Did 2020 Really Suck?

Come along with me as I review my year in 2020.  The year starts out great with travel, visiting family, weddings, and new jobs. And then COVID reared its ugly head. 

What am I looking forward to in 2021?

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Transcript

Carol Marks: 0:17

Well, hello and good morning or afternoon. My little love bunnies. This is Carol Marks of the more remarks podcast. Welcome. Welcome. As I am speaking I am sitting in our Tunica goldstrike Hotel. We came over here for the weekend. We do this every so often throughout the year just for a quick little getaway. It's about three and a half hours from our from where we live in Huntsville. So not a bad little trip. And we don't stay very long. Like we came in yesterday's Saturday afternoon. We'll stay all day today, and then we'll leave Monday morning. The jet has taken Monday off and I don't have to go into work until three. So we don't stay, you know, maybe you know day and a half, which is plenty of time. Anyway, it's December, and it's almost Christmas time. December also means indivior. And I thought I would take a look back over the year of my podcast, which turned one year old in the month of December December 8, I believe, is when we first put out our first episode and I say we because my daughter Gracie and I started it together. And we did January, February, March, April and August together. And then in August, she decided she just you know wanted to take a little break.

Carol: 1:51

And so she did. She's taking a break. She's not with it any she's not doing the podcast with me anymore, obviously.

Carol Marks: 1:58

But I think from time to time, I can still talk her into coming on. Now. Before she left the podcast though, we were enjoying it so much that especially me that I decided to start my own podcast on my own titled something else. Well, when Gracie decided she wasn't going to do this podcast anymore with me. I just transferred everything from my old podcast life after 50. I moved it over to this podcast. And thankfully buzzsprout made it super, super easy. I mean, they did all the heavy lifting. All I had to do was go in and rename what I wanted to transfer over and they took care of the rest and it was super easy. If you are wanting to start a podcast, please check out buzzsprout they are super user friendly. Customer service is great. They're always ahead of the game with technology. They have a great podcast. I think it's called buzz cast. They have all the latest and greatest updates about what's going on in the podcasting world. Technical wise, trending wise, and they're always one step it seems to me that they're always one step ahead of the game. Great people are buzzsprout I highly recommend them. Okay, so on with the show, shall we? Well, everybody had a birthday this year, which is good, right? I just celebrated my 54th birthday on Friday. Now, turning 54 for some reason was a little harder for me than when I turned, let's say 50 when I turned 50 I had no problem. But 54 for some reason, bothers me just a tad

Unknown: 3:51

just a little, not much. But I just I can't believe I'm 54 for one thing. I don't feel 54 whatever that is supposed to feel like in many ways, not just physically but emotionally. And you know, I still feel like a young person. And I don't know if that's good or not, like my maturity level is still isn't I don't think is at a 54 year old level, whatever that's supposed to be. But it's it's alright. I'm just happy that I made it to 54 so far, right? Especially this past year, my goodness gracious. Looking back on 2020. Let's say let's finish the birthdays. So I've turned 50 for the gent my husband turned 58 in April,

Carol Marks: 4:38

my daughter turned 25 in April, and my son turned 23 in November. So yay, everybody had a birthday. That's great.

Unknown: 4:48

What are some of the things that we did and now when i say i'm looking back on the year of 2020 I'm not talking about nationally or worldwide. Looking back, I'm talking about my own personal life and my

Carol Marks: 5:00

family life. In January, it's the January started off great. January 2020 started off fantastically. I got to go back home to Ohio and visit lots of family Family members. I mean, I took like, a week off. Well, I say we got off. I wasn't working at the time. I had quit my car sales job in December, because I knew I was getting another job. But I didn't know when it was going to start.

Unknown: 5:34

Ended up start my new job started in April. But at the time in January, February, I didn't know that. But we were we were

Carol Marks: 5:43

at a place where I could take that time off. And so I did. And in January, I drove up to Ohio and visited. All of my family members took a week and did that that was fantastic. enjoyed that love that I'm

Unknown: 5:56

so glad and grateful that I got to do that. I visited my sister and her family. I visited my grandmother, which who is, you know, in her 90s

Carol Marks: 6:11

that is the main reason I went up there is to visit her. And then my for all of my aunts I got to visit with Well, except Barbie, I didn't get to visit with Barbie.

