#oneaday Day 292: Thriving within limitations

Most of you reading this who are at least A Certain Age will probably think back on your school days with varying degrees of fondness, but I suspect pretty much all of you are glad that those days are behind you for one reason or another — the chief one being the freedom you have once you are no longer constrained to an institution's timetable and rules.

As I get older, this is probably the rose-tinted nostalgia talking, but I increasingly miss that whole sense of structure that the school day had. I'm talking as a student here, not as a teacher; as a teacher, the school timetable was nothing but a source of stress, particularly when I forgot I was supposed to be "on duty" (whatever that actually means) and ended up on the receiving end of snarky comments from dickhead colleagues. But I digress.

No, I'm talking about the sense of structure you have when you are a student: the knowledge of exactly what is going to happen when for the day ahead, and the fact that you know your time is most likely going to be spent in at the very least a vaguely productive manner for the next 8 hours.

Sure, there were always the lessons that summoned up the inevitable sense of dread — Maths for me — and, of course, there was always the blind panic you'd feel when you realised you hadn't done the homework for the lesson that was scheduled for immediately after break, leading to frantic completion of said homework outside, leaning on a wall and hoping your teacher for the next period doesn't wander past and clock what you're doing.

But for the most part, it was nice to wake up of a morning and know what to expect. It was nice to have "favourite days" because that's when your best lessons were. It was nice to know exactly when you'd have the opportunity to work with your friends, or learn from a favourite teacher.

If this all sounds insufferably swotty, I don't know what to tell you; outside of some bullying incidents (where I was the victim, I hasten to add) I mostly thrived in secondary school in particular, and I enjoyed having things that I was good at, and which got acknowledged as things I was good at. Because heaven knows I wasn't "cool", and I knew that wasn't likely to change, ever.

I often find myself thinking whether the daily grind of work could be made better if I split it into discrete "periods" like the school day, with specific times set aside to do specific things. I suspect it actually might, but actually developing that schedule has been my sticking point. As a lot of my work is pretty self-directed, I'd be responsible for both setting and sticking to that schedule, and I'm not sure that's what worked well for me back when I was at school. Rather, I think I thrived because I had a schedule set by someone else, and during that schedule I was told exactly what to do, and exactly what was expected of me — again, by someone else.

I know part of "growing up" is being able to do those things for yourself, but lest we forget, I am what is politely termed these days as "neurodivergent", and thus I find myself wondering if I wouldn't just be better off in a situation where someone sits me down, says "9am-10am, you're doing this. 10am-11am, you're doing this. Then go have a bit of a break. Then 11.15-12pm, you're doing this…" and so on.

Sure, we have weekly Teams meetings (God, I hate Teams meetings… scratch that, I hate meetings in general) but those aren't exactly what one might call "engaging" in the same way a good old-fashioned school lesson was. Perhaps I was just fortunate enough to have, on average, very good teachers, and in other places, school is, in fact, ideal preparation for a life of adult misery in Teams meetings. But I doubt it.

Anyway, perhaps I should actually make an effort and try the "schedule" thing for myself. Who knows, it might actually work? Can't hurt to try, right?

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#oneaday Day 263: Room service

It is, if you will pardon my deliberate misuse of a term typically used to mean something else, that time of the month again: the time when I get to drive two and a half hours from my home, hole up in a hotel for the evening and then go in to the office tomorrow.

The hotel I normally stay at, known as The Broadway, is quite nice. The rooms are pleasant and the beds are comfortable. My only real objection is that its bathrooms are very inconsistent. Sometimes I'll get a room with a lovely big bath, which it is a delight to luxuriate in after that long drive. And at others, you'll get ones like the one I have this time, featuring a shower cubicle far too small for a human being (let alone a larger gentleman such as myself) and a toilet placed in such a way that you have to lean around the toilet paper dispenser to be able to sit down and do a poo.

Oh, and they use those horrible office-style single sheet toilet roll dispensers, too. I have taken to bringing my own proper toilet roll rather than spend my poos here scrabbling away at sheets of toilet paper far too thin to have any practical purpose whatsoever.

