mixed habitat & densely vegetated hiding places

In 2025 I posted reviews of 44 games, of which 10 were replays, 1 was a revision of an old review, and 33 were games I hadn't played before.

( and here they are )

(I made sure to number them because when I went back to number my book post I realized I had shorted myself four books! It was actually 51!)

My ongoing gaming side-quest is to play games from different countries. This year my new countries were Brazil, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Hungary, Iran, Peru, the Philippines, Scotland, Spain, Sweden, and Taiwan, bringing my total to 28. (At least the way I'm counting. I realize that "what is a country?" is a fraught question, but it's also a question that's way above my pay grade so I'm trying not to sweat it for such a low-stakes project.) My list of potential games to play includes 31 more countries. There are still lots and lots that I haven't yet identified a game for, including some seemingly low-hanging fruit, but since I'm keeping it to titles that would be of interest to me outside this project, the search for options can take longer.

My game list is a bit silly right now because I decided to add every game I could remember playing... ever. I love revisiting childhood games, and I enjoy searching for obscure titles and figuring out how to get them to run, so I'm okay with the list just being long. I actually do think it is possible, in principle, for me to review every game I played as a child, while attempting to do the same for books would be totally absurd. I've read a lot more books than I've played games, I started reading at a younger age, and I think I'm much less likely to forget a game than a book simply because I have a strong visual memory. Anyway, for future reference (I know I'll want to know next year) I currently have 280 games on my list.

Of the games I played for the first time in 2025, my favorites include: Until Then, Disco Elysium, Engare, I Did Not Buy This Ticket, The Last Door, and The Drifter.

In 2025 I posted reviews of 51 books, of which 8 were re-reads, 5 were revisions of old reviews, and 38 were books I read for the first time this year.

( and here they are )

This brought me up to 11 novels and two short story collections in my chronological Le Guin project. Have I made much of a dent? Well, her website says she produced "23 novels, 12 volumes of short stories, 11 volumes of poetry, 13 children’s books, five essay collections, and four works of translation" so I have certainly taken a big bite out of the novels even though I'm only up to 1976. I don't think I realized how novel-heavy her early career was. I am not planning to read all the poetry (I'll probably do some) and the only translation I'll be looking at is her Tao Te Ching. And yet, even when I sketch out a planned posting schedule that assumes I'll be grouping some of the picture books together, it still comes out as three more years and I don't know how that's possible. Stay tuned to find out if she really wrote as many things as I think she did, or if I just can't read a calendar.

At the end of last year my TBR list had 180 books on it, and my goal was for that number to go down. Which it did. By three. It's not that I wasn't reading things from the list, it's that I kept adding more. I decided to do a big cull, mostly of books that had been on there for way too long and I couldn't honestly say I was interested anymore. Now it's down to 140.

Of the books I read for the first time this year, my favorites include: The Backyard Bird Chronicles, The Spear Cuts Through Water, We Have Always Lived in the Castle, The Only Good Indians, and Convenience Store Woman.

In 2024 I made posts about 54 books, of which 4 were re-reads, 12 were revisions of old reviews, and 38 were books I read for the first time this year.

( books! )

This was the year that it really Happened for me in terms of posting about books. It's something I've wanted to do for so long, and now I am doing it. It feels amazing.

One of my reading side-goals was to read some nonbinary authors, which I did, ( and here they are. )

Of the books I read for the first time in 2024, here are some of my favorites:

novels: Piranesi, Klara and the Sun, The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi, Elatsoe
nonfiction: An Immense World
memoirs: Hijab Butch Blues, Better Living Through Birding
series: Imperial Radch (Ancillary Justice, Ancillary Sword, Ancillary Mercy)

My list of books I want to read or re-read currently sits at 180, which I do not think is excessive considering that it includes everything Ursula Le Guin ever wrote. My book-related goals for 2025 include continuing my Le Guin re-read, importing more of my old reviews from LJ to DW, and ending the year with fewer books on my TBR list rather than more.

It's time again for threeforthememories, a comm for sharing three photos you've taken during the past year that you find meaningful in some way. All are welcome to participate, and you can choose the photos based on any criteria you like.

Here's my entry, though if you look at my photo posts you've seen all three before!

The event continues until January 24th.

I had a goal of making posts about 12 games this year. I ended up at 13, but two were demos, so I think I just about made it.

