and completed the Leeds 10k, going sub-60 for the first time with a result of 59:59. England crashed out of Euro 2016 in a miserable fashion.
I had finally managed to lose some weight by the time July came around. We packed out bags and headed to Anglesey for our annual group trip. Michelle flew in from China to attend. More music was made at Sunday Assembly. It was picnic month: both the Finnish picnic and the Humanist picnic took place.
In August Team GB crushed it at the Rio Olympics, finishing second in the medals table. Tradgy stuck as my grandma passed away just two months before her fist great grandchild was due to arrive. We celebrated Leeds Pride and launched Rena Men. I helped Sky Sports go live with their new Premier League clips system.
It was still warm enough to eat outside in September. I finally cracked the secrets to making a good pizza and we had sauce month. Anxiety Leeds held a picnic. Yarndale look place and Jeremy Coryn won a second Labour leadership election.
October was dominated by the arrival of Baby Worfolk, who later turned out to be called Venla. We drank champagne and smoked chocolate cigars. Venla spent the month laying around and looking cute. The Leeds Restaurant Guide was made available on iBooks as was my novel, Summer on the Horizon. Elina and I celebrated our first anniversary and Team Europe was bested in the Ryder Cup. At the end of the month, I turned 30 and the Victoria Gate shopping centre opened.
The big news in November was Donald Trump being elected US president. I felt this rather overshadows the launch of Worfolk Anxiety Management and my new book, Technical Anxiety. I smashed it in the Abbey Dash, setting a new 10k personal best of 56:45 – a full 10 minutes faster than my previous Dash (though that one was a personal worst). Finnish Christmas Carols were sung.
In December we celebrated my sister’s birthday and I launched the Worfolk Anxiety Podcast. Venla met her other grandma for the first time, and we took a family trip to Tropical World. I said goodbye to long-time client Sky Sports. West Yorkshire Humanists held their Winter Social and Holiday Food Drive for local homeless shelters. My mum turned 60. I went sub-28 in Parkrun for the first time while my dad completed his 100th.
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Tags: 2016, year in review
This entry was posted on Sunday, January 1st, 2017 at 10:51 am and is filed under Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.