All of this has happened before and all of this will happen again...

When a new year rolls around, it seems custom dictates that we look back upon it and those of us so inclined to waffle on do so in that retrospective manner. Those of us so inclined take to using bizarrely structured sentences with big words to make themselves sound ever so more eloquent than they really are, to promote the idea of intelligence. That or the person in question has just watched the last episode of Sherlock again and as such is feeling like prancing around and being a smartass. Unfortunately, that is all I'd be able to do as I lack Sherlock Holmes' rather brilliant deductive processes.

Anyway, that's a digression. Back to the matter at hand, which is the retrospective look at 2013. Blame old Janus for that one, two-headed know-it-all. Thanks to that particular god - who, fun fact, has no equivalent in Greek mythology - we spend a lot of January (shockingly enough named after him, vain little bugger) looking back at the year before and planning on doing so many wonderful things in the year ahead. We call them New Year's Resolutions, more commonly known as "sign up for the gym in January then stop going in February because I can't be arsed". Disclaimer - there are those in this world who do manage to actually stick to their resolutions and kudos to them, but I'm one of the little naysayers who doesn't even bother them. No definite philosophical aversion that I'm going to jam down your throats, I've just never felt the need for them. Simple apathy really.

Oh bollocks, I'm digressing ONCE AGAIN. Ahem. All right then. 2013.

First off, thirteen. The number has itself a bit of an unlovely rep. In the western world we have this undue obsession with thirteen being unlucky. In fact, in the later months of 2013, I was serving a customer - as my job requires - and as they had ordered food, I gave them an order number. It happened to be thirteen. So they said "Can I have another number?" Now I'm usually one to just bend over backwards and say "Yes, sir, of course, sir, no problem, whatever you like, sir." But I developed an affinity for thirteen in my old age. I happen to think it's a bit of a misunderstood number, the underdog that everyone should be rooting for. So my less-than-composed response was something along the lines of "Really?" The gentleman did not seem entirely impressed, especially when I tried to explain my off-hand objection in the context of my feelings towards thirteen. Epitomised by the serial number of my Colonial Fleet dogtags, 428813. I changed the number despite him apparently yielding to my defence of thirteen. Just to attempt to keep the customer happy, even though I'm 99.9% certain that he was distinctly unimpressed by the whole exchange.

But that's the latter half of 2013. Let's talk about the beginning. Now the last time I did a retrospective, I talked a lot about movies, babbled a little about books and went all gushing about people. Not sure if I'm going to do all of that, but there is some kind of abstract exploration I want to do. You see, when 2014 rolled around, I noted many people on the dread website Facebook noting how glad they were it was over. Indeed, I managed to blunder myself into one of my trademark hole-digging session on New Year's Day, just after the stroke of midnight, when I decided that there was really only one person I wanted to text and did so, expressing the sentiments to the effect of a hope that the coming year would prove as awesome as the last. Only to discover that in spite of several awesome things having happened to this person, a lot of crap happened afterwards. I sense, from the tidal wave of Facebook sighs of relief that many people felt that way about 2013.

Given my affinity for the number, I had some pretty high hopes that 2013 was going to be my year. It's been hinted and intimated on many an occasion (or maybe not, so some exposition will follow) that I have been attempting to woo/impress the object of my affections. First of all, object of my affections is an awfully unfortunate phrase. This person is not an object, they're a rather fantastic human being who on several occasions I was quite absolutely sure I'd completely blown it with. The beginning of the year being the first roll of a tiny snowball down the mountain, that eventually tumbled down and exploded at the end of June. Thank the Lords of Kobol that when it did, I discovered the lady in question did not in fact revile me or want me gone, they actually quite value my friendship and thus my affections have safely died away and some seem to be stirring elsewhere, but what becomes of that remains to be seen.

So, a little more geeky context. Earlier in 2013, I mentioned a television show called The Almighty Johnsons, the main thrust of which is the mortal incarnation of Odin seeking to reunited with his true love, the mortal incarnation of Frigg. Since watching the show, this has been something of a theme, the quest to find the Frigg to my Odin. Let's face it, if I could be Odin going around defeating frost giants and looking particularly badass with an eye-patch, it wouldn't be so bad. But I'm not exactly Odin, I just like the phrasing, "the Frigg to my Odin". Other potentials are "the Starbuck to my Apollo" and "the Holmes to my Watson". All in keeping with a theme of finding...companionship. I hesitate to say more because it feels a little too much like tempting the gods and they have an awfully annoying habit of making things awkward and pissing themselves laughing at the folly of mortals. That and it seems to me that there is a perception, nay even a prejudice, against those who seek to bestow affection on those they deem worthy of it. Phrases such as "You'll find it when you're not looking" are commonly thrown at you, should you dare to actually believe that you can find your Frigg. Or Odin. I can testify that things seem to work best when someone comes out of the clear blue sky, tearing through the little bubble world you've been in and drop-kicking you in all of the complicated feels, but nonetheless I do hope that I can find my Frigg. And if not, I can definitely say I've made some wonderful friends along the way.

