I can’t say I feel terribly inspired to do a year-end wrap-up here. It was kind of a boring year; not a bad one, on a personal level, but one lacking in what we generally think of as Events.

We did get to see Courtney Barnett at the Fox in Oakland earlier this month, on a trip that included my first visit to the Chase Center for a Warriors game. (A loss to the Spurs, unfortunately, but a fairly exciting game.) There were also several nice dinners with friends, and on the whole I can say that a good time was had.

But for the nonce I’ve decided to take Courtney’s advice and, rather than looking back, make a list of things to look forward to in 2022.

• To paraphrase Colonel Kilgore, “someday this pandemic’s gonna end.” It may just shift terminology into an endemic, and maybe that won’t mean things are really different at all, but I’ll take it.
• I have a ticket to see Stephen Malkmus and his Traditional Techniques band in Portland on January 16. Hopefully that show will actually happen and I’ll actually be there. (The last couple years have been good practice in never taking anything for granted.) There are also a bunch of Pavement reunion shows scheduled for later in the year, and there’s a decent chance I’ll make it to one of those.
• I haven’t yet started watching the second season of How to with John Wilson, which everyone says is fantastic. So that’s exciting.
• We still have two more seasons of Bojack Horseman to go, though we’re starting to get that itchy feeling you get when the end of a show you’re really digging is in sight. Bojack would no doubt hold up to multiple viewings — the screen is often cluttered with fleeting little jokes — but will we really do that? It seems unlikely.
• I got a little clicky in the days after Christmas, and so various packages will be arriving throughout the month of January. One of them will contain the Jazz Butcher compilation Dr. Cholmondley Repents: A-sides, B-Sides and Seasides, the liner notes of which will hopefully explain the name.
• The Warriors continue to roll merrily along, even without Klay, who remains out but is due back in the first week or two of 2022. Optimism runs high in Dub Nation.
• I’m planning a major new writing project to begin in March. I’ve already talked to some of you about it; everyone else will find out soon enough.

The year to come also holds, inshallah, 365 more days to walk Jah’s green Earth, eat, drink, and be merry, love and be loved, and pursue my eternal goal to make everything I do as funky as possible. Hope to see you along the way.