Moving past 2020

As widely noted, this year has been a dumpster fire of sorts. Millions have lost their jobs, many have been sick and untold travel plans have been dashed. Still, if asked if I personally would want to have this year erased, I am not so sure. It has been a year of great local discoveries, in particular the mountains of the North, and a pedagogical revolution in front of the green screen that will forever change how I teach. Instead of the Amalfi Coast, I got to run along the canals of Stockholm. And while both Rio and Goa ended up being cancelled, I now have 275k+ miles in store when international travel again becomes possible.

On Strava, there is a “Move past 2020”-challenge consisting of a minimum of 60 minutes of activity. Wrapping up a year with 288 active days, I only saw it fit that I also completed the 300 km distance challenge for December by meeting Elin for a lunch run downtown for a total of 25 km.

Back home from my run, it was time to start preparing some roast carrots with gingery tomatoes, quinoa and mint as a vegan NYE dinner together with a half-bottle of the house champagne. While I may not always agree with Johan Norberg, he has a great piece in The Spectator on why 2020 may not have been such a bad year after all when looking at the aggregate numbers. Let’s now just hope that Trump does not do anything really crazy in his last days in office and that 2021 will finally mark the beginning of those roaring twenties!