Happy New Years
Either the 5th impact happens or nothing at all.
A Moment to Reflect
Before I start talking about myself, I’d like to mention those that I have lost this past year. First, my grandmother on my mother’s side. She passed in December of 2023. She succumbed to Alzheimer’s. Second, my one of my aunt also on my mother’s side passed in January of 2024. She succumbed to lung cancer. Both were expected, but what was not expected was for them to basically happen back to back. I at least take comfort in knowing they are both no longer suffering from illness. It’s also partly why I largely ignored this website for a while. I had bigger problems to work out. But, I think I’m back on track.
Happy New Years!
A new year has passed, and it feels like nothing happened at all. Personally for me at least. I know for the rest of the world, too much is happening. To the point it can feel like we’re yelling across a void to make it stop.
I think, because of that. It makes my personal achievements feel miniscule to the grand scheme of things. I need to stop thinking that. But it is intimidating. So in this post, I’m going to quantify my year in moments that matters. Especially since I’ve been ignoring this website for a bit. I think it’ll be a nice way to start off the year.
Getting rid of the bloat
Starting off the year, I decided to pretty much get rid of most of my streaming services. I found that I would pay a monthly fee to log in maybe once every other month. At first it was a pain knowing some shows/movies I’ll be missing out on. But I’ll manage. The only subscription I kept was music.
In addition, I’m now becoming more determined to include physical activities during my daily routines. I have tools to aid with that, and one I can’t recommend enough is a weighted vest. They’re incredibly effective at making the most mundane of exercises very intense. I’m still not at the level I’m at, but I’m considering on adjusting the timing of everything. I’m learning rather fast that I’m not a great morning person for physical activities.
The leisurely routes
In my free time, I created a little marble simulator game. The main purpose of this game was to create a fun and interactive way to make choices for the Game Club I part take in. It’s current use is figuring out what games earn “double points” for completion. The points in question is largely meaningless, but does show what members participate in the club the most. I try to be as active as I can be in that area. I will probably never publish this game and add it to my portfolio. Unless I clean it up and polish it with some real art. Currently it’s kind of hard to look at.
Furthermore, I have been looking at some other mediums of creative output. I currently have an outline in the works for a book I want to write. Right now, there’s really nothing special about it. It’s just a outline of events I think should happen. And I’ve been stonewalled a couple times already cause I have no idea where to lead it. But I can at least say I have the main characters fleshed out already. I will not spoil any details, but I will mention that the overall theme will be sci-fi.
I also have been wanting to take on drawing again. It was something I did when I was younger quite a bit. I had a folder that was filled with probably thousands of random art I did over time. I was rather proud of it, kept it in my closet for safe keeping. I don’t know what got into my brother that day, but I guess he thought it would be funny to just dump all my artwork in water, also ripping pages up as did so. I tried to save what I could, but it was pretty much all ruined. Still bums me out to this day, and whenever I do try to get back into drawing traditionally, for some reason just get bummed and think that will happen again. Which is why I’m looking into digital artwork. It’ll take a lot of time and practice to get to where I was when I was young. But at least I know digital art can be backed up really easily, and even backed up on a website. So who knows, maybe future updates I’ll post some artwork I’ve been doing too!
Marble Game Screenshots
Still Slaving Away
Next up, I’ve made some big strides in my career. I’ve been put into a team that specializes in transforming old infrastructure and software to meet modern requirements. In a nutshell, that 20 year old backend service that uses a cloud VM needs to be hosted in a container service now. Oh, and probably rewrite the entire backend while you’re at it so that it can adapt to new products more easily in the future. The only thing I wish however, was that it came paired with a sizeable raise. But I’ll survive. For now. Dunno what 2025 has in store for me.
For the record, no I am currently NOT looking for a new job. Currently, my income needs are met. Meaning I’m not struggling like others. However, as I imagine it’s the case for most others as well, it would be nice to be able to save more so I can actually see a chance at fixing up my home. 😉
But at the current status quo, since I’m single with no kids I don’t really get any additional benefits. Never made sense why people with partners still get paid more than their single colleagues in the current modern era. Chances are highly likely they’re both working. That pay increase was traditionally meant to be a means being able to financially care for an adult dependent. Even though I do have an adult in my house that I am currently the primary caregiver of; I guess it doesn’t count if they’re not your partner. It’s whatever, I’m not gonna put a ton of thought into it. Maybe it’s just an excuse to finally find a partner. Those tax benefits look really nice too.
Final Thoughts
Not much else to really discuss. Personally, I’ve been slowly getting back on track. Having gone to 2 funerals in a row really does dampen your motivation to pretty much do anything. And it’s a hard habit to break out of once you get used to “doing nothing”. But I guess now that I’ve had a lot of time to reflect about what has happened. Also about how I feel. I think I’m finally ready to actually start moving forward. Before, it was more like a crawl. With that said, the year 2025 is a scary unknown thought to me right now. Given the past year hasn’t been exactly favorable politically. However I digress. This a blog about me. I will only provide this quote about the subject at hand. I hope it helps.
Nothing strengthens authority so much as silence.
- Thomas Edison
With that said. I hope this year proves my intuitions wrong and I both see and do many great things!