A fairly usual year of activity for me- less traveling, more stuff locally. My last holiday letter came out in early March, so this covers from there forward.

Family trust: finished liquidating the rest of my mom’s properties and closed out the trust business. Yay! Have a closing tax return and K-1s to distribute, but there wasn’t much activity in 2008, so it should be straightforward. I’m Really Glad it’s done.

Real estate: I bought my mom’s house from the trust, hired contractors to do the major overhauls. Spent the 2nd half of 2008 doing hands-on reconstruction work, which will last into the first half of 2009. It’s fun and satisfying to swing a hammer and push a paint brush, seeing direct results from my actions (as opposed to managing 50 people two levels away). On the other hand, I’d have been happy with a couple months of that, not the year it’s going to take.

Relationships: started dating Dorit, and, by extension, her 7-yr-old son Gil. It’s been fascinating learning about 7-yr-old views of the world and modern family dynamics. It’s also startling how world-wise he is in some ways, and completely naive in others. I’m also recognizing some adult behavior as carried over from when the people were his age… Music: finished a second certificate program at Berklee, a 9-unit electric bass series. Spent the rest of the year doing the other half of the classwork that didn’t fit the first time through. Reworked my 5-string Fender Jazz, am starting to look for people to play with. Also found the Jazzschool in Berkeley, which might be a good next step on the path to adding academic heft to my music doings.

Biking: bought a new road bike (Bianchi) in April, joined a couple bike clubs, and successfully completed the Chico Wildflower and Wine Country centuries (100 miles each). Don’t know that I’d do the Wildflower again… as much as I like Chico, parts of the Wildflower are tedious, especially the 20mi return through never-ending orchards. The Wine Country c. was excellent, though, scenic and varied. Only rode about half the 4000 miles I’d targeted for this year, but that’s better than 2007.

2009 is undefined. It will take another 4-6 months to finish the building rehab and find tenants, though sooner would be better. I’ll do something with music, still working out what that will be. Am considering returning to the salaried working world- steady paychecks are looking kinda luxurious in these economic times. Will do at least another couple century rides, am resisting the enthusiasm of the Grizzly Peak Cyclists list for double-centuries. 200-mile rides are unnatural.