Welcome, 2009

Except for the most wonderful arrival of D in May, I can't say this has been my favorite year.  It wasn't all bad, but it wasn't exactly roses either.

It was pretty sad to watch the housing market and the economy slowly and obviously tank in front of my eyes while the talking heads all claimed this was just a blip or that was just a minor correction.  W won't be missed by many.  It's been pretty embarrassing to have him represent me to the rest of the world, and only to have him become more and more impotent and ineffectual as everybody wished desperately for someone else.  It's sad to see that we are still in two wars, neither of which appear to be close to an end, one of which has not even achieved the goals of getting rid of the Taliban and finding the ass who started this whole mess in the first place.

I'm fully aware that we'll pull through this.  We always do.  When backed into a corner, we've quite often shown ourselves to be a pretty resilient country.  Hopefully, Obama will be able to help channel that energy in a positive direction.  I'm am hopeful that he will at least be able to put a positive and more generally appreciated face on the country.  I feel like he's got a more realistic world view than we've had lately and that every situation will not be approached as black and white or right vs. wrong.  Is it too much to ask that we have a leader that keeps everybody's interests in mind and tries for the best for everyone?  Probably, but I can hope, can't I?

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Well, that was about the most pessimistic Happy New Year I could have come up with.  Plus it was a day late.  Shame on me.  It's really not that bad.  I've got a wonderful wife and two excellent boys.  I've got a decent house, which is still worth more than I paid for it.  Although it's probably not recession-proof, my job appears to be relatively secure.  (At the very least, we service a lot of wastewater plants, and no matter how bad the economy, nobody stops flushing. :)  We've got a new president coming on board that I actually like so far.  Plus a tin full of cookies and candy just showed up in the mail, so how bad can things be exactly?

Here's wishing everyone a happy and safe 2009!