AHEM. I think it's time to move swiftly on to a point that I've kind of been building up to. It's kind of a life philosophy. About six years ago, the world as I had wanted it to be crumbled down around me. The woman I believed I loved promptly turned around and jumped on some other donkey, dangling the false carrot of possible friendship as opposed to reconciliation and pretty much left me to emotionally bleed to death. Gods, that was awfully melodramatic. Anyway. As a result, I became even more of determinist in order to reconcile what had happened with the way I believe the world should be. Eventually, this evolved into a simple mantra - "Bad fortune is merely good fortune in a very clever disguise". Now in some cases, this is extremely hard to follow. I know because by sheer virtue of believing something, you invite others to criticise and challenge you. By way of example, 2013 put one of my friends through the absolute frakkin' ringer. Hades himself couldn't have been more sadistically evil in torturing them. Yet I believe that all that bad fortune, all the bad things that have happened, happened with good reason. It may not show itself immediately, but the reason is frakkin' out there.

Before this life philosophy attracts more raised eyebrows and strenuous objections, time to move on to the housekeeping. Well, the little details, more relevant to my journey through 2013. I've covered the big, nearly screwed-it-up-with-amazing-person-who-still-wants-to-be-my-friend, but 2013 wasn't all me bumbling around trying to love someone who loved me back, but only as a friend. In fact, in terms of my working life, 2013 was frakkin' epic. On the front of my paying job, I had a boss who unlike the last two jokers actually had the vaguest hint of a clue what they are doing. A revelation after the abject hell me and my colleagues had been through in the previous year. Then, as I mentioned in my last blog entry of 2013, I actually started and finished the first draft of my novel! Backtracking to the bad fortune/good fortune thing, I want to say that 2013 is almost...part one of a trilogy. Or maybe part two. Heck, it's Empire Strikes Back. The bad guys have one, the good guys are on the run, but all the crap we've been through, all the things that have happened good or bad have set us up for where we're going to be next. So 2014, if it turns out to be as awesome as everyone hopes, might just owe a frakton of thanks to 2013 for being so crap.

Also in 2013 where some other artistic, non-writing touches, but not by me. First of all, I had my first ever tattoo:

In keeping with my nerdiness and obsession with Battlestar Galactica, this is the Colonial symbol for Scorpia. To put it as simply as I hope I can, each of the Twelve Colonies of Kobol is named after the twelve constellations of the Zodiac. So, if you go by my logic, to figure out which colony you're from and which symbol is yours, look at this simple table, pick out your star sign and BOOM, that's your colony:

Aries - Aerilon.
Taurus - Tauron.
Gemini - Gemenon.
Cancer - Canceron.
Leo - Leonis.
Virgo - Virgon.
Libra - Libran.
Scorpio - Scorpia.
Sagittarius - Sagittaron.
Capricorn - Caprica.
Aquarius - Aquaria.
Picses - Picon.

For further information on the Twelve Colonies of Kobol, visit the helpful Battlstar Galactica wiki or, if you're in anyway obsessed with Galactica like me, go to Quantum Mechanix and buy the Map of the Twelve Colonies. It's where I took the symbol from that is now permanently inked on my arm. So say we all. Straight-faced this time. Also, photo credit goes to my colleague, call sign "Sonic" on account of his mohawk (not blue though), who as of Monday, 13th January 2014, has become my wingman. This could turn into a very interesting year...

The next subject of art is also in a similar tattoo vein. You see, I've wanted a tattoo for ages. Before I decided on the Scorpia Colonial symbol as my first tattoo, I came up with the idea of a dragon and a wolf in a Yin-Yang pattern. As luck would have it, I'm friends with a rather brilliant artist, Jennie Gyllblad. Click the name to discover her website and the brilliance of her work. Further good fortune smiled upon me, as she accepts commissions, so I commissioned her to design it. Now, given that I am something of a fan of The Song of Ice and Fire books and the associated television show, the design is a Targaryen dragon and a Stark direwolf. It now sits, beautifully framed, on my desk, right next to my computer. It looks (sans frame) a little something like the link you can click on which is these words. It is supremely beautifully awesome and much kudos goes to Jennie for her hard work and artistic genius. Still debating the tattooing of it upon my body, but by gods I still have an awesome piece of artwork to proudly display in my humble hall.

