Chris Walden's Blog

2020: A Year In Review

January 1, 2021January 13, 2021 Chris Leave a comment

I had such a shit 2019 that it’s hard to be too sad about this waste of a year. It’s terrible, obviously, but I’m very grateful that my family has dodged the virus, and some have even had their first vaccination jabs against it. There’s a lot I would have like to have done, but with any luck we can make up for some lost time towards the end of next year.

Anyway, there’s nothing I can say about the virus that you haven’t already heard, so that’s enough of that. Here’s my usual rundown of the year, mostly for me to read in five years time when I’ve forgotten all of it. Woo!

2019: A Year In Review

December 31, 2019December 31, 2019 Chris Leave a comment

2019 was, for the most part, a heck of a year. Selfishly put aside all the things happening in the country that I disagreed with and yeah, I did a bunch of things I enjoyed the heck out of. Of course, even with that stick-your-head-in-the-sand approach to looking back at the year, 2019 made sure there was no doubt this is worst decade I’ll have to live through. To summarise briefly: fuck cancer.

Anyway, that’s the doom and gloom for the post so let’s get onto the neater things~

2018: A Year In Review

December 31, 2018December 31, 2018 Chris Leave a comment

I didn’t write this with the worst cold I’ve ever had in my life, so there’s an improvement over 2017. The rest of the year, well, it had its moments. Here are some of the things I got up to and feel are worth sharing.

2017: A Year In Review

January 2, 2018June 7, 2018 Chris Leave a comment

2016 might have been a complete dumpster fire, but at least… nah, 2017 was pretty bad too. A smaller dumpster fire, perhaps.

On a personal level, it’s been quite a good year. There may not have been a big Japan trip this time, but I can be happy with my improving health (save for, like, the SUPER COLD that’s been destroying me for the past week or two) and a handful of other things. I made a list!

2016: A Year In Review

January 1, 2017January 1, 2017 Chris Leave a comment

It’s New Year’s Eve 2016 and there’s nothing on TV, so it’s time for a look back at the year (that and I’m not going to remember any of this nonsense after a few weeks of 2017).

Note to future self: 2016 generally wasn’t a year worth remembering.

2015: A Year In Review

December 29, 2015December 29, 2015 Chris Leave a comment

In time honoured tradition, by which I mean that I did this last year, it’s time to convert some thoughts into words and take a look back on 2015. Not least because I’ll just forget about what happened this year if I don’t. So with all this dramatic build up, let’s get on with it!

Surviving Extra Life 2015

November 10, 2015November 20, 2015 Chris 1 Comment

I think I became aware of Extra Life two years ago. At the time, I was happy enough watching people play video games on the Internet, and watching people go from being overly enthusiastic to fighting off sleep was an entertaining bonus. The idea of running our own Extra Life stream wasn’t really floated around until after the 2014 Extra Life, and as is the case with most events that are a year away, a Trello board was made for planning.

There were more than a handful of ideas that never made it into our stream. For example, we were planning to play a bunch of board games on the stream, as it’s allowed by both Twitch and Extra Life. We played some Cards Against Humanity and a little Who Want’s to be a Millionaire? on our test stream back in April, but there was just too much downtime with people going for food and messing around with cameras for it to really be worth it.

The Grand Search for Wi-Fi

April 28, 2015April 28, 2015 Chris Leave a comment

I decided the other day that I would go and see the new Avengers movie. The first film was great fun, and I’d thus far managed to avoid any trailers, character lists or spoilers. All the more reason to go and see it early, right? Nothing like being able to browse social media in complete confidence, but I suppose that’s going to remain a pipe dream until I’ve caught up with the current season of Game of Thrones.

My ticket was booked at home, but I needed to head to the cinema pretty sharpish if I was going to get there in time. I realised that I’d only be missing a few adverts if I was late, but I’d paid for those adverts and I’m damn well going to get my money’s worth.

American Chocolate and Blow a Kiss Katie

February 27, 2015February 27, 2015 Chris Leave a comment

A few months ago, myself and a friend discovered a Tesco Extra a good 40-50 minutes away from my house. We’d been walking around aimlessly, as is tradition in Reading, when we stumbled upon it. We didn’t need to get anything at the time, so we carried on past it and wandered elsewhere.

On one of my first walks with Snorlax, I decided to find a distant place on a map and walk there. Walking around by yourself without a goal in mind is tougher than it seems, so I picked the Tesco. It was close to an hour from where I was at the time, so it seemed like a reasonable location to walk to.

Pokéwalker Challenge Update #1

February 18, 2015February 18, 2015 Chris Leave a comment

It’s been nearly two weeks since I started carrying a pokéwalker around with me, and I think I’ve been doing a better job at forcing myself out of the house, taking longer routes and exploring this town I’ve lived in for 9 months. I’m now at the point where I need over 2000 steps per level, and while I’m averaging about 5000 steps a day, this is the part that I’m most worried about. If Snorlax isn’t levelling every time I connect to the DS, will that kill my interest? We’ll see. If you fancy seeing the stats so far, I’m keeping a Google Doc updated. It’s also pinned on my Twitter if you want to keep an eye on it and hurl abuse/encouragement my way.

Cool things I’ve found out because of Snorlax:

Toys “R” Us continues to have a shit amiibo selection.
Boonies Tesco has an amazing world foods aisle and I might just go there from now on.
Finding a thing on a map and walking to it is kind of fun.
Carrying my DS with me while Snorlax was low-levelled was sensible as it made the best use of my steps.