Hi all,
Oh gosh things have changed a little round here as well on the back end since I was last here. Looks like my hosting service has gone all in on AI so I might have to go all in on somewhere else.
I think the rise of GenAI and the rampant uncontrolled harvesting it does has contributed a lot to me staying away here but there’s been more going on there. This is a very quiet site, there aren’t that many real people visitors and I’ve contributed to that state lately by this being the first post of the year. Content brings traffic. I’m getting sidetracked but the way I’m seeing it on this site is that in the first 6 months of 2025, this site got 325 views. In the first 6 months of this year, there have been 18.1k views. That doesn’t make sense with the lack of content, it can only be explained by this site being used for active harvesting of what I write for presumably GenAI large language models.
Not a fan of that. Something I’ve attempted to develop in myself for both home stuff and work stuff is a writing style that’s genuinely me. If people see my writing or my emails, they’re more encouraged to read, they can hopefully follow along with me (something I’ve really had to work hard to develop) and they respond. That’s especially important at work when you don’t get that much time to keep people’s attention with everything that goes on.
Never mind that though, how have I been, how am I getting on ?
Physically, my arm with the scaffolding in there is mostly good again now. It’ll never be perfect again because I’m getting old and I did a horrendous amount of damage to the two forearm bones. But I have pretty much full use of the fingers again now, feeling is back to perhaps 99% so the nerve damage is pretty good now and the shoulder is strong enough now to allow me to pick heavy things up again. I can clasp my hands behind my back again, which I could barely do at the start of the year. That’s what hurts now of what’s left with the movements, the rest is fine (pretty much)
Mental side is … different. I feel as if I’ve been in a slump for most of the year to date and have been putting that brave face on it. I can continue doing stuff I’ve started but it’s been really difficult starting doing stuff. Like I should have done a shopping run this weekend, that’s been deferred to tomorrow evening. I’ve been able to do a few things so far this year but that stay in it’s easier has been winning too much.
Quite.
Things that have happened this year and I’ll do these in their own posts in due course have been :
Dreamhack came to Birmingham for the first time in March. It was a chance to meet some wonderful people for the first time, some wonderful people for another catch up and a fairly chill and not so busy exhibition with lots of things to see and shinies to play with. It was great meeting people including the wonderful MissVadams and September Duck (and friends) with FGSquared coming in for a lunch meet up. They’re all people from the streaming community who are just awesome people and will brighten anyone’s day. LookitsTilly and Madddog were cruising for all the goodies, Curlylocksgamer didn’t quite run me over in the motorchair and it was fun running into kayPOWXD and very tall significant other after enjoying MiyukiPanda’s stage show.
I was able to catch up with Miyuki as well, there’s been a sense of catharsis running into and chatting to people from the Creator North event last year. Panda was about 10 feet away from me when I shattered the arm and was perhaps the one who sent the absolute most of anyone of the positive vibes that came my way after that accident. I had a lot of those come my way from all of the online communities and they massively helped last year with my state of mind. Anyway, it was good having a quick natter with MiyukiPanda after the event, she’s a lovely person plus one thing I’ve been concerned about is letting all the people who have been super worried about me see that I’m ok now.
And the arm is pretty much ok now. I was discharged from the need to go to the physio a while ago, I got a clean prognosis from the bone people who have been doing the x-rays. It’s not healed perfectly but … I still got 2 working arms. I’ll accept that 1% nerve loss for having 2 working arms again. I’m in a better place than a lot of other people there.
Ok ! Dreamhack led to an acquisition …
That’s a pair of Virpil Controls bits and pieces. I had a chance to try these out at Dreamhack and was very impressed with how they felt and the absolute highest level of quality in how they were put together. I went back to my previous Thrustmaster Hotas X after disappointment with (shockingly) poor build Saitek / Logitech X52 Pro sticks and while the Hotas X was still good for Elite, it was suffering from age with drift and buttons that were giving up. The Virpil Controls gear took a month to arrive after ordering but they’re incredibly good in use and they’ll support me looking to learn proper flight sims again with the extra controls they have.
Dreamhack has been the highlight of the year so far, that lunchtime meet up was a wonderful time.
I also did the Lords Interservices T20 day again, this was early this year being held at the end of April. It actually worked out very well for us, there was no rain on the day and I found a quiet perch with a great view. People were loving the Dwagon On Tour pictures that I’ve been posting from places too, my current avatar around the places is the Little Red Dwagon sat behind my good R50 camera.
Modelling … not so much this year. I have the finger dexterity but not the energy or inclination. That should come back at some point.
Oh there’s also been meet ups at Thorpe Park with the Creator Meetups people (good chill day out) and I acquired lots of shiny things at UK Games Expo. I won’t go to UKGE on a Saturday again, it was too much … too many people, too hot, too much crowd. But good loot and a good lunch escape with Andy of Billietrixx’s community.
Lots of reading’s been happening as well with the usual highlights being T Kingfisher’s novels and continuing the Share series by Nathan Lowell following his Ishmail Wang character who had to run off to be a merchant spaceman.
And of course the gaming … I enjoyed the Star Trek Voyager game that came out this year. They did well with this one, it’s like a greatest hits of the Voyager series but sticking to the stories from the show that were the most key and most achievable to put in the game. So the Seska series is in, Endgame is in, Year of Hell is not …
Last bit before I use up my hand points – Forza Horizon 6 has been huge fun getting into this one (with MiyukiPanda’s community!). Last time I did a lot of racing, I had a concussion that was putting a little bit of lag into my reactions. So I basically couldn’t do racing games. They’re a lot more fun without that particular concussion :-D.
Thanks for reading if you’ve got this far – I’m ok. I’m not the best mentally for a whole heap of reasons but I’m doing ok there. I’m in a bunch of fantastic communities online who are lovely to drift in, centred around the excellent streams to vibe in. I’ve got a few wonderful friends down here to talk to as well.
It’s good to have posted again – see you all next time !