What a year it has been. We've seen the final nail in the coffin (we hope) to the continually falling crypto slope, we got through an ugly election here in the U.S., and we've sized up inflation, met it face on, and survived so far by adjusting every different aspect of daily living. There's no argument most of us have come through with some bruising, but I do think that the pandemic gave us a lot of training to deal with continuing bullshit of 2022. Let's face it, after about two years of public health rules and restrictions constantly changing, 2022 felt a bit like a run around the park in comparison.

Now, does it mean we're out of the woods, and it's all rosy traveling forward for another five years? Oh hell no! I fully expect the crazy train to continue with 2023. I expect companies to be fudging their way through the "new work normal," inflation to continue because companies don't have a really driver to lower prices, and government to still bumble along in its classic way of too little too late. That said, and I'm fully aware, things could be a lot worse.

I expect a couple of things to play out in full fruition by this time next year:

• Bitcoin will drop further and stabilize at the $10,000 mark, becoming a solid long-term investment option versions the silly bank savings option in fiat money.
• Ethereum will need to separate from following Bitcoin's valuation trend and either put up, or shut up. The time is now for Ethereum to prove its case and stand on its own two legs. Without doing so, the banks will regulate that environment to pieces with governments' help.
• NFTs will continue to drop in value and everyone holding an OpenSea mega-million image will be left holding a bag of nothing wondering, "Why was I so stupid?"
• Regular NFTs will continue to grow in popularity and will become very commonplace with basic commodity trading on various markets, like comic books.
• Government in the U.S. will find a way to force folks into an approved-wallet so it can track profits and claim taxes, most likely linked to bank accounts in cahoots with big banks. Welcome to blockchain maturity, we all know it will happen eventually.
• Working two jobs will be the norm for the average person in developed countries as the cost of living increases so much, it will be impossible to pay bills without working a 12-hour day (get your hustle figured out now).
• Oh, and lastly, utilities will figure out that they got away with hell like the gas companies in charging an arm and a leg for heating this winter, so by next year the bastards will be trying to charge double that. Get ready for $1,000 a month heating bills!

Time to starting figuring out how to live off the grid. Survival won't be because of nuclear bomb war; it'll happen because civilization is grinding itself to death with economic stupidity.

Now go get another cold beer while you can, I did.