The first month of the second half of the year is over. It brought some nice moments and some deeper thoughts.

June was a tricky month for me, with quite some challenges but also hints of good things.

May has been, in many ways, a good month. But it also had a fair share of its challenges.

As I described in last week’s post, I started the month with a 5-day hiking trip. That was a nice way to clear my mind. I had my time off at work until the next Wednesday (8th May is another public holiday, commemorating the end of WWII), which gave me 3 extra days to rest. Returning to work after a week-long break was this much bumpier, though, but that’s something I’ve gotten used to. Thus, I welcomed the next weekend, and a relaxed hike to a place I know well (and last visited in winter). For once, I saw it without crowds even outside of winter.

The likely reason was that the weather forecast was quite unpredictable, something that was the case for most of the month. Sun and rain took turns often by minutes rather than hours or days. This resulted in a change of plans for the next hike I planned with my sister when we dropped the original location because of a storm warning and chose a backup plan. As usual, I’ll go into more details (and photos) from the hikes soon.

I was also pleasantly surprised by the battery life of my new Kindle, compared to the old one, even though I found myself terribly indecisive so I alternated between reading random favorite passages of books I’ve read in the past, and reading through my own draft of book two in hopes of regaining some juice for writing or at least getting some ideas to fix the issues that have me stuck for a year already. I realized that I didn’t even know which version I had uploaded to my Kindle, though I later realized, by seeing some changes made, that it was some later draft (even if with unfinished scene rewrites).

I guess that’s a rough summary of the month. May was a decent month, even with the ever-changing weather and being busy at work. I hope June will be just as nice, maybe even better.

April had been a colorful life in many aspects. Let’s have a look at some.

March had seen me in a good spot in many aspects, though there’s also room for improvement.

February this year… looked more like some weird hybrid between Spring and Autumn. That’s what climate change does here. Let’s have a look at what I’ve been up to…

As you’ve probably noticed, I’m late (more like missing) the party and haven’t yet posted my 2024 goals. Here’s a hint, as well as some background on why it’s taking so long.

With the year drawing to a close in just a few hours, it’s time to look back and reflect.