Copying Nathanael who stole if from Fiona, here’s a quick rundown of 2008, question and answer style:
Q: What did you do in 2008 that you’d never done before?
A: Left the country and moved overseas for half a year back to Germany to touch up my German, started freelancing properly, co-(un)organised Canberra’s very first BarCamp.
Q: Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
A: Much like Nat, I can’t remember any of my new year’s resolutions from last year.
Q: Did anyone close to you give birth?
No.
Q: Did anyone close to you die?
During this past year not, but Blacky passing away on Christmas Day last year is still fresh in our memories. We all miss the furry, barking bugger.
Q: What countries/states did you visit?
A: In Australia: Victoria for LCA, NSW a number of times for work; abroad: Germany (Frankfurt am Main, Mainz and Berlin), Turkey (Istanbul for GUADEC) and the UK for LugRadio Live.
Q: What would you like to have in 2009 that you lacked in 2008?
A: To have have attended a number of more conferences, or rather, not missed the ones with particular speakers, notably WDS.
Q: What was your biggest achievement of the year?
A: Becoming more independent as a result of my time in Europe and summoning the courage to get my most recent two piercings.
Q: What was your biggest failure?
A: Not managing to organise a more thorough trip throughout Europe alone through youth hostels and the like, partly due to money, partly due to time and partly due to my own negative misconceptions.
Q: Did you suffer illness or injury?
Nothing serious thankfully.
Q: What was the best thing you bought?
A: The AUD $1,800 return air ticket to Germany including health insurance, closely followed by my beloved black MacBook, Leno.
Q: Whose behaviour merited celebration?
A: Both Mum and Andy for overcoming more personal
Q: Whose behaviour made you appalled and depressed?
A: Appalled and depressed are strong words, and I’m pretty laid back, so nothing really gets on my nerves much—and more importantly I try not to let something bother me for more than half a year. So, with this in mind, the name that rises to the top of the bad people cesspool in recent memory probably include Senator Stephen Conroy for his pathetic Australian mandatory clean feed idea.
Q: Where did most of your money go?
A: Travel costs and design books, most of which were typography books, naturally.
Q: What did you get really, really, really excited about?
A: My Europe trip, conferences—notably Canberra’s first BarCamp—and attending Kitty in Berlin. Oh, and currently still internally raving about the possibility of landing an exciting job (and thus stopping freelancing).
Q: What song will always remind you of 2008?
A: Krilatie Kacheli by Evgeniy Krilatov, this amazing Russian tune that was overlaid on video on a ModBlog (NSFW) video of the Russian Pain Theatre gang doing some awesome multi-tiered suicide suspensions.
Q: Compared to this time last year, are you:
- happier or sadder?—happy as a clam at the time of writing;
- thinner or fatter?—went up a kilo or two but still thin as usual;
- richer or poorer?—my bank statements would indicate little change, but I’ve accumulated new assets (books mostly).
Q: What do you wish you’d done more of?
A: Parkour, rock climbing, and traveling.
Q: What do you wish you’d done less of?
A: Nothing really… maybe sleep a little less?
Q: How did you spend Christmas?
A: With my Opa in Budenheim, near Mainz (Germany).
Q: Did you fall in love in 2008?
A: Big fat negatory.
Q: How many one-night stands?
A: Two.
Q: What was your favourite TV program?
A: The West Wing.
Q: Did you make a friend with anyone that you didn’t know this time last year?
A: Yes, after entirely coincidentally meeting both Söda and his girlfriend, Eugenie from Canberra all the way in Frankfurt. And to think in all the time I had known Söda he never mentioned his girlfriend!
Q: What was the best book you read?
A: The Elements of Typographic Style by Robert Bringhurst.
Q: What was your greatest musical discovery?
A: Vibrasphere, an amazing progressive psytrance group from Sweden.
Q: What did you want and get?
A: To improve my German and a MacBook.
Q: What did you want and not get?
A: An iPhone that wouldn’t become a paper weight when I were to take it home to Oz, and possibly a romantic relationship. The iPhone is being taken care of hopefully this week.
Q: What was your favourite film of this year?
A: Death Proof, part of the Grindhouse double set by Quentin Tarantino.
Q: What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
A: Celebrated it in Budenheim with my Mum, Opa, and German friends. Age: undisclosed.
Q: What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
A: To be with the many friends I left behind in Oz during my time in Europe.
Q: How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2008?
A: Alternative whilst approachable and friendly? Just something different I guess.
Q: What kept you sane?
A: Mum and sleep.
Q: Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
A: I don’t really romantically fancy any celebrities, but was quite hot for seeing Obama get into the White House.
Q: What political issue stirred you the most?
A: The thought that even still in my lifetime the bollocks that’s going on in the Middle East probably won’t be solved. That, and the aforementioned proposed Australian Internet filter bollocks.
Q: Who did you miss?
A: Chewie our aging, barking furball of a lady, close friends from Canberra and Mum.
Q: Who was the best new person you met?
A: Eugenie Edquist, Mr. Söda’s lovely girlfriend.
Q: Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2008.
A: It goes like this:
Find your obsession;
Every day, explain it to one person you respect;
Edit everything, skip shortcuts;
And try not to be a dick.
Get better at the above.
I’ve decided to skip the last question of which song lyric most sums up my year (I don’t know nor have the time right now to figure it out).
That’s it for ’08. What about you?
6 comments
I think I know you a little better now, Simon
I enjoyed reading this post. Cheeri-o!
@Piotr: Thanks mate. Can we expect a similar post by you? ;)
Actually… I was thinking about it. However:
1) I have not time for that right now.
2) I promised not to blog about personal stuff on designr.it
3) I feel like it’s too late for it, isn’t it? ;-)
@Piotr: Fair enough mate. If you still want to write it, you could stick it up on Facebook? (Oh, and we’re still in January, so it’s not really too late.)
I too enjoyed learning more about you, Pascal.
I would’ve never expected though to hear you mentioning Krilatie Kacheli, the soundtrack to a very popular Russian miniseries from my childhood: The Adventures of Elektronik about a robot who was made to look like an actual boy and who switched places with him at school, improved the grades, etc. Here’s that song from the movie, sang by the boy-robot.
Thanks for the trip down the memory lane ;)
@inspirationbit: One learns something new every day. Thanks for the awesome background info—for me it was just song which was catchy and I found matched the suspension film particularly well (though I suppose most people would disagree with that). Mhh, this would the kind of thing that I’d expect to find on coilhouse.net.
As always, a pleasure to hear from you Vivien. Thanks again. (: