Well, nearly two weeks into the New Year and I finally get around to starting to write this, a quick look back on the year that was 2008 inspired, entirely, by Craig’s similar post on the subject from a short while back.

Still, better late than never, eh? *sigh* There’s one resolution already on its way out then…

Anyway, one thing that came up when I was deciding what I wanted to write was how best to structure it. Chronologically seems the most logical, but then there’s also the options of trying to categorize everything. Oo, decisions, decisions! Anyway, I settled, more or less, on chronological order, divided into quarters as, conveniently, my life this year largely fits into them. Sad, really. Some will be more detailed than others but, hopefully, none of this will turn into a Super-Wall-of-Text for you to struggle through, most of it has already been covered in previous posts.

First Quarter

The year started in a painfully slow way. I was without a job, lacking much motivation to really go out and find one, stuck on an almost American Timezone by playing Eve most nights and sleeping much of the days, in a relationship that was soon to end and by and large getting by on the money I’d brought back from Egypt. Don’t get me wrong, it was fun, but leaves little to talk about.

I applied for a couple of jobs, one of which I now do, and enjoy. But, during this time it didn’t look likely that it was going to happen. I didn’t, in all ho0nesty, know what I wanted to do with myself. I knew what I’d like to be in, but couldn’t work out what I was going to do if I didn’t get offered any of the jobs I’d been offered. In all honesty, I was edging closer to the idea that I was going to be going back out to Egypt with my tail between my legs and trying to part time study so I could get a proper job. Not that I’ve ever been particularly opposed to going back out, but I’d hate to be going back appearing as though it was a last resort. “That’s pride fucking with you. Fuck pride.” But that’s largely by the by.
By the end of the quarter I hadn’t heard from any of the jobs I’d applied for and was really needing to get some sort of income / generally getting impatient.

In Eve, I was still with TGRADS, who were still with the (now sleeping) Brutally Clever Empire out in the region of Fountain. We’d moved there pretty soon after I’d got back from Egypt, so I was fairly psyched about it all and being a part of it, which goes some way to explaining why I was playing so much into the New Year.
However, various things happened in game, one of which was the general direction BRUCE was heading, and the stepping down of FOOM, the Executor Alliance. FOOM, for me, seemed to share many of the positive points that TGRADS have, and had pushed BRUCE in the right direction throughout its time and into Fountain. Once in Fountain, the mass influx of Corps that generally didn’t seem to share the BRUCE ethos I’d been used to left me a bit disillusioned. When FOOM left, along witha  few fellow TGRAD members, I decided it was time for me to step back out of 0.0 based life for a while and work out what I want to do in Eve. So I ran back to Empire to work out what I wanted.

Second Quarter

Pretty much started with me working at Bigland Hall Equestrian up near the Lake District, doing pretty basic office stuff / organization. It was dull and slow at times, and I didn’t always get on with the management, but it wasn’t terrible and, perhaps more importantly, it was something to do. In landing that job, I have to thank Carol, my old employer from Capernwray Diving, for putting me in touch and recommending me so highly. God knows I needed the kick up the arse a job provided. It was fun, it was a bit different, and I got the Outdoorsy parts of it I needed by nervously trying to help out with bits on the yard every now and then.
It was good, and I felt pretty thankful for the job as it was, so I was left feeling pretty dreadful when I got a letter through the post inviting me for an interview to my current employers, the job I’d applied for nearly 2 months early. To say it was a surprise is a massive understatement.

As excited as I was about it though, I couldn’t get myself too excited, as I still highly doubted I’d get through the interview and survive, nevermind get the job. However, through some weird turn of events I got back for a second interview and got offered the job, starting in June. It was pretty difficult to break it to my boss at Bigland Hall that I was going to be leaving, but I couldn’t bring myself to pass up the chance to work in an industry I’d always wanted to get into.

Other than that though, it’s fair to say little else of note happened in terms of life stuff. There was the trip to Farnes, plenty of beer and silly nights out, and general good times. As is often the problem, having a regular income convinced me that regular outgoings are fine and dandy.

As for Eve, well, I was no longer in TGRADS and BRUCE, and was sort of missing the camaraderie I enjoyed with TGRADS. I was enjoying doing the bits myself, JW, and Mystified were doing, but I severely lacked motivation, and went through and early mid-life-crisis style moment when I cancelled my subscriptions to take some time off from the game. I think I lasted about 3 weeks. I just lost any motivation to play and do what I was doing, and felt I needed to take some time to actually make myself do things besides that when I was home from work, like catching up on reading and similar. Of course, I knew I was never going to actually _quit_ the game fully, I just needed some time out to work out what I wanted to do next in game and try some other games / get some other stuff done.
It was good, needed, and enjoyed, but it was good to be back in the game again, renewed and confident in my enjoyment of it.

Third Quarter

The one downside about getting the job offer when I did with the start date it had was that it came at just about the same time as a bunch of events / time off that I’d had lined up and booked off when I was at Bigland, all of which required me taking some time off almost immediately. In fact, I did 4 days, then took the Friday off to go to Oxford for Illumina. The full writeup of that is linked there, but it was bloody epic. A great experience, and a thoroughly bloody good laugh. I’ll definitely be trying to do it again.
So, a heavy weekend in Oxford then back into my new place of work, trying to get used to things, remaining convinced that I was in way over my head, and with a new nickname of sorts. If it wasn’t for the ‘in over my head’ feeling, I would have been fine. Nice bunch of people, fairly small crowd to get used to, and in an area I’m interested in and learn from every day. Bloody lucky, really.