Unknown: 6:20

She lives in West Virginia. And I didn't go up that way. And I got to see my dad and my stepmother.

Carol Marks: 6:27

So family visit in January. Fantastic. Very grateful. I had the opportunity to do that. February, not much going on. But in March, we had a wedding. And my daughter got married. We plan the wedding. She planned the wedding, we had wedding coordinators, there was a really good time. But that too, was like the beginning of the COVID the Rona, the vid, whatever you want to call it that was starting to creep in. I mean, I think at that time, it was getting to be pretty serious. But we went ahead with the wedding.

Unknown: 7:11

And it was it was just the beginning of the hype. I mean, the what am I trying to say it was the beginning of

Carol Marks: 7:20

what we are in now. I suppose it was just starting back then in the beginning of March. But we had the wedding, everybody was fine. Everything was good before we had to start wearing masks and all that.

Unknown: 7:32

It was just starting and no one really knew what to think of it. But family members came in from Ohio and the wedding went off without a hitch. Fantastic. In April, though, that's when I started my new job.

Carol Marks: 7:47

And I think also after April, that's when things started to get fuzzy with everything else throughout the year. Because COVID by then, I think was in full swing. I remember getting my job and thinking, Oh, how are they going to do this? How are they going to do this in the midst of COVID. I started April 9, but they did a fantastic job. They kept everybody separated. In you know,

Unknown: 8:14

I had just started the training part of it. So it was in a different location. It was in a different side of the building. It was they did it they did it very well.

Carol Marks: 8:22

They didn't they did a good job with that. But again, again, that was in the beginning of the COVID. Nobody knew what to expect. Nobody was wearing masks at the time. By then though we knew to keep social distancing, and to wash our hands and all that.

Unknown: 8:42

So I started a new job in April. I love my job, by the way, love it. And then throughout the year, like I said, we've been to Tunica a couple of times. In fact,

Carol Marks: 8:55

right after the wedding, we were scheduled to come to Tunica. And again, the beginning of COVID. Nothing is starting to shut down yet, but I think that was the week when everything started shutting down.

Unknown: 9:11

But we called goldstrike to make sure that they were still open. We called the day of when we were going to leave. And they said Yes, come on down. We're still open.

Carol Marks: 9:22

So we drive over, and we get here and they said oh, we're closing. They let us stay the night. And then we headed back the next morning. That was that was unusual. You know. I'm Jen and then January through March. Also when I had my time off, I cleaned the house and organized it. I went through a bunch of cabinets and drawers and closets and got rid of a ton of crap. But guess what the crap is back. I think what I'm going to start doing for the new year in 2020 is now that I have a regular work schedule, and I have the weekends off a regular two day weekend off. I am going to go stay I'm going to start going to the house again and decluttering and get reading get rid of a lot of stuff. In fact, I want to Want to strive to become a minimalist? There is a YouTube channel called the minimal mom. And I like her channel. And I want to declutter and get rid of a lot of stuff that we don't. And I'm talking about a lot of stuff, I think I will start small. And I'll start with, you know, on a Saturday morning just with a drawer, so I won't get overwhelmed doing it. I just start small and do one thing at a time, one little small, project one little small task at a time. That way, I won't eat it my whole weekend. And I won't feel overwhelmed. And I'll still feel like I'm accomplishing something. And I think that is going to be my only 2021 goal. I'm not going to have any fitness goals this year coming up, I'm not going to have any personal goals this year coming up, just going to focus on the house. Because hopefully, in the next couple of years, we are going to get some stuff renovated on it, and then we're going to sell it and start looking for our forever home. So in the meantime, I want to start getting it ready for that process. And I know it will make me feel better. Without having all that stuff in the house that we don't need and that we don't use. I want a minimal like minimalist house, because I think it's easier to clean, easier to take care of. You don't have to worry about a bunch of stuff. I just that would make me feel so much better to have a house like that. Okay, um, well,

