How to Spend All of New Years Day on the Computer

I have a weird New Years tradition that I thought I'd share with you all! 

Every year since 2009, I've done a kind of year-reflection to keep track of how my life is going, specifically how it's changed, and my goals for the future. I do this reflection using a serious of questions that I answer each year. I keep the questions in a onenote notebook (because back in 2009, I used onenote), and I don't look at any of the questions or any of the answers at all during the year, except at New Years. This makes it so that I don't remember any of the questions or any of the answers I gave before it's time to fill it all out again. 

There are four categories of questions, and I add at least one question to each category each year, which is part of the reason why I have no idea how many questions there are and part of the reason why answering them all takes me a very long time - we're talking hours. Though to be fair I do tend to be a bit long-winded in my answers.

The four categories are:

Life, or General - These have to do with the current state of things. Age. Currently reading. That sort of thing.

Favorites - Self explanatory. Favorite books, video games, youtubers, etc.

Dreams - My hopes and dreams regarding university, love, life, etc. This is also a place to reflect on my literal dreaming, and try desperately to remember some of the dreams I've had that year.

Questions - These are specific questions I want my future self to answer every year, next year, in twenty years, etc. Did I ever post that fanfic? Are people still going on about 2012? Did you get into University? Did The Hobbit come out like it's supposed to, how was it, how did you see it, what was it like? Ordinary stuff.

There's also a section for what playthrough of Tales of Symphonia I'm currently on. When I started in 2009 I was at 3. I'm now at 6. Balling.

After I fill everything out and make new questions, I go back and read over the previous years. I love reading how I've changed over the years, with what I thought was important and what I wanted in my life. I always find it's a really great way to start a year, because you have to look back on your whole life (since 2009, anyway) and that inevitably gets you thinking about the future, and the changes and opportunities that await. I also really like seeing things come to fruition through this. In 2009 a lot of my focus was on what university would be like, because it was still just a dream. Now it's a reality! You can see your dreams come true or change as time goes by. Since 2010 I started asking frantic questions about The Hobbit movies and last year I finally got to answer them. This reflection reminds me that the things I'm excited for now will happen one day, and that anything can happen. One day I'll be using this to reflect on graduate school, getting a job, and starting a family. The future is bright!

X-MAS 2013 - A LOW DOWN.

BOOM. Christmas 2013! It happened. I made cookies. In response to my last post, I think I rose to the challenge pretty darn well and have officially regained my mojo.

THEY'RE BEAUTIFUL. Bonus points if you can name them all. I got carried away once I mastered the Star fleet uniform.

Overall Christmas was a success! Like last year we ended up hosting the Christmas party thing for my Dad's work. That's always kinda fun and kinda boring. It was better than last year in that there were fewer people and it was less party hardy and more relaxed in atmosphere. I actually quite enjoy entertaining because I like preparing for things and I can (rarely and when the occasion requires it) cook, so it's always fun helping out Mom with this sort of thing. The fact that Mom really loves doing it is also a huge plus. Whatever makes my mother happy inevitably makes the rest of us happy as well, even just to see her enjoying herself. WE LOVE YOU MOM.

I also spent most of Christmas playing Batman: Arkham Origins, which was a truly fantastic early Christmas present. Those games are just so wonderful. From start to finish- pure joy. This is the first game in the series where I've been taking my time with completion of the story, mainly because whenever I'm home I always worry that I'm not spending enough time with the family, and while I don't mind playing games in the living room with everyone, sometimes it can be a little distracting. It affects my immersion, man! Escapism! Anyway I might talk more about the game once I've completed the main story, until then I'm officially reserving judgement (unlike the Knight... badum-tiss).

So after all that Mom and I flew out on Boxing Day and headed up to Ottawa to break-in the new year with the boys. Here are some shots of the skies over Ottawa and two very sleepy travelers about 16 hours into their journey.

Blurry because I haven't mastered the focus on my phone camera yet. Lolz! It was very cold when we arrived. I kept warm via selfies.

The boys actually had lots of presents waiting for me under the tree, which was a lovely surprise! I'd been utterly content with Origins, but I feel that Yoshi slippers are always a plus. And more selfies!

Hilariously a lot of those presents are actually wrapped up empty boxes because Colin likes to fill up the tree with presents. But that's cool, right? If it works for the stores it works for the home! We've also started the tradition of wrapping everything. Everything. If you ask someone to pick up some coffee that's on sale it'll go under the tree for Christmas. Unwrapping things is fun!

It's been nice seeing my brothers again. Kevin's actually moving out soon, so he's been busy getting ready for that. It's strange. Until now I feel like every change that's happened has done so because it had to. We all moved out to go to university, and when both of my brothers came to Ottawa they got an apartment. It's different this time. Tensions are high. Adult life is odd.

I got my marks back from last semester! My best yet, I'm very very very pleased to say. One thing that's always fun about Dad's work gatherings is that I get to hear how he talks about me to his coworkers, and a little parental gushing is always a nice treat. All evidence indicates pride in their daughter, so it would appear that I'm doing my job there. And I finished a short story! Wild, I know. I finished my most recently started story, too. But don't get too excited, it's not really done done, just technically done in that all of the bits are written, but I'm not nearly convinced that they're written WELL yet. You'll never guess what it's about. It may involve androids, space travel, genetic engineering and discussion on the concept of humanity. Like I said, it's really rough around the edges right now but if I can finagle it into saying what I want it to say then I think it'll be something for me to be proud of. Accomplishment!

Overall: a successful Christmas.

As for New Years I have no photos and not really any stories to tell? Not a bad thing! I had a night in with the fam (or most of it). We played Catan, ate lots of food, played Animal Crossing and watched Ace Ventura. It was great! It's possible I'll have more to say about New Year's Day as it continues, but I'm hoping it'll shape up to be just as blissfully uneventful.