Today, I’m going to share stuff with you that has made me happy this year.
This one is substack-only, as my software, for some reason, is preventing me from embedding tweets and videos on STUMP. So the first thing I’m thankful for is substack!
I usually allow comments only from paid subscribers, but today - anybody can comment!
Go for it! Of course, if you’d like to subscribe, that would also be great:
What makes me happy
The following are not closely personal…I am thankful for my family, and definitely for Stu still being around (please donate to the Movember Foundation to support men’s health issues!) Stu and I have been married for 20 years so far… and I’m hoping it lasts for at least 20 years more. But let me share more general stuff that makes me happy.
Of course, some people may remember that, back in February, I shared that I really enjoyed researching and writing about financial crises:
And, of course, I really do enjoy digging into mortality trends. So my idea of “happy” may be a bit odd.
But no, I’m not going to put any of that here. I write about mortality for the blog all the time, and an article I wrote on financial crises, publicly available, is coming soon. All that can wait.
Books that make me happy
I read a lot, all the time. So let me share books I read this year that made me happy. All the following have links to Amazon (and I get very small amounts of money if you buy through the links).
I’ve been doing a re-read of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series, in publication order. Currently, I’m on The Fifth Elephant, but if you’re a Discworld newbie, try out Guards! Guards! as a good place to begin in the series.
It’s the first book in the City Watch thread of stories, which follows Sam Vimes as he builds up the Ankh-Morpork police force, and the city undergoes great social change. In the first novel, they have to solve the mystery of who summoned a giant dragon and how to make the dragon go away.
Then there are two books that always cheer me up, no matter what’s going on, and they’re linked. The older book of the two, Three Men in a Boat, is by Jerome K. Jerome, a comedic shaggy dog book about three friends on a boat trip on the Thames for rest and relaxation… and they get anything but. It was published in 1889, and the humor still works.
Then there’s To Say Nothing of the Dog, by Connie Willis, which is somewhat inspired by Jerome’s book. You see, the full title of Jerome’s book was Three Men In a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog).
Willis’s book is a comedic sci-fi mystery, in which a time-traveling historian is sent back to the Victorian era for some rest and relaxation… and he gets anything but.
One gets a Victorian farce, along with time-traveling confusion, as the “modern” characters try to right the timeline and find the bishop’s bird stump in time for the reconsecration of Coventry Cathedral, rebuilt in Oxford. Don’t worry, it’s easy to follow, and it’s very funny.
That’s enough books for now. I’ve read almost 100 books this year so far, but I figure four books are enough to share today.
Thankful for hobbies
Here I’m not including blogging, because that’s a bit different. I mean making stuff.
I have been getting back into cross-stitch, knitting, and crochet this year. Here are a couple of things I made:
Thankful for online communities
I’ve been online for a very long time. It looks like the oldest thing I have saved from online writing is this bit of doggerel from 1994, though I do know I was on USENET back in high school. Ah well, I didn’t hang onto any of that stuff.
In the 30-ish years I’ve been online, I’ve been involved in various online communities, and “met” many people online I have never, and will never, meet in person.
In 2000, I joined LiveJournal, and I still post there, though the community I used to have there have mainly moved on to Facebook, Twitter, and Reddit. I had some Thanksgiving advice over at LiveJournal, and it can extend throughout this holiday season.
In 2003, I signed up at the Actuarial Outpost as I was taking exams. The site dissolved this year and has been replaced by something else. RIP to the old Actuarial Outpost, which built a great community over two decades. We may have been scattered to various places, but it seems that many of us have ended up at GoActuary. I’m meep there, unsurprisingly. We will see where the online actuarial community gathers in the future.
Thankful for my readers! And music!
Howdy to all y’all, and I hope you are doing well.
I know some of y’all have been reading me from well before I started STUMP back in 2014, and others I’ve picked up this year as I came to substack. As readers, you have given me the gift of your time and attention (and some have bought me some cups of tea or subscribed to the substack.)
Thanks to the reader who recommended substack - it came at a good time, as my website crashed soon after, and I needed a backup place to blog.
Thanks to the many readers who have emailed me over the years (marypat.campbell@gmail.com), giving me feedback as well as giving me links to all sorts of stories that I missed, especially ones for my 80% funding myth series. It does help when the readers give one material to work with.
Readers have shared my pieces, too, which has boosted the readership. Since coming to substack, you may be interested to know that my most-read post has been Illinois Asks for $10B(+) for Pensions -- Most Disgusting COVID-19 Bailout Yet?
Well, Illinois has not gotten any sort of bailout, which does make me happy (for now). I’m sure the bailout machine will get revved up in 2021, giving me plenty to write about when it comes.
In exchange for your attention, I’m going to give you one of the most joyful moments in opera, from my favorite Verdi opera, Falstaff: the finale fugue.
Have a restful weekend everybody!
This newsletter makes me happy (although not always but that's by design) Thanks for the time and effort you put into it!