First Life Takes Time, then Time Takes Life - 2019 Wrap-Up

- now the next move's up to me*

What happened to 2019? My mind is falling apart and I don't remember anything of significance this year. A fatalism has taken hold of me and I accept what I'm told, things for the way they are. Of all the famous deaths this year, none surprised me, not one shook me out of my complacency. They could all have died years ago for the difference it would have made in my life. Or maybe some of them should have died years ago, but somehow...

Bob Einstein aka Super Dave Osborne
Luke Perry
Dick Dale
Peter Mayhew
Dr John
Rip Torn
Rutger Hauer
Toni Morrison
Peter Fonda
Robert Mugabe
Eddie Money
Ric Ocasek
Ginger Baker
Doris Day
Lee Iococca
Jeffrey Epstein
Keith Flint
Bruno Ganz
Ross Perot
Rip Taylor
Carroll Spinney
Ram Dass
*David Berman
Don Imus

Here are some albums that came out 20 years ago in 1999. Reading this list reminds me of a time when I still believed in radio, but was also being introduced to non-radio bands.

Ani DiFranco - Up Up Up Up Up Up
Turbonegro - Apocalypse Dudes
Built to Spill - Keep it Like a Secret
Collective Soul - Dosage
Immortal - At the Heart of Winter
Wilco - Summerteeth
Fugazi - Instrument Soundtrack
Buckcherry - Buckcherry
The Ataris - Blue Skies, Broken Hearts...Next 12 Exits
Ben Folds Five - The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner
Pennywise - Straight Ahead
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Californication
Pavement - Terror Twilight
The Tea Party - Triptych
Santana - Supernatural
The White Stripes - The White Stripes
Various Artists - Punk-o-Rama Vol. 4
The Flaming Lips - The Soft Bulletin
P.O.D. - The Fundamental Elements of Southtown
Days of the New - Days of the New
The Magnetic Fields - 69 Love Songs
Nine Inch Nails - The Fragile
Adam Sandler - Stan and Judy's Kid
American Football - American Football
Creed - Human Clay
No Use for a Name - More Betterness!
Kenny Wayne Shepherd - Live On
311 - Soundsystem
Opeth - Still Life
Bush - The Science of Things
Rage Against the Machine - The Battle of Los Angeles
Saves the Day - Through Being Cool
Fiona Apple - When the Pawn...
Korn - Issues
NOFX - The Decline
Metallica with the San Francisco Symphony - S&M
Aimee Mann - Magnolia Soundtrack

The albums I bought this year include:

Iggy Pop - Lust For Life
Doves - The Last Broadcast
Entrails - The Tomb Awaits
Taking Back Sunday - Tell All Your Friends
Thursday - Full Collapse
Genghis Tron - Board Up the House
Talking Heads - Remain In Light
Damien Rice - O
Negura Bunget - Om
YOB - Our Raw Heart
Slayer - Seasons in the Abyss
Mithras - On Strange Loops
Death - Human
Deafheaven - Sunbather
Trow - Monochromacy
Farcaster - Farcaster
Miles Davis - Porgy & Bess (LP)

Books I read this year are listed below:

