2021

2021 was another COVID-19 pandemic year. It looked promising at some point with pretty effective vaccines, but people being people^[1], 2021 turned out being just another 2020 in disguise. I allowed myself to see friends and family a bit more often, and go on vacation or weekend trips in Switzerland and neighboring France and Italy. I am still not longing for international travel, let alone air travel, so that was perfectly fine. What I am missing, as in 2020, are live concerts. Some happened again, but I don’t trust the epidemiological situation enough yet.

Job

As a continuation of 2020, 2021 was a work-from-home year. With quite a twist though. Long story short, my employer Bestmile ran out of money. A very promising deal got canceled last minute resulting in everyone being laid off. Management was smart enough to have enough cash reserves to pay everyone until their contracts ended, which meant that we got 3 months of paid Summer semi-vacation. Four years ago, my job search was a miserable endeavour: too long, too many applications, too many soul-sucking interviews, too many disappointments. This time, I wrote half a dozen applications, mostly at companies I applied for in the past. And it worked out! I’m a happy Archilogic employee since September. The job is full-remote, but I still decided to move from Lausanne to Zurich, where their headquarters are located.

BMX

Lausanne is a very nice city, but one thing speaking in favor of Zurich are the BMX infrastructures. There are a good outdoor skatepark, several indoor ones, a decent outdoor pumptrack (none in Lausanne) and a more open-minded trails scene. I have been saying this for the last 10 years, but this time it might be true: the next 4-5 years might be the last years that I can decently ride BMX, so being here in Zurich is a plus.

Overall my BMX year was pretty lousy. I wasn’t in the mood to deal with the vibe at “our” local trails, so I think I rode there only twice. Which is completely ridiculous compared to the ginormous amount of hours spent building the place. It is what it is… I went a couple of times to Genève. On one of those occasions I randomly ran into Switzerland’s BMX Freestyle Olympic champ Nikita Ducarroz at the trails. She sure can handle her bike! I’ve been to the pumptrack at the UCI headquarters in Aigle^[2] with Gabriel and kids. Since November he can go ride at the shiny new pumptrack, bowl and skatepark in Bulle. The previous park was the place where we both started riding BMX.

Mountain biking

I renewed my SBB Velopass. Originally, the motivation was that I would go at least once a week to the BMX trails. But I got injured in 2020, so that didn’t happen. Instead, I used the Velopass to go mountain biking in the Jura and Vallée de Joux region first, and later in the mountains above Vevey and Montreux, as well as Leysin.

I did a couple of dumb snow tours. One was at Vallée de Joux, in early Spring. I was a bit optimistic regarding the progress of snow melting. But it turned out ok. The other one was not ok at all. Here’s the story I posted on Strava:

Learnings: when in the mountains and it starts snowing, turn around. A couple of months later, I actually did the tour I initially planned (Rochers-de-Naye to Roche via Malatraix) with Gabriel:

Instead of going to close Valais, I went twice to Lenzerheide for a couple of days. I had a blast both times. Once I was joined by Urs for 2 days, and the next time I rode with Rico, Jessie and Jo. This was the first bikepark riding on my Santa Cruz Megatower. It works flawlessly. Another time, Damien brought me to La Thuile. Best. Place. Ever! I have to return somehow in 2022.

Here are my mandatory year over year Strava stats:

Something feels a bit off about these numbers. I probably did more lift-assisted rides in 2021 than in 2020.

If I ever find a girlfriend again, I would like her to have some passion, or at least interest, for some regular physical activity. I don’t care what it is, it does not have to be shared, but I don’t think not doing anything is healthy, both physically and mentally. Anyway. So, why not try to meet those rare girls who ride mountain bikes? There have been a couple of attempts in 2021. More on that further down, read on!

Consumerism

Every year I think back to the stuff I bought and go: “hhmm, I did pretty well this year!”. Then I actually go through my online accounts, emails and scanned paper receipts, and it systematically turns out to be more than I thought. My point is, don’t buy shit you don’t actually need. Here’s where I failed:

• the Fast & Loose dvd. I could have waited for the (by definition, dematerialized) YouTube release. But it was worth it. BMX video of the year!
• I bought back a Dell U2415 display from work. I haven’t used it yet…
• another thing I could have gotten the dematerialized version of is the latest NOFX album. I got a good old CD instead, for my CD wall.

