Looking Back at 2010

I have vague memories of 2010. it’s not that I don’t remember events, but my chronology is off. I know distinctly what happened in 2009. I also know what happened in 2008, or even as far back as 2005. 2010 seems like an amalgamation of several years; I’m genuinely surprised when I reminisce about a certain event, and realize that it only happened last year, instead of two or three years ago.

I wouldn’t say 2010 was a bad year, but a lot of complications arose which prevented me from doing what I usually do. There is, of course, the day job, but I don’t air my dirty laundry publicly. As far as my personal life is concerned, my parents decided to renovate the house, one room at a time, so most of the year was spent packing books and magazines--and then never unpacking them. I’m sure I lost a lot of books and magazines but recovering them is not worth the effort, between my allergies to dust, and the lack of space in my new room.

There is also my over-commitment to a lot of projects, especially with my increased activity in websites like SF Signal and The World SF News Blog. Suffice to say, finding ways to shave off time here and there helped me cope. I used to copy/paste my daily link list to Facebook. I don’t do that anymore. It might only take three minutes but you’d be surprised how much three minutes each day saves you, especially considering I do most of my ‘net activities all in one go.

I’ll be honest: I haven’t been able to read as much as I usually do in 2010. I have a huge backlog of books to review. There are two reasons for this.

As far back as May, I was suffering from Chronic Blepharitis. Or rather, I was suffering the severe effects of it. My right eye was blurry. Unfortunately, I wasn’t properly diagnosed until December. So in between May and, well, until the end of 2010, it was fuzzyville for me. This mostly affected my ability to read large chunks of text on a screen, and since I prefer my books to be electronic (especially considering my physical books were being packed in boxes at the time), not a lot of reading was done. Hence my reviews stopped being weekly.

The other reason is more selfish. Starcraft 2 was just released, and I don’t want to do things half-hearted. Even as far back as the beta release, I committed myself to being an extremely good player. Perhaps not good enough to play the game professionally (i.e. competing in paying tournaments), but proficient to a point that I could brag. Unfortunately, Starcraft 2 is a complex game to master. To be the best involves various kinds of practice and learning: playing a lot of games on the Ladder, practicing with Practice Partners, learning and observing strategy (Day9’s Dailies for example), watching tournaments, testing out Build Orders, and reviewing your Replays. I didn’t do all six, but I did more than half. And it’s a time-consuming process. By November, I successfully qualified for the Diamond League (highest division at the time) in the US Server (I’m Platinum in Southeast Asia), which is the top 20% of players in that region.

It’s February now and the last time I logged on for Starcraft 2 was in early December. Suffice to say, I’m gearing up to get my reading groove back.