The year two thousand eleven has come and gone.

It was a good year. Not perfect, but lots of happy memories. Lots of learning, lots of work, lots of time with Corinne and Lauren, even some solid time spent with Mike, and Richie and my parents. Some very weird stuff happened with a friend who's now gone, and some new friendships were started. I spent less time on the bike and behind the camera, but have more resources to take care of my family and to help out where I see the need.

I've learned I can't do everything, but for 2012 I'd like to shift my personal, work-hobby balance just slightly more toward biking and photography and away from ridiculous and impossible project deadlines. I don't want less work, or even different clients... just more realistic goals that will let me better manage my time. (The cycling was affected as much by the work as it was by going bikeless for six weeks.)

Life with the ecclesia has been good, also. Ups and downs as with everything else. Faith, it seems, is the easy part of spiritual life: relationships are where the work happens. Perhaps that's trite, but perhaps that's why it's easy to forget and let things slip.

I hope 2012 is just as good. Maybe I'll even find a little more time for writing! Hah hah, no silly resolutions, here, sorry.

Happy New Year, everybody.

P.S. This site is in serious need of a redesign. Yuck.

I have so many things I'd like to say about last night's news. So many people with a more direct connection to Steve Jobs are saying their piece right now that my saying anything at all feels a bit silly.

So be it. I'll keep this short.

My connection was nearly life long — 30+ years — but very indirect. I saw him in person once, but never met him. My first mac was a 512 Ke in late 1985 or early 86, but I fell in love with the 128 when I saw it at a computer store sometime in 1984. MacPaint was on the screen, and someone had drawn an elephant.

For years I'd been programming in basic on a TI 99/4A, then on various Commodores. Seeing my first mac was like... something from the future. Mind boggling, even for an eleven year old.

Anyway, we all knew this day was coming. For most, since the the resignation in August. For others, since the WWDC. That was mine. I'd been watching his stick figure's shaky walking on the stage for at least an hour, saddened at how thin (gaunt) he was…

Then came the moment that told me he was resigned and knew his end was coming. He was talking about how much he loved the company he had built, and his voice cracked, and his eyes got shiny, and he looked very old and frail and sad.

I've watched people — friends — die from cancer. It's horrible. And I saw in his face that he knew, just like they knew.

There's so much more I'd like to say. Comparisons with exceptional people I respect from history and how rarely and brightly their lights shine, so rarely that we can name many of them even hundreds or thousands of years later. Or the fleeting nature of life, and how important it is that we do our best with what time and resources we have.

But mostly, since I learned in a text message from Corinne that "Steve Jobs died", I've been thinking about friends we never meet. People we interact with every day but in a very one-sided way, and how they can be important to us without them ever knowing it.

And how it hurts to lose them, even if they were never really there.

I'm beyond impressed with the new Boston Globe web site. It's the best I've ever seen. Congrats to @beep and the rest of the designer/developer team. As +Craig Hockenberry said on Twitter, other newspapers are going to look at it and either realize they need to imitate it, or they'll keep dying.

If you have a big monitor, resize your browser window from very narrow through to full screen. Go very slowly, and watch as the layout adapts to the new size, every step of the way. The images resize, the number of columns will change from 1 to 2 to 3, each column's width changes... it's brilliant.

(What I've mentioned here is just the first-glance stuff. Look around, the attention to usability and detail is intense.)

A friend called Corinne today (on her birthday!) and asked, "Please fatten me up?!" (referring to herself). I think she wants to look more matronly.

(Personally, I think the children she's corralling do a fine job of matronizing her, but nobody asked for my opinion!)

1. This may be the best birthday present Corinne ever gets.
2. She came to the right place!
3. This friend may not realize what she's in for. Seriously, buy the larger clothes before she delivers your first meal, or you'll have a major problem.

As of this afternoon, my lovely wife has been calling me her husband for fourteen years.

Fourteen years!!

Happy Anniversary, Corinne. :-)