2022 – A Year Rewind

(I didn’t check for typo’s, expect lots of em.)
(PS: might make some edits later and attach some extra photo's, I already spent 2 hours writing this.)

It’s the end of another year, and depending on the way you lived it, it was either terrible or hot garbage. It didn’t go all bad, but there’s barely anything memorable that happened this year that is worth pointing out. I didn’t go outside a lot for fun, I barely met up with people and the cracks are starting to show that I’m pretty lonely, with the only thing keeping me accompany being the internet. Nonetheless, before this year ends, I’ll be posting some resolutions, hopes and everything notable that happened this year. Grab a bag of chips (or crisps if you’re from the UK) and read.

Covid​

2021 didn’t start off the best. I was tested positive a day before Christmas and the entire family had to quarantine. Some had more pain or weird effects from Covid than others, but I got away with a stubborn nose. That also meant nobody was able to show up on my birthday with it being super close to New Year’s Eve, so it really felt like any other day. Everyone luckily recovered, so it felt more like a minor inconvenience, and I give props to my mom for taking care for all of us.

tf is this weather​

Weirdly enough, between February and April, the weather was constantly changing from hot to cold, which means that we got a rare glimpse of actual snowfall. Snow used to be pretty common in the Netherlands, but with global warming kicking in, that dream is nonexistent now. One day when I came back from thrifting, my bike was covered in a small layer of snow and it was freezing that day. It concerned me a bit, because the games I found were in cardboard boxes, but they luckily didn’t get damaged.

The Discord Incident​

Going back to March a bit, with a more darker story. March 5th 2021, a date that has been stapled in my brain. Not only was that the day that a small indie group launched a game titled Antonball Deluxe, but a day before that, my Discord account got hacked. This was a targeted attack, and I was watching on March 4th how my account was turning into toast. Next day wasn’t any better, because these people got access to my account again and logged a bunch of servers and private DMs, some of which contain more personal info than anyone is allowed to know of. I literally lost parts of a school projects thanks to these skrimbo’s, meanwhile they were calling me through my phone number because Discord’s security is hot fucking garbage. Once someone has access to your account by simply finding your cached email and session token, they get access to your servers, DMs, phone number, email, possible attached payment methods if you have Nitro, and they can log all of it and wipe your servers and account clean. I’ve got floods of messages of people telling me to enable 2 factor authentication when it was always turned on. If there’s one thing I’ve learned from this, it’s to NEVER, EVER keep your stuff on Discord, because someone can easily swoop in and give you nightmares for a couple of days. I still think about this situation to this day, just because of the impact it left on me. I found out who was behind this hack and I never looked at them in a good way since.

Movies, Movies, Movies!​

Something a little less dark. While I’m still getting my motivation back to actively play single player games, I found another great distraction this year – or so did many other people. Somewhere around May, me and other people started organizing weekly movie nights and we’re still doing it. Every time it’s a blast, and we’ve watched a lot of varying genre’s. I think it’s safe to say I’ve watched more movies than I played video games this year, and I’m a little bit proud of it, because I barely watch any movies. The only times I do watch them is when they air on TV. I don’t even watch Netflix anymore! All I used it for this year is watching Squid Game, and I never even finished it, I think I stopped on episode 4. If you’re curious, I put a full list of every movie we’ve watched this year, and I really hope we can continue doing this for at least 3 years.

School's...​

Something that I almost forgot at this point is that I passed my exams with no fails. I was pretty nervous, even though I started practicing 3 weeks ahead of my first exam. On the day that everyone was called up, everyone that I knew in my class was there wearing flags they got from our teachers as capes, and it was super fun hanging out with my classmates, as it would be the last day we would be together as a group. Wonder how they are doing now, since I lost almost all forms of contact with them.

...uhh...​

Something I was debating with myself is if I should’ve gone to HAVO or MBO. For those outside of the Netherlands, after you passed your exams, you go to MBO, which is where you’ll pick a study to become your future job. At that point, most of the stuff you learned from regular school (history, math, languages, etc.) is dropped and you put all your focus in your future job (in this case I’m doing something called “media design”). But if you meet a specific list of requirements, you can also go to HAVO, which is where you continue with regular school on a higher level. As it wasn’t obvious already, I went with MBO just because of how excited I was about Photoshop, Illustrator and all of the other Adobe junk. I think it’s safe to say that going to MBO was a mistake. Not a huge one, but big enough that I regret it.

...not going great.​

The way we get taught at my school is something a lot of people aren’t happy with. The tasks we get are either laughably easy or give such a short deadline that I went into panic mode a couple of times. One time I actually freaked the fuck out, and the rest of my week was completely ruined all thanks to school. We had 4 days to put together an entire brochure with original text, high quality images and a list of specific requirements. I was with a group of 2, but the other guy was only thinking about getting it finished as quick as possible so he could leave class early. Not to mention, we’re now also getting tasks where we just haven’t been taught the ability to do specific things. Now they’re asking us to create onomatopoeia’s being used in a comic form. As a school, it’s YOUR duty to teach US how to draw body proportions, but they can’t even do that. This school is a fucking disaster, no other words for it. I don’t even have friends I can sit next to in my own class or even people that talk to me, and I’m starting to wonder how much longer I’m willing to stay here.

Work For Your Money​

Rewinding a bit, this year was also when I got my very first job! I don’t have much to say because, just like school, nobody really talks to me. Though, that’s not because the people there are shit, they just don’t know a goddamn word of Dutch. Most of them speak Chinese and the language barrier is pretty clear here. That doesn’t stop me though, because I’m always doing my job and it pays pretty damn well to begin with. Problem is, the new Covid regulations forced most workplaces to close yet again, including the place I work at, so me and many others were temporarily laid off. They did give me a Christmas packet that had a box of chocolate in it though, so I’m definitely not gone from there yet.

Can You Hear Me?​

Nothing noteworthy really happened in the last 1/3rd of the year, because it was mostly “SCHOOL SUCKS, FUCK THIS SHIT”. Not that I’ll be going too in-depth, but I feel like the people around me don’t really acknowledge me anymore. I really have to get people’s attention now so they start talking to me, and it sucks. Combining that with school, and you’ve got a combo of me not feeling so well lately. It isn’t that I’m depressed or anything, just feeling a lot sadder when life could be a lot better. Because of that, this year felt kinda shit, especially because I didn’t do a whole lot myself, and because I barely met any new people. My mom is fully supporting me in that regard, and I appreciate it, because she’s the only one that listens to what I have to say, even if she doesn’t always agree with me, which is fine.

something i quickly noted down​

Oh yeah, somewhere in this year, my rabbit passed away. There’s not a whole lot to say, he died of old age but there’ll never be a rabbit as calm and relaxing as him again. He died at the age of 12, so I’ve known him for at least 3/4th of my life. Rest in peace buddy.

Resolutions & A Thank You​

Other than that, it’s December 31st. Time to start thinking positive and looking forward to the new year. Here’s my plans:

• Get some actual work done on my game. It’s more of a private project at this point, but I’ve barely done anything this year. I don’t even have a proof of concept. I want to change that for 2022.
• Get in contact with more people. Although Covid and these piss fuck shit cum rules make it harder (you need a QR code to enter stuff like festivals and other facilities, only obtainable by being vaccinated or getting a negative test result that lasts 24 hours), it’s something that I want to get tackled.
• Get back to actively playing video games. I can stream my entire library now no problem with the cheap capture devices I got. I did stream and get to around 65% of completion with Super Mario Galaxy this year, but that’s not enough. Besides that, the games that I feel like I actually played this year (meaning completed in a way) are Captain Toad (attempt at 100%), Antonball Deluxe, a prerelease build of Grapple Dog that was uploaded to Steam by accident, Galaxy, Mario Kart 8 (as I would occasionally play it with people that come here), Sonic Mania (normal 100% run), a couple of Roblox games, Pizza Tower (with various mods), and maybe a couple of other things that I forgot. I don’t really have a clear record of what I played, as I instead bought a lot, put it on my shelf and forgot about it.
• Think more positive. All of this negative thinking and talking really does something to you.
• Draw more. I’ve asked for a simple drawing tablet for my birthday. If school isn’t gonna teach me, I’ll do it myself.
• Do more stuff on my YouTube channel, as there has been some stuff sitting in my video source folder that I feel like has to be put out there.

If you’ve come this far, then I want to thank you for reading my lengthy blog post, I really appreciate it. Normally I wouldn’t make these kinds of lengthy posts, but I felt like ending the year by dumping my thoughts and events in a single thread would help lift a lot of weight off my shoulders. No year is perfect, and with this one being as empty as it could be with stuff that already happened constantly repeating helped this one being less favorable. I want to thank my mom and the rest of my family for helping me through this, and any people online that supported me. You’re all awesome. Now it’s time for a new year with new memories!