No preamble this year. Let’s get straight to it. Here are my rapid-fire memories from 2017:
- Bringing in the new year in the White Castle drive-thru
- Buying new couches online
- Getting my wife pregnant
- Going to my first ultrasound
- Going to the second ultrasound and finding out our baby was a boy
- Watching Jayden for three months (four months total, starting in December 2016)
- Deciding not to pursue foster parenting with Jayden
- Releasing “Haunted by a Memory” with Hunchback Whale
- Getting our first physical fan mail for Hunchback Whale
- Giving out Hunchback Whale cards at the Great Lawn for Thurby
- Driving to Erie, PA and back to drop off Gage with his dad
- Visiting Revolution Church
- Visiting Hope Culture
- Visiting Calvary Chapel Syracuse
- Going to Sarah Cook’s birthday party
- Creating a logo for Super Nano Pro
- Building a website for Super Nano Pro
- Writing Gage a letter for his KPREP
- Washing the siding of our house
- Going on Facebook Live
- Trying to do the rope course at Main Event
- Helping clean up the limb that fell off our tree (and took out the neighbors’ power and internet lines)
- Building shelves in our kitchen
- Walking to the park to swing on the swings
- Getting into a car accident when someone backed into us at Burger King
- Riding my bike to work for a week straight while our car was getting repaired
- Wrecking my bike on the way to work
- Going to Andrew’s every other Monday
- Trying elk, kangaroo, ostrich, and alligator beef jerky for Valentine’s Day
- Creating Facebook Live videos for Hunchback Whale
- Driving from Louisville to Rhode Island in one day with only four stops total
- Listening to the audiobook version of Walden on the drive to Walden Pond
- Swimming in Walden Pond on Henry David Thoreau’s 200 birthday
- Getting stuck in traffic on I-95 for three hours
- Swimming in the ocean in the rain
- Building Ft. Grennos on the beach in Rhode Island
- Floating in our popup pool in our backyard
- Seeing Niagara Falls from the New York side with Meagan
- Visiting Maine and eating my first bacon covered hot dog
- Driving through New Hampshire, twice
- Eating at Mystic Pizza in Connecticut (the one from the movie)
- Eating littleneck clams in Rhode Island
- Eating stuffed quahogs in Rhode Island
- Attending the DIY Musician’s Conference
- Meeting Rick Barker, Taylor Swift’s first manager
- Waiting anxiously to see if the evaluators would choose “Haunted by a Memory” as a sample song to discuss at the DIY Musician’s Conference (they didn’t)
- Eating Tacos with Bethany Rhiannon (and her friend), Ender Bowen, and Ted
- Seeing The Weeks and Moon Taxi in concert with Meagan while she was pregnant
- Learning Moon Taxi’s “Morocco” before the concert so we could sing along to it at the concert
- Attending a birthing class
- Touring the hospital where our baby would be born
- Going to see the Balloon Glow at the Gaslight Festival
- Selling Super Nano Pro at the Gaslight Festival
- Selling Super Nano Pro all day at the NuLu Festival
- Preaching about Job
- Driving to Carrollton, KY in the evening with the family to drop off parts for Sonitrol
- Listening to Hardcore History while doing dishes
- Meeting with Ted on Sunday morning to work on Hunchback Whale stuff
- Recording documentary footage with Ted for Hunchback Whale
- Walking through the Enchanted Forest Nature Walk at Foxhollow Farm
- Talking with Bryce about FBA businesses
- Researching FBA businesses with Jungle Scout videos
- Purchasing the Jungle Scout Chrome Extension
- Running red lights to get Meagan to the hospital
- Watching my baby be born
- Cutting Lachlan’s umbilical cord
- Naming my son “Lachlan Miles”
- Feeding Lachlan from a bottle in the NICU
- Walking Lachlan to sleep in his Tula
- Preaching about James
- Quitting Toastmasters
- Finally putting in new headlights after my second one went out in my car
- Discovering and listening to hours of StoryGrid podcasts
- Seeing the two-person Shakespeare play at the Middletown library
- Going to the How-To festival at the main library
- Going to the art festival at the new library off Outer Loop
- Going to Elsie’s first birthday party and finding out Will and Lauren were having another baby
- Popping balloons at Elsie’s birthday party to find out the baby was a boy
- Buying a Christmas tree
- Decorating our house with Christmas lights for the first time
- Getting a Christmas bonus check
- Making homemade egg nog
- Making homemade cranberry sauce
- Eating Meagan’s pumpkin bread
- Writing a reference letter for a friend trying to adopt
- Redesigned the Super Nano Pro logo
- Going to the Tom Petty tribute concert with JC
- Rearranging our living room furniture
- Building a fire so hot in the backyard that we couldn’t roast marshmallows until it died down
- Setting up the pop-up form on MarshallJonesJr.com to gather emails for Hunchback Whale
- Setting up the email auto-responder for Whale Mail
- Trying to go through Rick Barker’s 30-day challenge
- Hanging out with the Cohns at Rooster’s
- Going to Jeremy and Jacki’s for Thanksgiving
- Getting coffee and going out shopping for Black Friday (and actually buying stuff)
- Winning lazer tag at Main Event for the Christmas party
- Hanging out at my boss’s house for his Christmas party
- Hosting Christmas Eve at our house
- Melting scented wax on Christmas Eve
- Opening presents with Meagan, Gage, and Lachlan on Christmas morning
- Swapping out my watchband with the tools Poppy lent me
- Playing as many board games as possible before the New Year on New Year’s Eve
- Giving Lachlan a bath
- Touring Meyzeek Middle School
- Touring Crosby Middle School
- Going to Gage’s school concert
- Watching Pan in the hospital with Gage
- Changing diapers
- Making coffee in our French press
- Going to Southeast’s Christmas pageant
- Going to the drive-thru Christmas story at the church in Shepherdsville
- Doing camera job inspections for Sonitrol
- Cutting Meagan’s hair
- Bathing Lyndon to try to get the fleas off him
- Mapping out how to visit my last remaining states
- Losing everything on my laptop when it died
- Writing 10 Marshallogue posts in a little over an hour
Happy 2017!
(Coming soon… 2018.)