Over the past week my Facebook status stream has been flooded with updates from friends and acquaintances all saying essentially the same thing: “2009 sucked, and hopefully 2010 will be better.” And while it’s only natural to wish that the next year will be better than the last, I gotta say, 2009 was pretty good to us.

In the midst of a horrible economy, Susan kept her job and I got a new one. Earlier this year I changed jobs and moved from a government contractor position to a bona fide federal job (again). The new job has its ups and downs (just like any other job) and I traded a chunk of my salary for a chunk of job security, but I don’t regret the decision at all. I’m now dealing with computer security issues 40 hours a week, and while that might not sound like fun to some of you, I love it.

In 2009, our family took (at least) three vacations: we attended my Grandma O’Hara’s 80th birthday party in Chicago, spent the Fourth of July in Branson, and took our cruise to Cozumel, Mexico. I can’t tell you how lucky and blessed I feel to have taken so many great trips with my family this year. In addition to our own family adventures, Susan flew 43,000 miles last year and got to visit Washington D.C., New York, and Hawaii (for the first time).

Over the past year, none of us had any serious health issues. Mason only went to the emergency room once (a concussion check after hitting his head on the ice), an improvement from 2008 where he went twice (broken arm and a concussion check), so that’s an improvement (I guess). None of us caught the swine flu that we know of, a fact I’ve attributed to our steady stream of bacon (we’ve built up a tolerance).

One of the best things I did last year was founded “Nasty Pirates Night,” a once-a-month guys’ night where my friends and I get together to eat food, drink beer, play poker, play video games watch bad movies, and laugh our butts off. It has been so much fun that we are planning on doing it again this year! Although I have known most of these guys for most of my life, I feel like our friendships have definitely been rekindled because of this and I feel closer to these guys than ever. Each time one of us makes the whole group laugh, I am reminded why these guys are my friends. Andy, Jeff, Josh and Scott, thanks for making Nasty Pirates Night 2009 such a success and I am already looking forward to 2010!

Susan and I had the greatest New Year’s Eve ever. Both of us took the day off from work and spent the entire day running around town (without the kids in tow). We had breakfast at Jimmy’s Egg, went shopping at Best Buy, spent lunch at Remington Park Casino (and won!), stopped at City Bites just to have a cookie, got a bunch of errands done, and got back to Yukon just in time to pick up the kids, dash downtown and watch the Thunder beat the Utah Jazz in a nail biter of a game. The only minor bummer of the day was that we didn’t get to spend New Year’s Eve with any other family members; by the time we made it home from the game, the kids and Susan were asleep within ten minutes and I didn’t make it much longer, falling asleep during the Three Stooges marathon. None of us actually made it to midnight this year.

So yeah. 2009 was pretty good to us. Coming up with resolutions for 2010 is easy as there’s always room for improvement, but as far as last year goes, it’s tough to have any complaints. I hope everybody got to ring in the new year with friends, family or loved ones at their side. Here’s to 2010!