I suspect I have waffled on for a lot longer than I usually do and about subjects I don't usually waffle about, though I suppose that just goes to show that I feel a bit strongly about some of these things. Especially the bad fortune/good fortune thing. It's not the most popular life philosophy, mostly because people look on it as a cop-out, a cheap way of excusing bad things. It doesn't excuse them, barely explains them. What I hope it says, what I want to say to the people who have had a shit 2013, the people I care about who know who they are and will punch me repeatedly for being so stupidly sentimental, is that the bad things don't have to rule us. They happened because they needed to, to put us on the path we're on now. Hell, at the risk of getting myself shot, it's time for a final thought.

This year, I started out being completely in love with this incredible girl. I still love her in this moment right now, but I cannot stress enough how platonic that feeling is. She is my friend. For the very good reason that without falling in love with her, without expressing my feelings to her, putting myself through the ringer with own neuroses and insecurity, I could not be the man I am now. Slightly more confident than yesterday. Looking at 2014 with Mal's pistol strapped to his hip, the promise of Vera on the horizon (see QMx's Facebook page for context), high hopes for a Mk II Viper one day and hoping that maybe, just maybe, out there somewhere, is the Frigg to his Odin, the Starbuck to his Apollo.

I was an adventurer once, until I took an arrow to the knee

I was a blogger once, until Skyrim came along and put a twisted, game-addiction version of Cupid's infamous arrows into me. Probably not my knee as I can still walk...when I'm not sitting at my computer and playing the aforementioned computer game.

It goes largely without saying that I've been neglecting my updating of this blog for a good long while. Mostly Skyrim, but that pesky little bastard known as Life also shares some blame here. Strangely enough, Life is going to be something of the running theme of this post. Well, Life in the context of the events of 2012.

That's right, kids. It's the Year in Review blog entry. It had to be done.

Well, I wanted to one. So there.

Of course, a lot of 2012's major events have been thoroughly catalogued in the thirty-four preceding entries. But I'm going to ramble on anyway, maybe filling in some gaps that I left. But we'll see about that.

Logically, we start at the beginning January 2012. The landmark of January, aside from starting up this blog, was seeing The Artist. Anyone paying attention to film news and the Oscars, etc., knows that The Artist received many accolades. And in my humble opinion, quite rightly so.

Being, I hope, dear and loyal readers of this blog, you might not think that The Artist was my kind of movie. If you take a look at the cinema tickets stuck to my wall...well, this year's rogues gallery includes Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists, Avengers (obviously), The Dark Knight Rises (again with the obvious), Brave and Skyfall. I'm also half-watching the 2009 Star Trek movie as I'm writing this and Spock just said "Set phasers to stun." I felt this required comment.

Moving on...

So, The Artist doesn't seem like my usual thing. But I absolutely loved it. It was a beautiful, brilliantly realised work of cinema and quite deserving of all its praise. But I will say (and Phoenix, my friend I went to see the movie with, agrees), it's a movie to watch as a group and preferably in a cinema/cinema-like environment. It's just...it's a necessary part of the experience.

Staying on the track of movies, this year has seen some brilliant gems. In spite of the opinions of the readers of The LA Times, I don't feel Avengers was overrated. I had this conversation with a colleague and he drew comparison to The Shawshank Redemption. I'll admit, I have not seen this movie. I imagine that is some kind of cinematic atrocity, given the high regard it is held in. And while I have no illusions that you could compare Shawshank Redemption and Avengers and come out smelling of roses. I will simply state that I love Avengers. It's my favourite movie of the year and probably in my top ten/top five movies of all time.

Looking to future with movies and backtracking to the mention of Star Trek, I am very, very much looking forward to the cinematic year. We have Star Trek: Into Darkness, where we can finally find out just who the Seven Hells Benedict Cumberbatch is playing! Smart money so far is on either Khan or Gary Mitchell. I'm not betting on either of them just yet. Merely looking very forward to the movie.

Then...Iron Man 3.

I've been thinking a lot about movie trilogies lately. Generally the trend is that the first or second movies are the best, the third often falls down a bit. But this is Marvel. This is Iron Man. The first was awesome. The second was awesome. And I have every confidence that Robert Downey Jr will make the third instalment just as amazing as one and two.

On the subject of trilogies, The World's End, the finale in the Blood and Ice Cream trilogy from Edgar Wright, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost will be coming out this year. I'll be honest, it's taken them long enough! But nonetheless, I am looking forward to this as well as. So far, Hot Fuzz trumps Shaun of the Dead as my favourite of those movies. We'll see what happens with movie number three.

Still on the subject of trilogies, I finally watched all three Lord of the Rings movies. Yes, I know, being a twenty-four year old self-professed geek having not seen these movies up until now is pretty much tantamount to treason in geek circles. But better late than never. Overwhelmingly, The Two Towers is my favourite. I fully intend to acquire these movies on DVD, but so far the 'Verse is spurning me, hiking the prices of the boxset of the Extended Editions wherever I look. So it may be a while. But as I've shown, I get there in the end.

