2019 review: the year by the numbers

The last post of the year! It’s been a really excellent year all round and time for my traditional post counting down some of the numbers and showing some of the photos that have been my (and our) life this year.

  • 1,069,463: my lifetime total butt-in-seat miles on United, making me a Million-Mile Flyer
  • 61,027: the number of miles I flew on United this year
  • 35,755: my current tweet total (up 465 from 2018)
  • 14,893: the number of people who follow my Twitter ramblings (up 772 from 2018)
  • 13,834: the number of subscribers to our Insider mailing list
  • 6,558: the number of emails I sent (down 2,263 from 2018 – a good thing!)
  • 2,161: the number of non-reference books (real ones) that I own (up only 44 from 2018 – I restrained myself!)
  • 1,179: the number of books I own but haven’t read yet (exactly the same as 2018)
  • 350: the number of SQL Server wait types I have documented in my Wait Types Library (up 6 from 2018)
  • 188: the total number of hours of online training we have available on Pluralsight (up 6 from 2018)
  • 142: the number of nights away from home (down 9 from 2018, and all with Kimberly)
  • 110: the number of dives I did this year, in Mexico twice, Hawaii, and the Maldives, taking my total to 1,023
  • 71: the number of minutes of my longest dive this year
  • 65: the number of Pluralsight courses we have available
  • 44: the number of books I read (see this post)
  • 42: the answer to the question of life, the universe, and everything!
  • 38.90: the percentage of time we were away from home (which is why we call it our vacation home!)
  • 38: the number of flights this year (3 more than 2018)
  • 35: the number of days in Immersion Events and conferences
  • 33: the number of SQLskills blog posts, including this one
  • 25: the number of different places we slept apart from our house and on planes
  • 14: the number of airports I flew through this year
  • 14: the number of monthly magazines I subscribe to
  • 12: the number of years I’ve been married to Kimberly
  • 10: the number of different shark species we saw around the world this year (Galapagos, scalloped hammerhead, grey reef, black-tipped reef, white-tipped reef, silky, nurse, bull, silvertip, dusky)
  • 6: the number of full-time SQLskills employees, all of whom are fabulous and indispensable
  • 4: the number of countries we visited this year
  • 3: the number of wonderful cats we have (Andre, Holtzinger, Valentina)
  • 2: the number of new bird species I saw, taking my total to 606
  • 2: the number of awesome daughters we have (one a sophomore at UC Berkeley studying to be a trauma surgeon, the other a senior in high school)
  • 1: the number of new airlines I flew on (Trans Maldivian Airways – largest seaplane operator in the world), taking my total to 39
  • 1: the number of new airports I flew through (Male, Maldives), taking my total to 101
  • 1: the person who seems to cram the most into non-work time (farming, scouts, diving, building, …): Tim Radney
  • 1: the person who is the best at snapping her fingers and cooking yummy sweets: Erin Stellato
  • 1: the number of Jonathan Kehayias in the world – thankfully :-)
  • 1: the number of wonderful assistants, without whom our lives would be a distressing quagmire – Libby we love you!
  • Finally, the one and only best person in my life: Kimberly, without whom I would be lost…

Thank you to everyone who reads our blogs, follows us on Twitter, sends us questions, watches our videos, comes to our classes, and generally makes being deeply involved in the SQL community a joy.

I sincerely wish you all a happy, healthy, and prosperous New Year!

Cheers!

(April 10; at San Benedicto Island, Revillagigedo Archipelago (300 miles out into the Pacific), Mexico – it’s an 18-foot melanistic (all-black) mobula birostris, a.k.a. giant oceanic manta ray. The big-creature diving in the archipelago was so good that we’re going back in March.)

(September 11; at the end of the Glen Etive road, where the River Etive flows out into Loch Etive, a sea loch in Scotland. Nearby is the house, Invercharnan, that used to be owned by my high school, Glasgow Academy, and I made several weekend trips to in 1984, when I was 12, to help with restoration work. And I’ve camped around there since, many times!)

(September 13; outside the Talisker Distillery on Skye, illustrating one of the main differences between us… and yes, of course I bought a great bottle of scotch while I was there – do every time!)

(October 26; successful test of how good the suction cups are on one of Kimberly’s micro tripods… )

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