2024: The worst, the best, and all the rest

My year in ups, downs, travel, books, and more

It is New Year’s Day, my dudes—and if you’re sick of seeing everyone’s year-in-review posts, you are in the wrong place!

Partly because I don’t know what else to do with myself today and partly so I can remember this year well when I look back on it in the future, here’s an incredibly detailed (and only moderately navel-gazing) recap of the very best and very worst parts of my 2024.

My year in travel

In 2024, I visited:

• Geneva, Switzerland to onboard for my new day job

• Utrecht in the Netherlands for a day trip with friends

• Seville, Spain with my partner for my 31st birthday

• My hometown in Pennsylvania for a week

• Arnhem in the Netherlands for a quick weekend trip with my partner

• Llucmajor, Mallorca for an annual all-inclusive vacation with my best friend

• Barcelona, Spain for another work trip

• Dutch theme park Efteling with friends from Haarlem

• Paris, France for a luxurious girls’ trip

• The Christmas markets of Prague in the Czech Republic with friends from back in the States

• A tiny cabin at Basecamp Amsterdam for New Year’s Eve with my partner and our pup

My year in books

My top reads of 2024—of the 56 books I read this year, according to The Storygraph app—were:

• The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality by Amanda Montell

• A Bit Much by Lyndsay Rush

• I'll Just Be Five More Minutes: And Other Tales from My ADHD Brain by Emily Farris

• Sandwich by Catherine Newman

• Give Me Space But Don’t Go Far: My Unlikely Friendship with Anxiety by Haley Weaver

• How to Be Online and Also Be Happy by Issy Beech

• Role Playing by Cathy Yardley

• The Rom-Commers by Katherine Center

• Elsewhere by Gabrielle Zevin

• Funny Story by Emily Henry

• Killing Me by Michelle Gagnon

• Margo's Got Money Troubles by Rufi Thorpe

• The Verifiers by Jane Pek

• Counting Backwards by Jacqueline Friedland

• Of Monsters and Mainframes by Barbara Truelove

• We Solve Murders by Richard Osman

• Listen for the Lie by Amy Tintera

• Here for the Wrong Reasons by Lydia Wang and Annabel Paulsen

• The Kill Club by Wendy Heard

• Don't Want You Like a Best Friend by Emma R. Alban

• Everyone This Christmas Has a Secret by Benjamin Stevenson

My favorite things this year

The things I bought or received in 2024 that I’ve appreciated the most have been my:

• Olive spoon

• Owala water bottle

• Smeg kettle

• Ember mug

• Book Money coin pouch

• Baggu Cloud carry-on

• I Am Unwell headache hat

• Acupressure ring fidgets

• Nintendo Switch

• Kindle stand

• Kindle page-turner

• Debut book IRL!!!

My favorite apps

The top apps that I downloaded, used, and enjoyed most in 2024 have been:

• NYT games

• Finch

• The Storygraph

• Happier

• Libby

• Everywhere is Queer

• 1SE

My worst experiences of 2024

If I’m being vulnerable about it, this year’s lowest lows were: