Happy New Year - 2021

What went well 👍

This year has been more personal challenges than technical due to the Covid19.

Marathon:

Ran my first 10K Marathon, Chennai. I ran with my wife and we finished together 😍

Blog:

Started this blog - I am super excited about. Had registered this website few years back, but never got a change to blog.

WFH:

Personally I have always admired how great minds like Scott Hanselmen manage to work from home - for more than a decade - lead a team and also stay productive. Well : if you need to learn to swim, then you should first throw yourself into the water. In a way, thanks to C19 and forced WFH - I ended up setting up my home office.

But but but, as Scott says this is NOT remote work its quarantine work 😉. I don’t quite belive life would be the same (pre C19 days) again, and I am up for the challenge.

Reading:

One of the best habit I have developed this year - reading books consistently. Read ~15 books (pinch myself, record - usually its 1 or 2) this year. Ensured - I read every single day before I go to bed. Thanks to the book Atomic Habits and my bookmate best friend(Mr.P). When I look back, I feel guilty I didn’t start this early - anyway it’s never late than ever.

Home Sweet Home:

All our plans went into a array due to the lockdown - there was a 2 week mild relaxation, took a risk and we sneaked into our new house. This was a dream come true - we always wanted to move into a community esp for my daughter and here we are.

Niece (s):

Happy to welcome the two little ones (T and G) into our extended family - Stay blessed!!

Neck Pain:

6 different doctors (physio, ortho, chiro, homeopathy, ayurveda - you name it) * 1.5 yrs - no luck. Finally met a spine surgeon - took an MRI and figured out it was just LOW Vitamin D damm!! What an AntiClimax 😱. Sometimes we (including the doctor) do complicate things - all that was required was just a simple blood test - patterns can sometimes be misleading (can we use - AI? take care of the Training set).

Hackathon Judge:

I was part of the Judging panel for our first 100% virtual hackathon- pinch myself 😎. I was a participant in the last 2 hackathons at KLA - won prizes. But this time I was sitting on the other side of the table - asking question and digesting new solution and prespectives - it was such a wonderful experience.

What could have been better 👎

Meeting:

There were days I had ~14 planned meeting in a single day 😞 and an Average of ~9 meeting in a day. This might not be sustainable - I would need to figure out a better way to manage these overheads.

Journal:

Started on Journaling this year - actually tried Bullet Journal, it was nice. It gave me a good picture to reflect how the day (month) was and also plan what were my important task for the next day - but sadly I wasn’t consistent 😦. Yr 2021 - I hope to be better.

Badminton:

Wanna get back to start playing Badminton regularly - I love the game. After the game your mind is so clear - its my best form of meditation.

Fracture:

What an end to the year : a hairline fracture on my foot - casted - 4 weeks - home quarantined 😟

Fittr:

I signed up for FITTR program, but unfortunately - the fracture came in between 😞. Next year I will come back stronger.

Conclusion:

2020 was a mixed year with lots of learning both professionally and technically. Looking back - I dont have any real regrets and I hope to have an even better 2021.