Seasons Greetings Joey Style (2010)

( #2011, #Resolutions )

Happy New Year my friends! This year feels like it went by quickly yet when I look back, 2010 has been a game changer in so many different way. So let’s all take a minute to stop and reflect what this year has brought us both good and bad.

[Changes in 2010]

When you wake up every morning, do your routine, go to work, come home, and then go to sleep – ddoes it feel like anything is ever different? Things change, but it is more of the same… isn’t it? Not so much. The status-quo that has been in place for the last few years got shattered by a few things (I am going to do this chronologically):

  • My nephew being born: I don’t see him nearly as much as I should and we can slot that into 2011 goals, but Luke being born changed the dynamic of my immediate family. My sister has come into her own and has matured in a very graceful way. Cobra Commander has been demonstrating admirable nurturing and protective personality traits . My mother is fully embracing her roll as “Nonna”, and even Mean Joe is starting to warm up to the idea of being Grandpa Meanness. The coming year is going to be a sweet spot for me when his mother asks me “where did he learn that word?”
  • Graduate School: It feels good to read some of last year’s goals and see that I am accomplishing them. I have my opinions about the education system, but finding WGU has been rewarding and immediately helpful in my career. I needed to do this to remain mentally fit.
  • Mean Joe’s Heart Procedure: For the outside reader – my father needed a triple by-pass this year. I was never worried that he would die, whether he had too much mean left in him or knowing that my cousin Dr. J was overseeing the whole thing – I knew he would be okay. Even though I was confident that he would survive to continue to terrorize 9th Street, his weeks in the hospital reinforced bonds with my parents and family.

There were tons of other milestones/issues this year: other family medical dramas, re-connecting with old friends (and learning to forgive and forget), more babies (Congrats to Mike, Laurie, Alex, Paul, and Aimee), becoming a semi-professional blogger… this could go on for a while….

I tend to get obsessive about how I spend my time (especially after 13 hour work days), who I haven’t seen or spoken to in a while, and worry about not doing things I feel like I should be doing, but in the end it all levels out. While there is always room for improvement, I felt like I did the best I could in most cases.

[Looking at 2011]

With school set at a decent pace and my semi-professional writing career making some progress, the thing I need to work on 2011 is my weight. If you have read this blog since the start or have known me for a while, you know I managed to knock out about 170lbs at the peak of my health kick and while I haven’t gained it all back, I have been slowly gaining weight the last 4 years regardless of my work out schedule and dietary efforts. Its time to get back on the wagon again…hardcore. Fingers crossed.

Babies for Joey and Allison in 2011? Probably, if not this year, early 2012. No point in being coy about this, I am not getting any younger and neither is my lovely wife. We have a plan in place (to everyone who says you can’t have a plan – be quiet, because you can) and now we just have to see how fate treats us.

My thoughts on everything else? If you haven’t been reading the blog weekly, you should because I cover it all there, but to summarize right now I would say focus on job creation. I had a conversation with a manager this year who said America is country of innovation and all the jobs should focus on that. While I agreed with the concept, I don’t think America is made up of 100% innovation labor force, hell I don’t think it is 20%. How do we employee the rest of the country long term? Personally, I think American companies should take advantage of the lower labor costs and refocus on domestic manufacturing while keeping the unions in check (sorry union supporters, they do kill companies over time).

For everything else – we should continue with green ideologies when they make sense, try to get away from our dependence on foreign oil, and focus on reducing national and personal debt. Politically – all of these jokers are the same; as long as we allow lobbyist groups to set direction for special interest organizations we will continue to be managed by an enormous corporation instead of a government. I will add – get involved if you don’t like what is happening to your country, town, city, village, school, sandwich shop…

[Closing Thoughts]

Once again, I respectfully request leeway from anyone that I missed in my year end thoughts and thanks. As always this is the trickiest part because people tend to get pissed when I leave them out. With that in mind – here we go…

If it hasn’t been made clear yet, I want to thank my parents, wife, and expanding family for being a centering force. Genetics is a hell of thing because as much as I cursed my parents in high school, I become more like them (or see wisdom in their “bad decisions”) as I get older.

I can’t do one of these without saying thanks to my cousin Tony because I talk to him every day and whenever I get freaked out about life (especially having kids), he puts me in the right frame of mind (unlike Slobbert).

For the friends in my life, I am thankful for you and for the experiences you collectively share. For the friends that have stepped back, I am thankful for that too because time is not infinite. Not to sound like a brown-noser, but I would like to thank my boss because even though work gets nutty – I feel like I can say what I need get the right advice, attention, and focus.

In conclusion, don’t bullshit yourself. Only you know what you are capable of doing, so if you are sitting around complaining that you need to get something done, or want to start something… Do it. If you can’t – get some help and get it done. I wish you get everything you wish for yourself this coming year.

Smell you later,
~ Joey

Previous Editions: 2009 Seasons Greetings

Traffic in 2010 (map)

( #Traffic, #OrderedChaos, #Blog )

I just wanted to take a moment to say thanks to my readers for allowing me to break least year’s traffic record by about 300%. The entire “Joey Lombardi” brand of websites brought in about 25,000 unique visitors this year (and traffic the last few months has increased by 30%) Not bad for a little vanity website.

Last year you helped me achieve my goal of having at least one person in every state in the US look at the blog… but I haven’t been paying attention to the world view. Check it out:

Its kind of insane for me to think so many people across the world have checked out my crazy blog. I hope it serves a purpose and people are getting something out of it, it has certainly made me happy to have an outlet for my thoughts.

This is (hopefully) just the beginning.
– Joey

Kindle Review

( #Kindle, #Amazon )

I bought a Kindle over the weekend. I have been thinking about buying one for about two months. I went back and forth between Amazon, Barnes and Noble (Nook), and Apple (iPad) before I just said screw it and went with the Kindle.

The reason is the e-ink. I thought it would be easier on the eyes and it is. On Friday night I bought the device at Target. I opted for the $189.00 version because it has free 3G connections for downloads and for things like Wikipedia. I thought that would come in handy. Once I turned it on, I was immediately impressed with the screen, size, and weight of the device. It is super light and small, but doesn’t feel cheap. It was very simple to connect to Amazon and once I did, I purchased and downloaded my first book which took a few seconds to download.

The book is 600 pages in paperback form and I read it in less than 24 hours. My eyes feel great. I love not having to turn pages, the Kindle remembers the last spot you read, so no more bookmarks, and it even highlights quotes people thinks are memorable (but it can be turned off). I spent the morning searching Amazon’s free selection of classic books. I downloaded a few I own in hardcover that I haven’t read in a long time. I can see impulse book shopping becoming very dangerous for me this year.

The Kindle has a built in web browser, but I didn’t mess around with it too much yet. I went to this website and it rendered well for black and white, but I wish Amazon would have a Google Reader applet for RSS feeds, but they are trying to get people to spend 2 bucks a month on their own bullshit RSS feed subscription plan, so I don’t think it will happen anytime soon.

My initial thoughts are that I am really impressed with the device, it is easy on the eyes, and I am very worried about my wallet since they make it so easy to download books.

Phillyist: Top 5 Comics of 2010

( #Philly, #Comics, #Phillyist, @ronmarz )

Phillyist is doing a Countdown to 2011 and asked the writers to start doing best of lists. Nobody covered comics, so I figured I would toss one out there…

Phillyist: Joey’s Top 5 Comics of 2010

I stayed away from the typical spandex characters because I am honestly bored with them. I would have put Walking Dead on the list, but everybody knows about that now, so the title certainly doesn’t need any more attention.