Onwards (well, more backwards really) to other events in 2012. Or one event in particular. Well, now that I think about it, I can make this a ramble about a tenuously interconnected series of events that can be brought under the same heading. It's the subject of friendship. Now this is going to be the shamefully sentimental part of things.

First of all, there's my dearest Oracle. She started out as one of my regular customers at work and has grown into being one of my closest and dearest friends. She's a fellow Marvel nerd, but her knowledge of the comics far exceeds mine. Which makes for some interesting discussions as I remain blissfully ignorant of the things that aren't quite right with the movies. But nonetheless, she has become very dear to me and, in keeping with her callsign, possesses much wisdom that she is more often than not called upon to impart.

Secondly, there's Kraken. Again, someone I met through work. A charming American girl with intriguing tattoos and a bag with a steampunk-y octopus on it. Hence her callsign became Kraken. That and she resides in an area of the United States where she is surrounded by water. It was a curious friendship that developed...I innocently commented on the awesomeness of her tattoos and her bag, she was sufficiently impressed by our conversations that day that Facebook connections were established and a brilliant trans-Atlantic friendship has developed.

Finally, but in no way an afterthought, there is Thief. The Rhaegar Targaryen to my Lyanna Stark. Because it has been firmly established that I am the girl in our dynamic. I have no shame in this. It's a complicated tango we dance and I do not regret a second of it. Thief, so named for her desire to steal my replica of Malcolm Reynolds' pistol, is an exceptionally brilliant and beautiful lady. I'm just a gushing, sentimental fool. Nonetheless...I met her on the same day I met someone else awesome - the GRRM Reaper, George R.R. Martin. Though, in true sentimental fool style, meeting her was much more awesome. For one thing, she's stuck around and said more than three words to me!

I'm getting so much more than an arrow to the knee for this. Regardless, these three are just the latest addition to my rogues gallery of amazing friends. I love you all, you incredible, complicated and beautiful people.

On the subject of meeting authors, this year I had the privilege to meet British science-fiction author Peter F. Hamilton. Whenever I go into a bookshop, I inevitably gravitate towards the science-fiction section. In fact, whenever I meet up with my friend Phoenix, our usual meeting point is the sci-fi section. So naturally, I'm always browsing the books and, as I mentioned when I reviewed A Quantum Murder, my eyes continually rested upon Hamilton's books. In honour of the release of his latest book, Great North Road, he came to Bath to do a talk and book signing. So in addition to buying the tome-like Great North Road, I brought along the Greg Mandel Series and had them all signed.

But the most brilliant thing for me was getting to talk to Hamilton. When meeting the GRRM Reaper...well, it was a packed-out church with an estimated...three hundred people in attendance. The event for Peter F. Hamilton was a lot smaller, allowing for more books to be signed and a little more idle chit-chat. During his talk, Hamilton mentioned an incident where he was in a taxi with his friends (while he was writing Great North Road, set in Newcastle) and idly noted that he needed to go to Newcastle to find somewhere he could dump a body in the Tyne. His friends had to assure the taxi driver that he wasn't a murderer, just a writer. Very much similar to incident with me. I was on the bus back from uni, discussing my novel with one of my classmates. At one point, I was talking about blowing up a research facility with orbital railguns, potentially killing hundreds. I turned to the girl sitting next to my classmate and sheepishly explained that I was just a writer. It was...well, somewhat comforting to find that I'm not the only writer this has happened to. Odds probably always said I wouldn't be the only one, but it's nice to have proof.

By and large, what is there to say about 2012? It's been an incredibly intriguing year. Complicated, like all things in life. But it's been one of those years that has shown how much I have to learn about the worlds. I've learned much about myself, the most important thing being a revelation I had about happiness. It's put me on a long road, a road under the glare of an unforgiving sun, where each step lasts an eternity. The horizon shimmers, my destination shrouded in heat haze, but one way or another, it is there. But by all the gods in Asgard and Olympus, there isn't a power in this 'Verse that can stop me from getting there.

Yikes. I do seem to get carried away when being all crazy and emotional. But oh well. Sometimes you just need to.

As for 2013, it's started off...well, mixed really. I discovered that my PayPal account was hacked and £600 spent, which was pretty annoying and forced a major overhaul of my passwords, but I still have hope for this year. Thirteen is a greatly misunderstood number, but I have hope for it. Come 2014, I hope to be posting another one of these reflections. Hopefully a great deal more....positive. Not that this isn't positive. Like all things in the worlds, it's complicated. But complicated isn't necessarily a bad thing.

I feel there's so many more things to say, but I think I'm running out of space and this may just be the longest entry I've ever posted. And the most dangerous. But that remains to be seen. But there we have it. 2012. You were a good, complicated year. Here's hoping for a frakking great, Tyrionically complicated year for 2013.