I had been using Quicken for bookkeeping since 2000. As I moved away from Windows and retired those devices, it became more difficult and inconvenient to continue using Quicken. I searched for cloud-based alternatives and finally found CountAbout last year. The basic plan costs only $9.99 US per year and it does everything I need. I highly recommend this service.

Over the past year of using CountAbout I had occasionally thought about developing an equivalent application myself, not to save money but as a fun project. Two weeks ago, with nothing else to do, I finally started prototyping and today my replacement application does everything that I had imagined. I learned OO PHP and Javascript, and used extreme programming techniques to create the prototype. My application is not pretty but the UI is efficient and I improved on some of the CountAbout workflow.

During the project I reverted to the obsessive software engineer that I used to be. I resented interruptions and was constantly thinking of the various technical problems that I was facing. While that’s how I got things done, it didn’t make me a better person. I like myself better as a gardener.

We arrived in Garden Bay on March 21. Today, March 22, was sunny and I spent the afternoon outside cleaning fallen branches and inspecting my messy garden. Next priority will be rose bush pruning.

I like to be busy and productive, and I read at night to prepare to sleep. For the past I don´t remember how many years, I have been reading almost exclusively fiction in Spanish. Before this phase I used to read almost exclusivley non-fiction, and I have just rediscovered that interest due to not being busy nor productive here in Guanajuato.

First book read this year was Eat, Drink, and Be Healthy: The Harvard Medical School Guide to Healthy Eating and I am now an avid healthy eater! My dietary sin was saturated fats and basically they have been minized in my diet. For example, no more butter BUT I still put a measured amount of cream in my coffee. I found a great website for daily nutrition tracking that for me makes eating goal-based rather than just filling the hole. Since I enjoyed reading this book so much, I searched for another stimulating read.

The third book read this year was The Big Picture: On the Origins of Life, Meaning, and the Universe Itself. This is a mixture of current science and philosophy that I found very interesting, true, and relevant for the sexagenarian that I am. My favourite quote:

“That´s us. Ephemeral patterns of complexity, riding a wave of increasing entropy from simple beginnings to a simple end. We should enjoy the ride.” – Sean Carroll

In between the non-fiction I read Mariposa Intersections: a novel written by a friend of mine. It´s an interesting story set in Mexico with an underlying theme of nuclear power and climate change. Ideas beget ideas, and I think this book led me to the current book that I am reading.

Climate Change: What Everyone Needs to Know I admit that until now I´ve been a casual observer of the changes occurring in world due to, and in response to, climate change. It finally dawned on me that climate change could “be the defining issue of our time” so I better prepare myself and participate responsibly.

“Discontent is the first necessity of progress” – Thomas Edison (b. 1847)

I like to start the new year with thinking about where I’m at, what I would like to accomplish in the coming year, and making plans. In December I suffered from discontent due to idleness and a cold apartment, causing me to yearn to be home where at least I have lots to do and a warm house.

My thinking led me to read: Philosophies of Innovation, History´s  Innovators, and Their Teaching On the Character of Innovation by Michael Tirado. It is a compilation of quotes from over 50 “of the most notable creators and innovators in history”. While filled with wisdom, what follows are the quotes I find most personally guiding for the new year.

“I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand” – Confucius (b. 551 BC)

“Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn” – Benjamin Franklin (b. 1706)

“A well spent day brings happy sleep” – Leonardo da Vinci (b. 1452)

“Things won are done; joy´s soul lies in the doing” – William Shakespeare (b. 1564)

“We must cultivate our own garden. When man was put in the garden of Eden he was put there so that he should work, which proves that was not born to rest” – Voltaire (b. 1694)

“It is the working man who is the happy man. It is the idle man who is the miserable man” – Benjamin Franklin (b. 1706)

“To be is to do” – Immanuel Kant (b. 1724)

“The busier we are, the more acutely we feel that we live, the more conscious we are of life” – Immanuel Kant (b. 1724)

“He is happiest, be he king or peasant, who finds peace at home” – Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe (b. 1749)

¨Learning ballroom dancing is great for your brain.  But it  only works for three to six months.  After that, you’ve got all  the benefit you can get, and so you have to move on to yoga,  and then Tai Chi, and then bridge, always keeping on the steep  part of the learning curve” – Nolan Bushnell (b. 1943)

“Get busy living, or get busy dying” – Stephen king (b. 1947)

Stewart, Karen, Aimeé walking in the woods near Deux Rivieres ON

This is our last day in Ontario as we fly from Montreal to Mexico City tonight.  We’ve had a wide range of fall weather including a few snowflakes.  Being here is all about visiting with my family and we feel quite at home.