December 24

The End of the Year and End of the Decade

Once again, the year is wrapping up and it is time to review both the highs and the lows of the year. This year however is slightly different as it is not just the year that is ending, it is also the end of the decade. There were plenty of lows this year but yet again, I have had far more positives over the year that has far outweighed any low that I have experienced as well as plenty of opportunities to start off 2020 in a positive fashion. As always, I will split this up into a few sections with a quick review of last year’s goals and then what the plan is for 2020!

 

Streaming

This year has been one of my worst for consistency unfortunately. It started off well, keeping to my 12 streams a month average but after 4 or 5 months, it took a turn for the worst with a few personal issues that was going on. On the positive side, I managed to exceed the 5 viewer average goal I set myself for the year, this was largly thanks to the high average viewer streams between June and August. Unfortunately I didn’t hit the 500 follower goal I had set either. On the positive side, I did get accepted to The Live Coders which will bring some good challenges and opportunities over the next year.

To prepare for 2020, myself and Clare have been spending some time planning out how the first quarter of the year is going to look and if everything goes to plan then it is going to be a busy start to the year. In the first month or two, the streams will only be on the weekend whilst I get re-adjusted. Below are the goals for 2020:

1) Average a minimum 12 times a month over the year (144 times overall).

2) At a minimum, maintain 2019’s average view count of 13. Stretch goal is to knock it up to 15 average over the year.

3) Look for a minimum 100 new followers over 2020, 200 as a stretch goal.

 

Professionally

Now this one has been both the cause of my lowest moments of 2019 but also my highest moments of the year too. Those that know me on a personal level, understand fully know hellish my current boss is. Well, working for her finally took me to breaking point which resulted in quite a bad deterioration in my mental health which with a little push from Clare, I went to see my GP who decided it was best that I take a leave of abcense from work for a two month period.

During this period, I felt so much about my personality change in a positive manner. It was almost like a weight had been lifted from my my mind, my shoulders and everywhere else. In the first week of being off, I also applied at a couple of companies. One as a PHP developer and one as a Supply Chain Analyst. Suprisingly enough, both of them wanted to hire me which was a massive tick in the box for finding a new role and I felt a million times better as well!

I start the new job in January and whilst it is a shame that I am leaving o2 after nine and a half years, it is a fresh start for a fresh decade… Same as when I started at o2 so it feels like it bodes well! My goal for 2020 is to really get into this role and develop myself massively!

 

I am not going to put out a personal section this year but I am really looking forward to what 2020 is going to bring in all aspects of my life. I am really greatful to all the friends, both physical and virtual that has helped me and been there throughout the year.

 

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August 18

It Has Been A While

Every month, I come back to here and think “damn I have been neglecting this blog so much, I need to write something” and then close down the tab (bad, I know). I keep telling myself that I cannot think of something to put together of adequate quality to present to a wider audience but sub-consciously I know that is just an excuse and one I need to get past!

To make the comeback easier, I thought it would be best to put together a summary of what I have been up to so far this year and then see where I go over the next few months in terms of blog posts… So lets get it started!

Professional Life

Despite the want to leave retail life, unfortunately opportunities have not been as forthcoming as I would have liked, I managed to get one interview to just be pipped at the post which is unfortunate but as always, just need to pick myself up, dust myself off and start looking again which is the plan!

Working in a more professional environment is the end goal but mainly I have been looking at technical roles (Software Configuration, Programming etc) and will keep pushing my skills to be more attractive to potential employers!

Streaming and Community

Well what can I say on this one? I have a small but amazing community that continually surprise me with the different levels of support from just turning up to financial. One amazing example is that in January/February I started a community goal to put money towards building a modern PC and retire the ancient machine I have been using for a decade! I expected this goal to still be going at Christmas this year but we managed to smash the goal by April which was crazy.

 

Other Tidbits

I have been doing a lot more programming in my spare time which has been excellent. Part of this is in the form of a website that I have released for my streamer personality https://itslit.uk which is a great showcase of leveraging the Twitch API as almost all the content is provided by data from the API services. The site also showcases a couple of side projects that I have been working on and released to the community as a whole and will continually add to it as I release new projects

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December 26

A New Year and New Goals

The Christmas lights are still twinkling, a beer is sat next to me and I am looking back through the achievements of 2018, professionally, personally and as a streamer.