These were not really needed:

• I bought an Apple Watch. I am not super happy with it because it keeps fucking up my workout recordings. I have yet to figure out what the issue is.
• new handlebars for my second BMX, the one I’m not supposed to be riding. I wanted to have a similar riding position on both BMX bikes, so I got these slightly taller bars.
• one day I randomly checked out an outdoor/sports shop in Lausanne and they happened to have a 50% off sale on most items. So I got a North Face sweater and bike shirt that I didn’t really need.
• I got a lightweight travel hammock I haven’t used yet. But it will get used at some point.
• I bought back my 15" mid-2015 MacBook Pro that I have been using since January 2018 at work. It replaces my 11" 2012 MacBook Air
• I have a new camera tripod. Not sure how often that’s going to be used.
• another thing I bought at my previous job’s liquidation sale was an office chair. I got rid of my previous chair at home when I got my standing desk, hoping that it would incentivize me to sit less. Instead, I moved the sitting part to my dining table, which was actually worse. So the chair is back, but I have to discipline myself to not sit for too long. It was a bit of an adventure to bring the chair home. I did not want to rent a car nor ask anyone for help, so I decided to rent a cargo bike for the first time. Unfortunately I only realized that the cargo e-bike was missing the battery pack once I arrived at the office, which is 100 elevation meters down from both my home and the rental place. I did not have time to go back get the battery, so I ended up pedaling a heavy non-assisted cargo bike loaded with two office chairs (one for Gabriel) up the Lausanne hills.
• I’m trying out the concept of bag-in-a-bag. Whichever backpack I’m taking with me on weekends or holidays will contain another bag with a bunch of useful things: pen & paper, swiss army knife, spare phone charger, camping cutlery (to avoid needing 1-way plastic spoons and forks), rain poncho, thread and needle, kleenex, hand sanitizer. The list probably needs some tuning. The role of bag-in-a-bag is taken by a Freitag toiletry bag. Maybe a bit on the heavy side, but the right size.

These were kinda required expenses:

• bike maintenance, replacing used or broken parts: chain lube, BMX grips, BMX brake pads, DH fork & suspension revision, drinking bottle, disc brake pads, MTB bottom bracket, MTB chain, new rim for the city bike
• my apartment in Lausanne had 3 big built-in closets. My new place in Zurich has zero. I successfully managed to only buy an additional 2x2 Kallax shelf, no closet. I’m pretty proud of that.
• I moved my mobile phone subscription from Sunrise, and my Internet provider from UPC to Wingo. Slightly faster, and cheaper.

Things I successfully did not buy:

• no LEGO sets, despite some pretty sweet releases: a gigantic AT-AT, a fun Mario 64 question mark block, a new version of a VW Camper, etc.
• I’ve been following what Panic was up to with its weird handheld Playdate console. I was going to buy it on day one, had it in the shopping cart seconds after the sale was launched but they fucked up their setup so badly that no one outside of the US could proceed to the checkout. When it finally worked, you got bounced to the end of the queue, out of the first production batch, and with completely exorbitant shipping fees. The console was 180$ and the shipping 60$. That’s a third of the console’s price. Come on! So, no Playdate for me. No regrets.

Media

Games

Not much gaming this year, but I didn’t miss it. On the PS4, I got the very hyped Swiss game Mundaun, that I played very little. Not my thing. On the Switch, I bought Tetris Effect Connected, the online multiplayer version of the Tetris Connected I got last year on PS4. I am a bit disappointed by the classic mode. Why can’t we get an exact replica of NES Tetris on any modern console? I also played LEGO Builder’s Journey, which is very cute, but boring. My game of the year is Metroid Dread, even if I actually stopped playing at some point, getting too frustrated by the boss fights, and the guided-but-not-really exploration part.

Similar to the Playdate anecdote above, the Steam Deck was not released in Switzerland (because not in the EU?). I never had and probably never will have a gaming PC, so I would be a potential client for that kind of hardware. I also sometimes consider getting an Xbox with the Game Pass.