Castle Adventure (1984)
Falling Lightblocks (2018)
Maniac Mansion (1987)
Heaven's Vault (2019)
Mystery House (1980)
Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis (1992)
Moraff's Stones (1992)
Chants of Sennaar (2023)
Alley Cat (1984)
Tubes (1993)
EGA Trek (1988)
The Will of Arthur Flabbington (demo) (2023)
Dark Tides (demo) (upcoming)

I started out with the idea that I was going to alternate between recentish games and nostalgic oldies, but, well, I'm going to need to play more recentish games for that to work. In 2024 I hope to be better about actually playing some of the games that are languishing in my Steam library, but I fully realize that's the gamer's equivalent of "I'm totally going to go to the gym this year" so we'll see if it lasts beyond January.

I just learned about threeforthememories, a comm for posting three photos you've taken during the past year. You can use any criteria for choosing your photos (aesthetics, what represented the year, things you want to remember, etc.) and all are welcome.

Here's my entry. The three I chose are all photos I've posted here before. It was hard to narrow it down!

The event continues until January 24th.

This year I posted 36 fics in 11 fandoms, for a total of 40,028 words. That's three more fics than last year, but 16,000 fewer words, which reflects the fact that I wrote more drabbles and other short things.

I continued to enjoy writing mostly for exchanges. The inspiration from the prompts and the hard deadlines work well for me, so I plan to keep it going in 2022.

I was proud of most of what I wrote this year, though sometimes outside stress from RL stuff made it hard to focus, and there were times when I was struggling and had to settle for stories being done rather than perfect. But on the other hand, sometimes being able to lose myself in a story or a character was a welcome break from RL stress, and a means of feeling like at least I was accomplishing and contributing something despite other challenges. Writing is work, but it's empowering work. That has always been true for me, and it was especially true this year.


( Star Trek (TNG, VOY, DIS, PIC) [16 fics] )

( Harry Potter [9 fics] )

( She-Ra and the Princesses of Power [4 fics] )

( The Little Mermaid [2 fics] )

( Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts [2 fics] )

( one-offs (Always Coming Home, DuckTales, The Venture Bros.) [3 fics] )

I finished and posted five (count 'em) fics this year, which sure ain't much, but at least it beats the one drabble I managed last year!

( Harry Potter )

( The X-Files )

( Quantum Leap/Rocky Horror )

It felt good to write again, even if it wasn't a lot. It's a start, and I hope to do more in 2020.

One thing I did accomplish in 2019 was getting in the habit of posting on DW more regularly. I've always been pretty consistent with reading and commenting, but not with posting in my own space. I was shooting for once a week, and I averaged a bit more than that (albeit with some gaps when I was out of town). Not every post was full of ~compelling content~, but again, it's a start. Other than fandom stuff, the big thing I want to do here in 2020 is post about books. Reading more books was one of my 2019 goals, and I did that! But I want to talk to people about what I'm reading too.

My general life goal for the new year is to invest more time and energy into things that are important to me (e.g. creative stuff, reading books, staying in touch with friends) and a lot less into things that leave me feeling frustrated and exhausted (e.g. engaging with pointless conflicts, reading bad news online, doing excessive organizational and emotional labor for others). An ambitious resolution, maybe, but really I've been moving in that direction for a while already, so it's more just that I'm putting it into words now.

I'm optimistic that 2020 will be a good year for me. I hope it will be for all of you, too. ♥

And now that reveals have happened for all the fics I wrote in 2014, here they are!

( Harry Potter )

( Star Trek )

( The Venture Bros. )


And OMG only three days until more Venture Bros. Anyone else watch this show? I've been a fan since the first season but I feel like I might have posted about it... never?? It's one of those things where I love it almost too much to write fic. After an episode I just sit there like, welp, I sure can't write any better than that, so...

Anyway, I wrote a bit less this year than last year, but I feel good about the quality of most of it, and there were several things that I'd wanted to write for a long time but the right opportunity hadn't come up before. (Yay, I finally got to write Guinan/Ro!) I was especially proud of Two Can Keep a Secret, and apparently others liked it too because it seems it won its category in hpfanficfanpoll. Awards can only be taken seriously up to a point, since of course they are subjective, but I do thank those who took the time to nominate or vote for my story, and congratulate everyone who was in the running. :)

I think 2015 is going to be awesome. No reason really, just a feeling.