The one thing I will particularly compliment the Broadway on is its food. In the morning, you get a lovely breakfast included, and it's much better than what you'd get in something like a Travelodge or Premier Inn, in that someone cooks it for you to order rather than batch cooking everything and leaving it to congeal under heat lamps.

I hadn't had dinner here before, so I thought I'd treat myself this evening, and it was excellent. I had a full rack of ribs followed by a chocolate sundae, and both were delicious as well as being generous portions. Bad for the diet, of course, but these trips away always mess with any good intentions to eat healthily, anyway. Back on track when I get home tomorrow.

Tomorrow's session at work promises to be interesting. Rather than just a regular day at the office, we're having a day of brainstorming product ideas, so I'm intrigued to see exactly how ambitious the organisers think we should be. I obviously won't be able to tell you anything that is decided or discussed tomorrow, but I have some fun ideas that it will hopefully be enjoyable to brainstorm a bit.

And with that in mind, it's probably time to get some sleep. So I'm off to do just that.

#oneaday Day 205: Last weekend of 2024

The last hours are ticking away on the last weekend of 2024 as I type this. I have two days of "work" (and I use that term loosely during this ever-curious interstitial period between Christmas and the new year) and then a day off for New Year's Day, and then it's back to normal existence.

I have enjoyed the Christmas break, overall. I haven't done very much with it — the fact I have nearly beaten The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom will attest to that — but the period of just straight-up rest and relaxation has been good for me. It's easy to just sort of "tune out" the stresses of everyday working life until you take a step back from them for a little while, and it's most definitely been nice to be away from work social media and the never-ending moaning that goes on there.

We've got an exciting year coming up at work. We've got some great licenses in the pipe for Evercade, one of which (SNK) we've already teased, but there are several more lined up and ready to go, too. I'm looking forward to revealing these at the appropriate times (you won't get any clues here, sorry!) but not looking forward to, once again, revealing something cool and being immediately hit with a torrent of "you should get [x]" comments. I swear, a significant number of people involved in this hobby don't actually care about the thing itself, they only want to know "what's next".

I was actually thinking about this quite a bit towards the end of the working year. Evercade cartridges are super-cool and good value because they collect together a bunch of interesting games in one place, but this unfortunately means that reviews of them tend to suffer. When you get maybe 150 words in a publication like Retro Gamer to cover a cartridge with multiple games on it, there's not really any time for the reviewer to talk about anything in great depth. And online review sites aren't much better, either; inevitably, when we get a cart reviewed, it'll be a general overview of the whole thing without really going into much detail about any of the individual games.

This is a real shame, I think. If I wasn't working for Blaze directly, I'd be wanting to do comprehensive reviews of each cartridge, covering each game in detail. In fact, as it happens, I may be doing something along those lines for both the Evercade blog and YouTube channel in the new year — we want to celebrate some of our back catalogue as well as the most up-to-date stuff, and there's a lot to talk about at this point.

I know "company that makes the thing writing about the thing" isn't quite the same as a professional review, but honestly, a lot of the reviews out there aren't really providing much in the way of helpful information. What I strive to do in my articles and videos for Evercade is provide some decent quality research, some historical and social context for the games — and just an outline of why they're cool, y'know?

So more of that in the new year. In fact, that's what I might just fill my days with on Monday and Tuesday this coming week. While there's not much in the way of "production" stuff going on, I may as well get ahead of the game with writing some bits and pieces, no?

I didn't intend this post to be so work-centric when I started, but, well, that's happened now, and it's not as if I had much else of note to write about, really. I mean, I could write about Echoes of Wisdom, but like most gaming-related things, I'm going to save my conclusive thoughts about that for MoeGamer once I've actually beaten it — which will be in the next couple of days, I reckon, possibly even tonight, depending on how hard I can resist looking at a guide to find the last few Heart Pieces and Might Stones.

Anyway. If you, like me, are back to work for a couple of days tomorrow, I hope you've had a nicely restful holiday season and that those two straggling days aren't too stressful. 2025 is yet another opportunity for a "fresh start" for all of us, and while many people around the world are staring down some significant challenges (I'm glad I never made it to America at this point, frankly) we can all just take each day as it comes and see how things go.

For now, more Zelda.

