The Pandemic
So early in the year, something called the novel coronavirus cropped up in the news.
Hopefully I can be forgiven for thinking "Oh here we go again with another bird flu/swine flu outbreak. Let's see how long this takes to go away."
Before long it was known as SARS CoV2 and then eventually came to be known as just COVID-19 and finally just COVID in conversation. Whatever you called it, it shortly became apparent that it wasn't going to fade as quickly as hoped.
From that point on, the rest of the year was consumed by worrying about infection, worrying about friends and relatives, looking for toilet paper, N95 masks, isopropyl alcohol and preparing for the coming apocalypse.
Sheltering indoors for months on end did not in fact get the creative juices flowing and move things forward with the web site. In fact, pretty much everything ordinary got forgotten amidst the pandemic and other personal crises that came in a steady stream for the next 2 years.