Podcasts

I stopped listening to a lot of podcasts I have been listening to for years. I got fed up by ATP, RecDiff, Cortex…

Here are a bunch of episodes I enjoyed from other podcasts:

• 99% Invisible: Finding Julia Morgan
• 99% Invisible: Corpse, Corps, Horse and Worse
• 99% Invisible: Real Fake Bridges
• 99% Invisible: Flag Days: Good Luck, True South
• 99% Invisible: Matters of Time
• The Allusionist: Cake is Mightier than the Sword
• The Talk Show: “A Total Landscaping”, with Mike Monteiro

…with a bit of a (good) French language invasion:

• Le Cœur sur la table: La révolution romantique n’est pas un dîner de gala
• Le Cœur sur la table: Le marché du cœur
• Le Cœur sur la table: Le chasseur et la proie
• Le Cœur sur la table: La princesse et l’escalator
• Le Point J: C’est quoi, la culture du viol?
• Le Point J: Pourquoi on se met en couple?
• Le Point J: Et si on s’en fichait du temps d’écran?
• Le Short
• Les Couilles sur la table: Qui sont les incesteurs?
• Vivons heureux avant la fin du monde: Peut-on cuisiner des animaux morts?

Series

Fewer podcast listening, and also fewer tv shows watching. Which is a good thing.

• my absolute favorite was Arcane. I love that animation style, which reminds me a lot of Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. If you like animation and haven’t watched it yet, drop everything and go! Now!
• the Swiss series Tschugger was very fun. It’s similar to the first seasons of Fargo (or the movie) in its aesthetics and absurdity.
• We Are Lady Parts was a lot of fun. I bought their songs.
• I watched Mare of Easttown twice, it’s that good. One reason is probably Kate Winslet’s performance, and another is that the US northeastern town esthetics reminds me of my time in Pittsburgh.
• Resident Alien is a bit cheap sometimes and has very convenient plot twists, but it’s also funny how it looks at us stupid humans.
• the first season of Lupin was refreshing, the second one was dumb.
• Stateless was a bit meh.
• I’m a bit tired of the MCU, but I still watched Loki. Entertaining.
• I caught up on the 3 seasons of Master of None. The first season was kind of ok, the second was a shitty stereotype, the third one was boring.
• Made for Love was a bit meh too.

YouTube

I might have replaced a good chunk of my tv-show-watching time with YouTube watching. I don’t log in, and often clear my cookies, but even then, I have to admit that the YouTube recommendation algorithms are pretty good. I watched and often subscribed to the RSS feeds of the channels:

• Our BMX, especially their Unclicked podcast
• Sofya Yokoyama, a very pretty, always smiling, young Swiss climber
• Magnus Midtbø, another climber who is entertaining to watch
• in 2020 I was subscribed to Scotty Cranmer but I grew tired of it. Probably for the same reason as for the podcast I quit: tired of Americans. I still tune in from time to time to see what dumb thing they came up with.

Concerts

The pandemic, especially in 2020, forced artists to be even more creative. For example, I had a lot of fun watching Mikey And His Uke covering various songs.

Here’s one with, among others, Moby going back to his early 1980s punk roots:

Then one with none others than Tony Hawk and Steve Caballero. Millencolin being skaters themselves, they must have been super stoked (or maybe they know each other well. I don’t know, it’s fun either way):

Joan Jett’s classic:

Dating

I think in 2020 I went on exactly one date. So in 2021 I was a bit more motivated to try again. The first one was with Carmen. She was only the second girl I dated more than once. On the first date, we walked around one evening in Lausanne, on the second we had pizza in Sion, on the third time we chilled at her place in Sion. On the fourth (record number of dates at this point) we had a burger in Lausanne, and on the fifth date, we went on a stupid hike. We mutually agreed that we enjoy each other’s company but that it wouldn’t work out, so we should just stay friends. We’ve seen each other reguarly since. That was a nice outcome for once.

Not long after, I had a date in Neuchâtel with Oriane. We went on a bike ride in Chaumont, and then chilled a bit by the lake. Everything went well, and she seemed open to meeting again. But sadly it never happened. She never explicitly turned my suggestions down, but always had excuses. I hate it when they do that. Grow a pair and own your decisions!