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2526: Quiet Weekend

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I've been working all week, and I now have two full days — a proper weekend — to look forward to. And I am indeed very much looking forward to it.

In particular, I'm looking forward to spending some more quality time with Final Fantasy XV and Pokémon Moon, both of which I've had the chance to play sporadically throughout the week, but not for particularly protracted periods of time due to the necessity of getting up the next day in time for work.

I've always appreciated free time with no commitments, but nothing really makes you appreciate it quite like a week of hard work, whatever form that hard work takes — whether it's getting out of the house and doing something in exchange for money, or simply doing something useful at home.

Although the work I'm doing is just temporary — it's the same seasonal position in retail I held last year — I'm enjoying it, and I'm noticing a few positive things about myself in the process. In particular, I'm finding it a lot easier to quite simply talk to people and feel like "part of the group". Whether this is a result of working with the same people I worked with last year and consequently not having to build new relationships from scratch, or if it's something to do with the new medication I started on about a month back, I'm not sure — it's probably a combination of those two things — but I am, on the whole, feeling uncharacteristically satisfied with certain aspects of myself at present.

There are plenty of things I'm unsatisfied with too, of course — most notably having put a bunch of weight back on since losing a bunch with Slimming World last year, though since changing medication I have subsequently discovered part of the blame for that can be laid at the feet of the pills I was on earlier in the year — but for now I'm trying to enjoy life as much as I can. I don't doubt that in January when my temporary position comes to an end that things will get a little difficult and tight once again, but I have a few plans in place for things to do and some potential opportunities to pursue.

It's perhaps a tiny bit early to review the whole year, though most people will probably agree 2016 has largely been a big pile of shit. That said, this last couple of months have proven to be a little better than the rest of the year, at least, so all I can really hope for at the moment is that the worst is over and that this is the start of the long climb back out of the abyss into something resembling a normal, satisfying, happy life.

It remains to be seen what 2017 has to hold, but I'm not worrying about that too much for the moment. Right now, I have a full weekend to look forward to. And I intend to enjoy it as much as possible by doing as little as possible.

2502: Black Friday

Spare a thought for the retail workers of the world, who have to work on days like today.

I'm still not 100% clear on where Black Friday came from — and, moreover, why it crossed the pond from America to Europe — but I have pretty mixed feelings about it on the whole.

On the one hand, it's nice to have a period of time when you know you can rely on getting low prices and decent deals on things that you might be interested in buying. In the online sector, events such as Steam sales and "Cyber Monday" deals demonstrate this clearly.

On the other hand, compressing aforementioned low prices and decent deals into a single weekend — or, in some cases, a single day — seems a little counterproductive when it comes to brick-and-mortar operations in particular.

An event such as Black Friday means that stores are probably going to be rammed full of people, making it a less pleasant experience for everyone shopping and significantly harder work for those people working the store who have to try and answer questions, ensure everyone gets served, keep the shop looking as presentable as possible and ensure no-one is wandering out of the door in possession of things they haven't paid for.

At the same time, though, an event such as Black Friday may encourage people to pick up things that they otherwise wouldn't have thought to purchase or been able to purchase at their normally higher prices. I personally haven't bought anything this Black Friday — at least partly because I was working the damn thing — but if I was going to buy something like an Xbox One (the one "next-gen" console I still don't own), Black Friday would appear to be a decent time to do so.

Like I say, mixed feelings. And if you've been out there in the rush and the chaos of people trying to get a hot deal, as I say, spare a thought for the folks who are rushed off their feet trying to make sure everyone leaves satisfied.

Now I'm going to bed to pass out and wait for my feet to stop hurting.

2498: Contributing Something

I went back to "proper" work today for the first time in quite a while. It's nothing fancy or exciting — just a seasonal retail job in our local video game emporium — but I enjoyed my time there last year and was fortunate enough to be called up to help out over the impending holiday season.

While retail is fairly mundane work for the most part, it is at least a nice opportunity to get out of the house, do something and actually interact with human beings, which is something I feel like I've been sorely missing for a while. Don't get me wrong, social anxiety is still present and correct, but I feel like I can usually cope better with interactions in a structured environment such as retail, where both parties involved in a conversation are there for a specific reason. The customer is there to either get some information or buy something, and I am there to provide whatever it is they are asking for, or to provide them with a suitable alternative if the thing they want isn't available.

