Just like the Walkmen declared.  We said that 2008 was going to be a good year.  Not just a good year but the Best Year Ever!  I can’t say that it was mind-blowing but, it was definitely better than 2007. We picked up our tired, broken souls and we moved forward. “Out of the darkness and into the fire…”

For now I will give you the wrap up for 2008.  The best of 2008 will come later.

This year in live music: Brothers and Sisters; Quiet Lovely; Les Savy Fav; Ghostland Observatory; SXSW (What Made Milwaukee Famous, the Constantines, Shout Out Louds, NERD, Explorers Club, El-P, Dizzie Rascal, Dan Oh, Staccato, Flosstradamus, Fuokids, Cut Copy, Moby,  Ra Ra Riot, Bound Stems, MSTRKRFT, and Kimya Dawson);  Ra Ra Riot;  The Little Ones: Prince Paul; Tapes n’ Tapes; Flosstradamus; Thao and the Get Down Stay Down; Ratatat; Voxtrot; Cool Kids; David Byrne; Weezer; Tokyo Police Club; Girl Talk; Brothers and Sisters; FFF Fest (The National, Atmosphere, Deerhoof,… and You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead, Bishop Allen, Centromatic,  Parts and Labor, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Spinto Band, Frightened Rabbit, Black Joe Lewis and the Honeybears, The Dead Milkmen, Clipse, Franki Chan, and Toxic Avenger); Rosebuds; and Matt and Kim.

This year in non-live music: I now own an iPod.  According to Last.fm, my top 10 bands are: Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltzin, the Eels, Girl Talk, the Sea and Cake,Tapes n’ Tapes, British Sea Power, Frightened Rabbit, Wilco, Atmosphere, and the Pixies.  I do like these bands a lot but there is a problem with last.fm and the iPod scrobbling.  It doesn’t catch a lot of things that I listen to because I don’t sync my iPod frequently enough.

This year in Sewing: I taught a few more classes at FirstSamples.  I did some more alterations.  I taught M to sew and gave her a sewing machine to play with.  Designed a line for a fashion show and I entered a design contest. I volunteered at the Swap-o-rama-rama at Maker Faire.

This year in Bikes: I managed to ride my bike the 10 miles to Megan’s house and back.  I bought a “new” bike.  A Japanese Mixte that I stripped, repainted, and rebuilt.  It should be ready to ride in 2009. I learned how to be a better urban cyclist from M and the pedi-cab drivers downtown during SXSW.

This year on the interwebs: I redesigned climbinginskirts.com (I also migrated the content from Blogger to Wordpress).  I finally signed up for Twitter (I am bad about updating it).  I learned to love and hate facebook.  I abandoned myspace. I signed up for Goodreads and Last.fm.  I downloaded iTunes.  I’ve viewed countless things on YouTube.

This year in Movies: (theater) SXSW (Nerdcore Rising, Choke, Bananaz, and Bulletproof Salesman);   Iron Man; Juno (which is going to get my best sountrack award); Wanted; 21; Wall-e; and Milk. (dvd)  Four-eyed Monsters, Darjeeling Limited, Batman Begins, Cars, Rattatouille, One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest, the Prestige, and Harry Potter (Goblet of Fire and Order of the Pheonix).

This year in Books: I signed up for Goodreads so I can actually keep track of what I am reading.  I also made use of my library card.  This is what I read: Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim - Sedaris, The Between Boyfriends Book - Chupack, Barrel Fever - Sedaris, Holidays on Ice - Sedaris, The Game - Strauss, The Sweet Potato Queen’s Field Guide to Men - Conner, Bringing Down the House - Mezrich, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay - Chabon, Heat - Buford, Strip City - Burana, Tropic of Cancer - Miller, The Sexual Politics of Meat - Adams, Little Birds - Nin, and Sex and Bacon - Lewis.

Here is the list of things I neglected to do in 2008 (in order of regret of not doing them) along with excuses for not doing them:

1. Travel: It doesn’t have to be out of the country. New Zealand will probably be postponed until 2010 because my traveling buddy has a house to pay for. Now that I have a new car, I am thinking road trip. I would like to go back to some of the places I stopped during the geology road trip from hell (GEO 660).  No road trips. But I did manage a semi-high speed chase after the hit-and-run incident.
2. Interact with real people (not on the internet). As more of my friends move away I realize that I want to spend more time with the people that are here. I will also need to branch out before I end up alone. I should also cut back on my internet stalking habit.  Still stalking on the internet. But I did manage to meet a bunch of new people this year.  I went on 17 dates.  That is more dates than I have been on in my entire 31 years of existence.  I made some new friends and I got to know a few friends a little better.

Not sure what 2009 will bring. I haven’t written up any plans just yet.  Here’s to another good year.