Unknown: 11:54

I guess that's it was that all I had to talk about? The year that was our urine review that that was it very much was it January through March, April, actually. And then the rest was all COVID. The rest was all COVID Oh, my goodness, oh, I may be in tune. Maybe also in 2021. I will try to

Carol Marks: 12:19

up my game on this podcast, try to make it a little better, a little more organized. But it's called more remarks. So it's basically about what I want to remark on. Whether it's pop culture, what's trending, what's happening in the news. So my blog is called Carroll remarks. Okay, my name is Carol Marks, right. My blog is called Carol remarks. And I created that because I wanted an outlet to talk about write about whatever I wanted to talk about, which is what came in as the remarks part. And then I wanted to start at the podcast and somebody said, Why don't you name it more remarks as an extension of the blog. So that's what I have done. But I think I need to focus a little more and actually pick a topic each week or each or every other week, or whenever my schedule is gonna be and actually do it properly. I don't know if properly is the right word. I think more organized and more well thought out. Instead of doing it on the fly. I think that's what I am looking for a

Unknown: 13:40

more focused podcast. Yeah, that's it. This is gonna be a short one again, which is fine. It's only 13 minutes long. Maybe a little longer. What about you guys? Are you guys having anything happening in 2021? Are you looking forward to 2021 I'm ready to see 2020 go though. I will say this about COVID. My daughter has COVID she has tested positive for COVID. I don't think she'd mind me telling you that. She the first day or two she just felt like she her head was congested. And she had a little bit of a cough.

Carol Marks: 14:24

She mainly complained about being having a headache. She had a slight fever for like a half a day. And the head congestion I guess is what she mainly complained about or what she had for like a day and a half two days. And she said that her skin kind of her a couple of body aches but she said it hurt to lay down

Unknown: 14:47

but no breathing problems or anything like that. And she like with after two days of that. She says she felt great after that, which is weird. And so she went and got tested again. like three days after her first test maybe four days after her first test, and she tested still positive even though she felt great.

Carol Marks: 15:12

So she's still in quarantine at her house but she She says she's doing great. I texted her this morning to see how she was doing. She says she feels great. And her husband has not gotten it yet either. Her husband has not gotten it, or he's not showing any symptoms. So that's weird. If this is such a contagious illness, and I still believe that it is. Why hasn't he gotten it? Maybe he's immune to it? I don't know. I don't know, I think we're still trying to figure all this out about what COVID is, you know, I have my conspiracy theories. I'll go from one end of the extreme to the other about this code, this whole COVID mess. You know, I'll go to believe in that this isn't, you know, it's just the head code is just the flu, and they're renaming it COVID. To No, this is very, very serious.

Unknown: 16:05

And of course, I take my precautions, because I definitely don't want to get it. If you watch the news.

Carol Marks: 16:13

They'll tell you that everybody's dying. I tell you what, when it first came out, though, I was terrified of it terrified. I thought, Oh, my God, if I get this, I will die. I really did think that and I still might you think it affects diabetics in the worst way. I think diabetics are not good with a with COVID. Anyway, I got off on a tangent there didn't mean to do that. We also had the elections this year.

Unknown: 16:47

I'm not going to say too much about that. No, I'm not gonna go there into politics. But we didn't have an election a you know, according to the news. In social media, it's still kind of going on in December. So you know, who knows? Who knows what's happening with that?

Carol Marks: 17:10

And I do, maybe that will be another episode. I'll have like I said, get focused Carol. pick a topic and do it. Not right now, though. Because it right now would just be off the top of my head. And now I am rambling. So I'm going to let y'all go.

Unknown: 17:28

I hope I talked about everything that I wanted to talk about. It seemed like I had a whole bunch more than that. But I guess that's it. The the anniversary for my podcast, the wedding, and COVID

Carol Marks: 17:42

in my 2021 goals, which is focusing on the house and getting that straightened out. Okay, that's it. Maybe I'll podcast about that. In 2021 decluttering and minimizing the house maybe that's what I'll do. I think that might that might be a good idea. Okay, y'all have a good one. Bye.