Fortunately, despite some lows, there are plenty of positives to look back on over the year which is setting the tone for 2019 which is what we are going to focus on for this post and I will split it over a few sections to keep it organised.

Streaming

Despite taking a couple of large breaks throughout 2018 due to not being quite into it mentally and a few PC related issues, there were plenty of highs to outweigh the lows which was excellent! The two biggest highs that instantly comes to mind is the most recent event, Naughty or Nice which brought in record numbers over December and helped me to be more consistent in general. The second high that always sticks to my mind is the two occassions that MopGarden, a partnered Twitch streamer raided me which opened up a few new opportunities and new friends.

In that clip, it wasn’t until Mop said hi that I even knew how many people she had brought along! #coolAsACucumber
For 2019 my goals are going to be quite challenging but it will require me to step my game up and really work hard and here they are:
1) Stream a minimum of 12 days on average in a month (so around 3 streams a week). Stretch goal is 16 days on average in a month.
2) Push for an increase of viewers month on month / maintain a minimum of a 5.0 average as set for December. Stretch goal is to reach 8.0 average month.
3) Aim for 500 followers by the end of 2019, with a stretch goal of 750.

I decided to keep it to three goals as this will be a lot of work, especially mentally, so I feel that they will be challenging enough to keep me going and to show improvement year on year!

Professionally

From the tail end of 2017, through to June 2018, I found myself in a secondment at work which allowed me to work in my company’s supply chain team instead of my usual retail work, to develop a new system from scratch that was going to benefit the company massively. Whilst it was only fixed term, it was still disappointing that I was unable to continue the role after the 9 months of a better work/life balance and so many benefits that made my job feel blissful whilst still being challenging.
Due to this, I have been bitten by the “proper” job bug and I am aiming to look at new opportunities outside of retail work that will make my life better, reduce my stress (partially from customers, partially from useless Line Managers) and increase my happiness overall.
My goal on this side is to look for new opportunities and apply a JFDI mentality and put myself out there. Worst case scenario, I get rejected and I start again, best case scenario, I end up in a better role, with better hours which will make life so much better overall!

Personally

A lot has gone on in my personal world this past year, much of which I wish to leave behind me. Brief, to the point and as vague as I can write it eh 😉

My aim in 2019 is to balance everything better so that I do not let Clare feel neglected but at the same time, I get to learn and enjoy as much of my spare time as I can!

I have so many side projects in my head that I want to work on, some of which I will stream like the Bot development tasks for G4G, a Destiny 2 clan that me and Clare are both a part of. Also there is the API for Twitch Streamers and communities that I have been working on over the past 12 months.

As you can see, 2019 should be a busy but hopefully positive year for me and I hope that is the same for you! There are several people who have made this year as great as it is, all of you will know who you are but some of the real stand out people who helped a lot in some way this year, in no particular order are:

– Synxiec
– Clare
– Mopgarden
– Diddy

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March 12

It has been a while!

So it has been almost 3 months since I last wrote here and a lot has changed in so many different ways, professionally, personally, physically and mentally too! So what has happened you ask? Well lets split it up:

 

Professionally

After 6 years, 10 months and 1 day of working for o2, I decided to start putting out feelers for different jobs, both in retail and outside of retail as I feel the stress and mental drain of the job far outweighs the benefits and it has done for quite a while. I am fed up of returning home from work mentally tired and fed up as it isn’t easy to just shake off when I get home which is affecting my work/life balance massively. For the programming side of my professional career I need to reboot my programming and build up a portfolio which pushed me harder to get DDR onto a framework (which it is now btw so go take a look).

On top of the framework, I was previously building the Android app that was previously chronicled on the blog which hasn’t progressed much more unfortunately but it will be making a return before the end of the month! I have also taken up to learning C# and again I will be working on a fun project to develop my knowledge of the language and spur me on. The twist to this project is that I have also asked Quis to help out on the graphical and story-line stuff but more information will be on that soon!

 

Personally and Physically

As a lot of you know, this year was my return to Rugby Union after so long away from it, it certainly has been a fun year of it but yesterday was my last match of the season due to work commitments which is sad and unfortunate. The community that is Yarnbury RFC is just amazing but it has also helped me lose weight too which is an added bonus!

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