After 2008, which was the year I was a football star on TV, 2009 was the year that I had 4 jobs. Switching between them is definitely what set the pace for the year, and what I fretted about the most (including the move to the States for the current job).

Some lessons learned

1. Working only 3 days a week is very nice if you can afford, but it requires that you can entertain yourself, because your friends don’t live to the same rhythm.
2. In work, I needed a new frame of reference. Up until now, Funcom has been my measuring stick for every new job, and I compared processes and people to that wherever else I went. My new job is a step up in terms of quality, and makes for a new, better baseline.
3. I still like games, but I get tired of formulaic ones. Essen 2008 marked the beginning of this: I was recognizing that a lot of games simply re-hash popular mechanisms and theme them differently. The same is true in video games. My love for the quirky different game in video games extends to the board game now as well.
4. My unstable life makes it hard to have nice things. For the n-th time now, I am living in an apartment that I do not so much decorate, but just put furniture into. One of these years, I’m going to have to settle for good, and then I’m going to get this right. For now though, my computer is on a folding table and there are cables over the carpet.
5. Following the news can be a bummer. Still I can’t live without, and I’m happy that fefe has been making it so much fun to keep up with the goings-on in the world. It’s so much more satisfying to pretend that there’s a conspiracy at work than to think everyone’s really stupid.

Best of 2009

1. Best Movies of 2009: My favorite movies this year were District 9, Avatar, and Let The Right One In. If you missed any of them, go watch them
   especially the last one. I also enjoyed the new Star Trek movie a lot. My favorite movies that weren’t filmed in 2009, and to which I was just late to the party: 12 Angry Men, Princess Mononoke and Primer. 2009 has been the year that I finally discovered Studio Ghibli, and it luckily coincided with a desire to learn Japanese (which has been difficult, to say the least).
2. Best Games of 2009: This is a tough one. Despite having lots of time, I played very few games. Rock Band: Beatles, although I only played it once and only did the singing parts, nevertheless takes the trophy for best-remembered game experience of the year. I can’t remember having that much fun with anything else. I also liked the craft and restraint shown in Torchlight, and was very excited about playing the new Monkey Island episodes. There were no MMOs that interested me. I hope this changes when Star Trek comes out. I wish I could say there were indie games that excited me. There were a few good ideas, but nothing that stands out like Passage did in 2008. Instead, the game I played the most ended up being Okami, also a few years old, but very pretty and a perfect game for a Sunday hangover.
3. Best Books: La den rette komme in, Kafka on the shore, Halting state. My one resolution for 2010 is that I want to read more. Thankfully, my new friends are avid readers and like to push their books on others, just like me. My plan is to make space for reading by doing less aimless browsing on the internet, trading a good behavior for a bad one.

Not so awesome in 2009

1. My health could be better. I had issues with my teeth, my wrists are getting better but I’ll probably never race again. I mostly stopped playing football, but did some climbing again which was good. I feel several years older than in previous years.
2. Despite having lots of time, I did not work a lot on hobby projects. It’s hard to say why: Sometimes it feels as if the motivation is just gone, or alternatively the inspiration for them is lacking. Also, I love fiddling with low-level stuff and that is not conducive to making something that you can show off.

Happy New Year everyone. I hope yours was good, too. Mine wasn’t the best one ever, but it was pretty eventful and the good definitely outweighs the bad. I feel like I’m getting out of a funk, and 2010 will be pretty cool if I just grab it by the horns. See you there!