Less than two weeks later I was having to take time off again, this time nearly a week in total, as I’d gone and got myself tickets for Glastonbury Festival and was heading down there with Mike, John, Owen and Duncan for the festivities. It felt bloody cheeky to be taking such a lot of time off work so soon after starting but I’m glad I did. It really was superb. And makes me look forward to this year’s event greatly.

So, Glastonbury finished, I recovered my senses, and the weekend after I went to LUGRadio Live 2008 – another fun event, just as much as the year before. Fortunately, this one didn’t require any more time off work.

The other weeks of this quarter passed by largely without incident. The weekends remained busy with various things, and the weeks were filled with work. As work progressed the ‘in over my head feeling’ subsided slightly, although, just as it does now, new things kept being uncovered to keep me confused, just as the earlier things became clearer. All good fun.

Back in the Eve Universe, I was back into the swing of things after taking a break and decided I wanted to get TD back into the pew pew aspects of the game. I put out a few recruiting posts on some of the forums to see what came back and see what took my fancy. I’d already decided I didn’t want to get back into full 0.0 politics again and get tied up in the tedium that is space control, but I did want to get back with a decent group of a moderate size that knew their pew pew. I got a few invitations of interest, the two that I thought long and hardest about being Contraband Inc. and Jericho Fraction.
Contra were the first group I got the invite to talk to, and I really did find them an interesting option. They had been a fairly longstanding member of the infamous Mercenary Coalition I had followed stories of for so long and, being mercenary-orientated and no longer in an alliance I wasn’t going to have to worry about them getting too caught up in 0.0 politics any time soon. They’re a bunch I know of for their ability to pew pew, and so they would have been able to teach me a good few things, and it would be a new approach, one that I haven’t tried before. The downside was that the few members I did meet in their public channel I never really managed to gel with.
Jericho Fraction, the executor corp of The Star Fraction alliance, was a name I’d known since some of my earliest days in the game, and one I’d come to respect. The website explains it much better than I can in a sentence but, essentially, JFand subsequently SF is a Roleplaying alliance within the game taking the line of anarchists (to put it as simply as I can) – a line which, in terms of game mechanics, is quite tricky to play out and gain ‘markable’ progress (at least, that was how I’d always viewed it). I’d always toyed with applying to join the Fraction throughout my time in Eve but never did for a couple of reasons – (1) I didn’t (arguably still don’t) think I had the Roleplay / Writing skills to be of value to the group, and (2) Until I had joined TGRADS I had experienced nothing of the PvP side of the game so never thought I had anything to bring to the table there either. So this time, when I got a recommendation to look at them more closely, I pretty much instantly realized that I was going to apply to JF and see what happens. Shortly after I applied I got another invitation to speak to a name I had heard of but knew little about but decided against it, focusing my efforts on getting in with the group I’d admired for so long. In terms of what I’d been thinking when I put up the availability posts, JF hit all the boxes – the people I spoke to in the Public channel were friendly, amusing, and interesting; the alliance was small enough that realisitically I could see myself being able to speak and get to know most of them, they take part in a lot of small-scale gang warfare in varying environments, have positively no desires of standard 0.0 empire-building policies, and the interview process was superb.
It sounds sad to admit it, but I was actually remarkably proud when I did get accepted, and just wished I had more playtime to really make the most of it. It’s proved to be just as much fun as I’d hoped for.

Fourth Quarter

In many ways this was by far the quietest quarter in terms of anything notable, the one exception being a trip to Reykjavik in Iceland for the Eve Online Fanfest. It was a fun trip, if over all to quickly. I’ll be making an effort to go to this year’s, that’s for sure.

Work continued at a steady pace, with plenty of stuff to be doing, new things to get to grips with and still more and more stuff that keeps me on my toes. The chance to be out and about increased and I’m pretty damn happy with how it’s gone. Overall I’m still occasionally a bit nervous that compared to others around me doing the same job, I’m the weak link, but at the same time I think I’m getting a lot out of it.

Eve-wise, things have steadily plodded on. I’m still with SF, out in the Amarr-Minmatar conflict zones hassling the Amarrians. It’s been damn good fun so far.

Looking Forward

So, that was last year, what about this one?

Well, I don’t make resolutions as such, so that’s out, but what in general do I aim to do during the year?

• Start running regularly again – I’m aiming for 3 times a week
• Keep on enjoying and learning at work
• Go to Glastonbury again
• See Bob Dylan live in concert (Glasgow, May)
• Move into somewhere I can call my own
• Head back out to Egypt on holiday to see friends I’ve not seen in over a year now
• Read more
• Sort out my personal time management so I can spend some more time in Eve and make a real impact for SF

And that’s about it. I was toying with going into details there, but I’m sure I’ll do that as and when it happens. I was also going to list some regrets, but then I realized I don’t really have any. There’s been plenty of things last year that could well be described as ’sub-optimal’, but they’re all just part of the learning curve, and to regret them would be silly.

Job done.