A follow up to my '2009 Year In Review' post, which was actually my second ever post! This may be heavy with links, as it means I have to write less about each event.
In January I decided to blog. In the past I have had unsuccessful attempts at writing diaries, but decided a blog could solve my problems. It could be a place for my 100 Things To Do List, and courage me to keep doing fun things to have something to write about. I bought my Birth Whisky, a drink that will only be drank at key times in my life. My Swedish friends came to stay with me which was fun. One of the funniest moments of the year happened, when a crazy guy latched on to me and Neil in the pub. Omglan played another dodgeball game in Leicester. FFFF was born, a much loved weekly work-place game, which quickly became the most viewed thing on the blog. One of the most important things was that The Shelf was built. January was a pretty epic month, and usually Januaries are quite boring, and depressing after Christmas. The year had started off very well!
February started off slightly quieter, and on a bit of a downer after I left £10 in a cash point (that money could really come in handy now), but picked up when Melissa made me a painting for valentines day. Later in the month I had a busy Saturday which included photoshoot (which in retrospect turned out to be my last due to my sudden dislike for modelling), and then ice-skating and conquering the biggest web thing ever. One of the most important thing to happen in the month is that I joined the boxing gym, something which has pretty much occupied me all year round.
March started off a pretty exciting month, with me losing my tyres and brakes on the motorway, and getting a behaviour warning from Sony. I got on Google Street View, went to Prague, and crossed two things off my list.
March was a bit of a turning point one way or another, in that I broke up with Melissa. I have purposely kept almost everything about my relationships off my blog. Not that I am bothered about writing personal things about myself, but that it could seem hurtful to other people. All I will say about it is that since before me and Tara split up, I had wanted to be single. When I met Melissa, I still wanted to be single. She was the first person I had seen after Tara, and it was too soon for me to start dating again. Regardless, things got serious and we ended up together, though I still knew that I wanted to be single, and couldn't be happy in a relationship until I had been single for a decent time.
April saw my decline in blogging. I was feeling negative, and didn't really want to keep writing whining things on my blog, so I decided just to mostly keep off it. It was a month of getting used to being single, which meant being able to meet up with some friends that I hadn't before (not in 'that' way, but sometimes having a girl over may seem weird to a girlfriend). Aside from going camping in Newquay, and starting sparring in boxing, not all that much happened.
May picked up a lot. I did more fun things, such as going to see Infected Mushroom with Della (crossing that off my list - Infected Mushroom, not Della, obviously). Kellie, my Australian friend, stayed over and we went out - which was really fun. Me and Dan braved a 2 mile, pitch black tunnel on our bikes, and a house very close to me found bombs in their garden. Also, Melissa told me she was going to be living in France for the Summer. Although we were apart, this made me sad.
Towards the end of May I had a sudden impulse to move out of home. I viewed a few places, and settled on the one I liked most (obviously). My mom took this as an insult, and that I am moving out to get more freedom, but that really wasn't the reason. I had a lot of freedom at home, and my parents did a lot for me, though I thought it would be nice to have my own place, and to have more people my age around to go out with, and be able to have house parties, and be able to have people.. stop over.
June was another month with very few blog posts. I spent a lot of the month going out and meeting the people in the area. I had continued boxing, and was starting to improve in sparring. I proved my manliness by building a BBQ with Neil, reminiscent to when we built the shelf. I also had my very first house party! On the nights I was meeting up with a lot of friends, like Belinda, Della, Emily, Amy, and Charlotte. And most days I was watching the world cup (which turned out to be terrible).
In July Neil moved away - the bastard. This made me quite sad too. I was made happier when I booked flights to Brazil with Andy. It was quite a good month. It was fairly quiet at first, but I had an amazing birthday, which included paintballing and a house party. At the end of the month I went to Paris to meet up with Melissa, which, although I was a bit worried about, turned out to be a really nice time.
I always love the Summer, and August was no exception. Spending the first few days still in Paris, I got back and had one of the more memorable holidays in Malia with the lads. It was memorable for good and bad reasons. Part way through, it became obvious that me and my friends were expecting very different things, which meant I spent a lot of time on my own. That was fine though, it's quite easy to make friends there. Though I still have a swollen finger and scars on my hand from smashing the glasses, but Dave's arm has mostly healed.
Also, Melissa returned from France early, and we started seeing each other more. Including finding my first geocache!
In September, my housemate Amy, who I spent lots of nights talking to about everything, was moving out to go travelling. I was sad. We threw a big party to say bye which was fun. Shortly after, it was announced that I would be having my first boxing fight. I was a little nervous, as it was going to be in Bhams biggest night club, in front of over 600 people. September was fairly uneventful due to the none stop boxing training. I agreed to build the gym a database system in exchange for private sessions with Neil, an ex professional boxer - my first proper freelancing. Later in the month the guy who I was meant to be fighting broke his ribs, and the opponent changed to one of my friends, Ed.
September also saw the return of OMGLAN: Dodgeball, with an entire new team, kit, and most importantly - video.
