Tales & Trails of a Traveling Wiseguy

It's been a few months since I've tallied statistics about blogging, plus now it's the end of the year— time for retrospective.

I posted 70 journal entries in December. At an average of nearly 2.3 posts/day that's well over my stretch goal of 2/day. It was one of my bloggiest months since January 2024. Blogging about the trip my wife and I took to Panama— which I haven't even finished catching up on yet—was a big part of that blogginess but not all of it. Even earlier in the month I was averaging 2 posts/day, mostly through writing about Breaking Bad as I was watching it via our new Netflix subscription. That's also not done... but at least I'm not backlogged on it. I've got two more episodes to watch.

For the year in full I write 707 journal entries. That averages out to a bit over 1.9/day... just short of my stretch goal. It's down from my 2023 tally of 760 (2.08/day) and even 2022's total of 765. I was off my pace at various times this year as I struggled for motivation in writing. Nearly nobody I know writes journals anymore. They've all moved to Discord (mostly) and Facebook (some). Those tools certainly have their place, but that place involves short messages, 1-2 sentences at a time. I still prefer to think— and express myself— in longer form.

Panama Travelog #37
Back at the hotel, Panama - Mon, 30 Dec 2024. 6pm.

We got back from our hike in Metropolitan Park with great views of the city from Cedar Hill and a few wildlife sightings just after 1pm today. I went back out almost right away to get some lunch from the Rey supermarket around the corner from our hotel.



Speaking of our hotel I realized when I was coming back from the quick shopping errand that I hadn't taken a photo to remember what the hotel looks like. Mostly that's because almost every time we've been here it's gloomy and raining, or at night, or all of the above. In other words, not great picture time. But early this afternoon it was still sunny, so I snapped a few pics around the hotel.



Another one I hadn't taken a photo of is our room at the AC Marriott hotel in Panama City. In this pic Hawk is sleeping on the bed. She was tired when we got home and fell right asleep. (Update: 24 hours later we were both feeling sick, so I think this is the start of it for her.)

The room is kind of a mess in this photo, but that's cinéma vérité. This is how we've lived in this space for the past 72 hours, with a few suitcases and various small bags lining the shelf along the wall. This is actually comparatively orderly as most of my clothes are out of the suitcase and on the hangers/in the drawers in the closet (and the empty suitcase packed away).



Here's the view out the window from our room. It's not quite as good as the view from the pool on the roof, but it's still nice. Note that tall black building, the Tower Bank building, dominating the view. That's the reference point I gave for where to find our hotel in the huge panoramic picture I made from the top of Metropolitan Park.



Speaking of the view from the pool on the roof, here it is... in the daytime, when it's not raining! The trick is it actually just finished raining. Shortly after the pic-from-the-room I capture above, the skies opened up and poured for at least an hour. Hawk woke around 4pm, and we went up to the hot tub for a nice, long soak after the rain cleared.

We've been at the hot tub for a long time today, almost 2 hours. The rain cooled the temperature in the tub so it's more of a warm tub than a hot tub. The difference of a few degrees means we've been able to stay in the water quite a while without overheating.