I talked to this girl Juliana on Tinder in the summer of 2020, but when I suggested we should meet, she turned it down, saying that she just met someone. I later randomly spotted her at a shopping mall in Lausanne. One year later, I get this message signed Jul from an unknown number. We had a drink one evening, but that was it. I still follow her on Strava because she does triathlon, which has always fascinated me. So yeah, on that one, I think we both weren’t really interested.

One nice thing with these dating apps is that you might meet people you would otherwise never meet. For example, I ended up in Genève on a date with Sharzad, a girl from Iran who recently came to Switzerland. It was an interesting evening, I even got to show off my recently acquired but quite ridiculous Arabic reading skills (Persian/Farsi uses the same letters). But again, apparently not enough interest on both sides to meet a second time.

Then there was another attempt at meeting a mountain biking girl. I match with this girl named Meije on a Sunday evening. On Monday morning she writes and says that she’s in the Lausanne region at the Bernex bikepark for the day. I improvise a trip there: 30min boat ride to Evian, 1h bike ride to Bernex. I try to call her a couple of times, but I can’t get through. I wait at the bikepark entrance, but cannot spot her. I see a girl next to a van on the parking lot, but she doesn’t look quite like the Tinder pictures. I still go talk to her and start by a remark about the shitty muddy riding conditions. She looks up at me, with that typical annoyed why-are-you-talking-to-me look. I figured, I didn’t recognize her, she didn’t recognize me, so she was not Meije. I decide to give up and ride back to Evian. As soon as I got a data connection again on my phone, I messaged her, telling her about my adventures. Turns out, the girl with the evil don’t-bother-me look was actually her. It’s funny that we both were too dumb to recognize each other.

Meije’s reaction is the reason I usually don’t even try to talk to girls. You also constantly hear about them feeling harassed. There are probably signals when a girl is open to being flirted with. But I think we’ve established at this point that I’m really bad at reading signals. Anyway, one summer evening I was chilling in the park next to my apartment and this girl Merline randomly comes up to me and starts hitting on me. It was so awkward. It might be third time this has happened to me ever (the other two being at a bar and at a party, so more likely), but it’s still weird every time.

The most recent dates I had were here in Zurich. In the span of 2 weeks I met with Diana twice. Right now she’s visiting her family in Mexico, so we’ll see how that turns out once she’s back.

Health

• I did not get injured in 2021!
• I haven’t gotten Covid yet, as far as I know, and I got 3 shots of the Moderna vaccine with little to no side-effects.
• For 2 years, I’ve had some skin problem. In February I decided to finally tackle it. Many appointments later, over CHF 1000 spent, after trying 3 different skin creams, doing a lab test, the problem is still there. I hate doctors.

Family

Last year, my grandad passed away. For a while, it looked like my grandma would follow this year. She tripped over her radio’s power chord and broke her pubic bone. At 92 years old, spending weeks in bed really fucks with your health. She somehow made it through though. So far.

Other

Part of my close family speaks Arabic. I thought it would be fun to learn another alphabet, but I didn’t want to take it too seriously. Duolingo finally added Arabic lessons this year, so I gave it a try. The way their lessons are built has some limitations though. Nothing is explained, ever. You have to guess what the grammatical rules are, and the lesson themes and vocabulary are a bit random sometimes. In theory I should by now be able to read Arabic, but I realized that I lack a bit of discipline and rely a lot on the spoken bits provided by the Duolingo app.

Epilogue

These Covid times are a bit of a blur. I sometimes am not sure anymore if the whole thing started in 2019 or 2020. While drafting this text, some things I scribbled down for 2021 actually happened in 2020. It’s confusing.

2021 has been an ok year. I wasn’t expecting to have to change jobs, but it turned out fine as I ended up at the place I wanted to work at last time I was looking for a job. I made a couple of good friends at my previous job, and re-united with old friends from Zurich. It’s been a sporty year with a lot of mountain biking but unacceptably little BMX riding.

Embrace the suck. Move the fuck forward.