October was arguably the best month of the year. This was partly due to having, and winning my first boxing fight. It was an amazing rush. The adrenalin was crazy. It made me not even that bothered about getting my first parking ticket. A couple of days after the fight I was off to Lithuania, for an amazing well-deserved piss-up after all the training.
October wasn't without its problems. Although things with Melissa were good, I still didn't feel like I wanted to be in a relationship, and she found out, and we split up again. To save having to write about it in the next month too, this was quite short-lived, and I decided that I should just take it as it goes and not think I have to be looking to settle down with someone.
November started out well. I dressed up twice for Halloween. I do enjoy a good fancy dress, even though it is a bit of an effort. Interested, but entirely not bothered, about what I actually consume, I decided to keep a diary of my eating habits, and found I had nearly double the calories, and 5 times the sugar I should be having. This was another fairly quiet month, of growing a moustache and going to Morocco. I will make the joke one more time... it was for 'Mo-Rocco' (which was amazing in many, many ways).
Oh, and my second boxing match was announced for December (I was a last week replacement), which I was excited about as I felt like I had got noticeably better than the last one, after sparring for 6 months. Oh, and and Melissa got in a fight with a guy at an acapella gig.
The December boxing match sadly didn't go ahead. That was fine, as I was having too much fun playing in the snow anyway! I had blogged quite a lot more in November, and thankfully I was able to maintain it in December, thanks to things such as stupid Police Men, dressing as a zombie-nerd-slut, and the further use of my Phileas Fogg sentence.
Most of December was quite stressful, as I was late buying Christmas presents, and didn't have any idea what to get. I also realised that over the last few months I had spent far too much money, which suddenly kicked me into a frugal state. Nonetheless, Christmas this year was amazing. I stayed at home almost every night between the 23rd and New Years. I had lots of nice presents, including a steel drum from Melissa, games, aftershave and other Christmassy things from my family.
New Years, as always, was fairly quiet, but I still really enjoyed it. We played Articulate, and then charades, which Leigh made amazing.
All in all, it was a good year and I crossed 6 things off my To-Do list! If I had to summarise the year, it will be that it was a year of not being single, learning to be single, enjoying being single, not being single, boxing, and moving out of my home.
In January I decided to blog. In the past I have had unsuccessful attempts at writing diaries, but decided a blog could solve my problems. It could be a place for my 100 Things To Do List, and courage me to keep doing fun things to have something to write about. I bought my Birth Whisky, a drink that will only be drank at key times in my life. My Swedish friends came to stay with me which was fun. One of the funniest moments of the year happened, when a crazy guy latched on to me and Neil in the pub. Omglan played another dodgeball game in Leicester. FFFF was born, a much loved weekly work-place game, which quickly became the most viewed thing on the blog. One of the most important things was that The Shelf was built. January was a pretty epic month, and usually Januaries are quite boring, and depressing after Christmas. The year had started off very well!
February started off slightly quieter, and on a bit of a downer after I left £10 in a cash point (that money could really come in handy now), but picked up when Melissa made me a painting for valentines day. Later in the month I had a busy Saturday which included photoshoot (which in retrospect turned out to be my last due to my sudden dislike for modelling), and then ice-skating and conquering the biggest web thing ever. One of the most important thing to happen in the month is that I joined the boxing gym, something which has pretty much occupied me all year round.
March started off a pretty exciting month, with me losing my tyres and brakes on the motorway, and getting a behaviour warning from Sony. I got on Google Street View, went to Prague, and crossed two things off my list.
March was a bit of a turning point one way or another, in that I broke up with Melissa. I have purposely kept almost everything about my relationships off my blog. Not that I am bothered about writing personal things about myself, but that it could seem hurtful to other people. All I will say about it is that since before me and Tara split up, I had wanted to be single. When I met Melissa, I still wanted to be single. She was the first person I had seen after Tara, and it was too soon for me to start dating again. Regardless, things got serious and we ended up together, though I still knew that I wanted to be single, and couldn't be happy in a relationship until I had been single for a decent time.
April saw my decline in blogging. I was feeling negative, and didn't really want to keep writing whining things on my blog, so I decided just to mostly keep off it. It was a month of getting used to being single, which meant being able to meet up with some friends that I hadn't before (not in 'that' way, but sometimes having a girl over may seem weird to a girlfriend). Aside from going camping in Newquay, and starting sparring in boxing, not all that much happened.
May picked up a lot. I did more fun things, such as going to see Infected Mushroom with Della (crossing that off my list - Infected Mushroom, not Della, obviously). Kellie, my Australian friend, stayed over and we went out - which was really fun. Me and Dan braved a 2 mile, pitch black tunnel on our bikes, and a house very close to me found bombs in their garden. Also, Melissa told me she was going to be living in France for the Summer. Although we were apart, this made me sad.