Albert Camus - The Fall
McNeil & McCain - Please Kill Me
Frank Miller - Batman: The Dark Knight Returns
Alan Moore - V for Vendetta
Charles Dickens - A Tale of Two Cities
Laura Ingalls Wilder - Farmer Boy
Frank Miller - Daredevil Vol 1
Mary Roach - Packing for Mars
Rainer Maria Rilke - Book of Hours
Frank Miller - Daredevil Vol 2
Carlo Collodi - The Adventures of Pinocchio
George Eliot - Middlemarch
Beverly Cleary - Socks
Frank Miller - Daredevil: Born Again
Jack Kerouac - On the Road
Chris Claremont - Wolverine
Edgar Allen Poe - Tales of Mystery & Imagination
C S Lewis - The Lion, the Witch & the Wardrobe
Arthur C Clarke - The Fountains of Paradise
William B Irvine - A Guide to the Good Life
Mike Mignola - Hellboy Omnibus Vol 1
Ken Follett - The Pillars of the Earth
P G Wodehouse - Very Good, Jeeves!
John Wagner, Alan Grant - Judge Dredd: The Dark Judges
Mark Twain - The Innocents Abroad
Edwin Abbott - Flatland
Rainer Maria Rilke - Stories of God
Brian Michael Bendis - Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 1
Neil Gaiman, P Craig Russell, illus. - The Graveyard Book Vol 1
Neil Gaiman, P Craig Russell, illus. - The Graveyard Book Vol 2
Don DeLillo - White Noise
Charles Perrault - Collected Fairy Tales
Neil Gaiman - Odd and the Frost Giants
Neil Gaiman - American Gods
Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman - Dragons of Autumn Twilight
Homer, Gareth Hinds, illus. - The Odyssey
Peter David - Spider-Man 2099 Vol 1
Matthew Pearl - The Dante Club
John Wagner - Judge Dredd: Origins
W B Yeats - Selected Poems and Two Plays
Stephen Crane - Collected Poems
Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman - Dragons of Winter Night
Claudia Aragon - The American Dream

Adding to my ever-increasing list of hobbies, this year I've taken up board game collecting and playing. Here are some that I picked up in the last 12 months:

Axis & Allies 1942 2nd Edition
Carcassonne
Love Letter
Dominion: Intrigue expansion
Dominion: Prosperity expansion
Dominion: Hinterlands expansion
Ticket to Ride: Nordic Countries
Legacy: The Testament of Duke DeCrecy
Carcassonne: Traders & Builders expansion
Forbidden Island
Dixit
Castle Panic
Castle Panic: The Wizard's Tower expansion
Smallworld
Power Grid
Roll for the Galaxy
Bohnanza
Kingdomino
Alhambra
Forbidden Desert
Colossal Arena
Oh My Goods!
Dead Last
Carcassonne: Inns & Cathedrals expansion
Concordia
Stone Age
Suburbia
Suburbia Inc expansion
Ultimate Werewolf
Keyflower
Lost Cities
Agricola
Last Night on Earth
Mage Night
Terra Mystica
Ra
Glass Road
Viticulture Essential Edition
Friday
Caverna
...And Then We Held Hands
Kingdom Builder
Kingdom Builder: Crossroads expansion
Run, Fight, or Die
Dungeon Petz
Race for the Galaxy
Hero Realms
Escape: The Curse of the Temple
Spirit Island

Here is an index, chronologically ordered, of weekly words:

01/06/19 Bespoke
01/13/19 Hegemony
01/20/19 Trenchant
01/27/19 Lassitude
02/03/19 Plinth
02/10/19 Orthogonal
02/17/19 Gibbous
02/24/19 Codicil
03/03/19 Cant
03/10/19 Demesne
03/17/19 Insipid
03/24/19 Sanctimonious
03/31/19 Gaslighting
04/07/19 Offal
04/14/19 Aloof
04/21/19 Colloquy
04/28/19 Glib
05/05/19 Obsequious
05/12/19 Cromulent
05/19/19 Abstemious
05/26/19 Imbroglio
06/02/19 Animal adjectives using the -ine suffix
06/09/19 Bucolic
06/16/19 Inscrutable
06/23/19 Élan
06/30/19 Probity
07/07/19 Syncretism
07/14/19 Pusillanimous
07/21/19 Extirpation
07/28/19 Cartouche
08/04/19 Kingmaker
08/11/19 Wry
08/18/19 Execrable
08/25/19 Plenipotentiary
09/01/19 Gimcrack
09/08/19 Scintillating
09/15/19 Limpid
09/22/19 Germane
09/29/19 Dowse
10/06/19 Fecalith
10/13/19 Sibyl
10/20/19 Bugbear
10/27/19 Promiscuous
11/03/19 Frisson
11/10/19 Talisman
11/17/19 Recapitulation
11/24/19 Mendacity
12/01/19 Incel
12/08/19 Maunder
12/15/19 Penultimate
12/22/19 Gyre
12/29/19 Pall