Towards the end of May I had a sudden impulse to move out of home. I viewed a few places, and settled on the one I liked most (obviously). My mom took this as an insult, and that I am moving out to get more freedom, but that really wasn't the reason. I had a lot of freedom at home, and my parents did a lot for me, though I thought it would be nice to have my own place, and to have more people my age around to go out with, and be able to have house parties, and be able to have people.. stop over.
June was another month with very few blog posts. I spent a lot of the month going out and meeting the people in the area. I had continued boxing, and was starting to improve in sparring. I proved my manliness by building a BBQ with Neil, reminiscent to when we built the shelf. I also had my very first house party! On the nights I was meeting up with a lot of friends, like Belinda, Della, Emily, Amy, and Charlotte. And most days I was watching the world cup (which turned out to be terrible).
In July Neil moved away - the bastard. This made me quite sad too. I was made happier when I booked flights to Brazil with Andy. It was quite a good month. It was fairly quiet at first, but I had an amazing birthday, which included paintballing and a house party. At the end of the month I went to Paris to meet up with Melissa, which, although I was a bit worried about, turned out to be a really nice time.
I always love the Summer, and August was no exception. Spending the first few days still in Paris, I got back and had one of the more memorable holidays in Malia with the lads. It was memorable for good and bad reasons. Part way through, it became obvious that me and my friends were expecting very different things, which meant I spent a lot of time on my own. That was fine though, it's quite easy to make friends there. Though I still have a swollen finger and scars on my hand from smashing the glasses, but Dave's arm has mostly healed.
Also, Melissa returned from France early, and we started seeing each other more. Including finding my first geocache!
In September, my housemate Amy, who I spent lots of nights talking to about everything, was moving out to go travelling. I was sad. We threw a big party to say bye which was fun. Shortly after, it was announced that I would be having my first boxing fight. I was a little nervous, as it was going to be in Bhams biggest night club, in front of over 600 people. September was fairly uneventful due to the none stop boxing training. I agreed to build the gym a database system in exchange for private sessions with Neil, an ex professional boxer - my first proper freelancing. Later in the month the guy who I was meant to be fighting broke his ribs, and the opponent changed to one of my friends, Ed.
September also saw the return of OMGLAN: Dodgeball, with an entire new team, kit, and most importantly - video.
October was arguably the best month of the year. This was partly due to having, and winning my first boxing fight. It was an amazing rush. The adrenalin was crazy. It made me not even that bothered about getting my first parking ticket. A couple of days after the fight I was off to Lithuania, for an amazing well-deserved piss-up after all the training.
October wasn't without its problems. Although things with Melissa were good, I still didn't feel like I wanted to be in a relationship, and she found out, and we split up again. To save having to write about it in the next month too, this was quite short-lived, and I decided that I should just take it as it goes and not think I have to be looking to settle down with someone.
November started out well. I dressed up twice for Halloween. I do enjoy a good fancy dress, even though it is a bit of an effort. Interested, but entirely not bothered, about what I actually consume, I decided to keep a diary of my eating habits, and found I had nearly double the calories, and 5 times the sugar I should be having. This was another fairly quiet month, of growing a moustache and going to Morocco. I will make the joke one more time... it was for 'Mo-Rocco' (which was amazing in many, many ways).
Oh, and my second boxing match was announced for December (I was a last week replacement), which I was excited about as I felt like I had got noticeably better than the last one, after sparring for 6 months. Oh, and and Melissa got in a fight with a guy at an acapella gig.
The December boxing match sadly didn't go ahead. That was fine, as I was having too much fun playing in the snow anyway! I had blogged quite a lot more in November, and thankfully I was able to maintain it in December, thanks to things such as stupid Police Men, dressing as a zombie-nerd-slut, and the further use of my Phileas Fogg sentence.
Most of December was quite stressful, as I was late buying Christmas presents, and didn't have any idea what to get. I also realised that over the last few months I had spent far too much money, which suddenly kicked me into a frugal state. Nonetheless, Christmas this year was amazing. I stayed at home almost every night between the 23rd and New Years. I had lots of nice presents, including a steel drum from Melissa, games, aftershave and other Christmassy things from my family.
New Years, as always, was fairly quiet, but I still really enjoyed it. We played Articulate, and then charades, which Leigh made amazing.
All in all, it was a good year and I crossed 6 things off my To-Do list! If I had to summarise the year, it will be that it was a year of not being single, learning to be single, enjoying being single, not being single, boxing, and moving out of my home.
I didn't write any resolutions this year - not that I think I am perfect enough - in fact just the opposite!
ReplyDeleteI'm really looking forward to this year - you need to get yourself down to London for that bowl of noodles!
oh my goodness, how fun! seriously like half of the things that you did i am totally envious of. and damn you europeans for being able to go all over the fucking continent without even a second though. half the places you mentioned i would die to go to. seriously.
ReplyDelete6 ? i have a to do list to, i keep it on the side of my blog, let me tell you how ive only done 2 the past year!! *sigh* thats it you've inspired me! im going to try and make time for this list of mine aka. myself. great blog btw :)
ReplyDelete