It can be quite rewarding, too — not financially, since retail pay remains fairly poo across the board, but in terms of knowing that you've helped someone. At this time of year in particular, a lot of people come into shops they might not normally go into wanting to buy presents, and this means that they often need advice. Well, that exhaustive knowledge of video games had to be useful for something, didn't it?

Since I worked my first retail job — I've done several over the years — I've found that the way I communicate with customers usually puts them at ease and encourages them to trust what I am saying. I'm not sure exactly what it is — perhaps it's the fact I display genuine enthusiasm for the things I'm talking about, or perhaps my teacher training lets me explain things suitably for all levels of knowledge — but it usually seems to go down well, and I've sent many a customer on their way with a smile on their face over the course of the last few years.

I'm not sure I'm cut out for anything more than working the floor, keeping things tidy and ringing up sales — although I guess you don't know until you're in a position to take a bit more responsibility and try it for yourself — but for now at least, this is providing both something to do and some money coming in, which is what I needed.

What will happen to me next year is anyone's guess. But I suppose that's the holiday period covered, at least.

2481: Rejected, Again

I did not get shortlisted for the job I mentioned the other day that I actually 1) rather wanted and 2) felt confident I would be able to do well at.

I am getting really quite tired of the same old copy-paste rejection email that everywhere seems to use. "Dear [name], Thank you for your application for [insert position here]. Unfortunately, on this occasion you have not been successful. Please have a nice life and try not to fall into a crippling pit of depression because no-one anywhere appears to want to hire you for anything, even things you have demonstrable abilities in and thus the potential to excel. Now we're going out with the normal people who have real jobs. Fuck you."

I added the last bit, but I feel like it's implied every time I receive one of these.

I am sick of this. Fucking sick of it. I am doing everything "right". I am following all the suggestions I read all over the Internet and hear in discussions with people. I am applying for jobs whenever and wherever I can, with preference for those positions that are directly relevant to my skills but also taking a chance on those that sound like something I might be able to do. I am updating my CV regularly, and producing tailored versions of it for different positions. I am writing covering letters that directly address the job description and person specification while making me appear like an actual human being rather than machine-generated business-speak.

And still fucking nothing.

I'm lucky to actually hear anything from all the places I've applied to. Most simply ignore me, leaving me wondering if I will ever actually hear from them, so I guess I should be a little bit grateful for those places that at least have the courtesy to give me a definite "no", but frankly it's hard to feel anything positive towards this whole ridiculous, demoralising and soul-crushingly upsetting process.

I should probably just go and apply to work at my local Tesco — they're hiring, after all. But you know what? I'm absolutely sick of doing shit that is beneath what I'm capable of, what I'm qualified for and what I have demonstrable experience in. I'm sick of settling for not even second best. I am so much more. I am capable of so much more. But no-one will let me prove that to them. And that's enormously upsetting. It makes me feel like it's not even worth bothering to try.

I just want to be recognised. Appreciated for my talents. Acknowledged as a person. But none of those things are happening, and with each passing day this continues to be true I feel more and more worthless; a waste of space contributing little to the world and apparently having no skills that anyone considers to be useful or meaningful in 2016.

I don't know what to do. I don't see a way out of this pit. I'm trying, by God I'm trying, but the walls are smooth and slick, and there's seemingly no way to pull myself up and out. And no-one seems to be coming to throw me a rope, either.

2474: Pay Your Damn Workers

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One of the things I've noticed as someone who has spent more than his fair share of time looking for suitably gainful employment is the number of employers out there who undervalue their workers, expecting them to work long hours at demanding jobs for pitiful pay — and in some extreme cases, expecting them to work on a voluntary basis.

The growth in the number of jobs where the people who do all the heavy lifting (literal or metaphorical) have to act as self-employed is disheartening. It's clearly a transparent, cost-cutting measure that means employers don't have to provide workers with any kind of benefits — whether it's basic things like holiday and cover for days you can't work, or more structured benefits such as pension plans, healthcare and the like — under the pretense of being more convenient and flexible for the worker.

The above would be more acceptable if the payouts for workers were commensurate with the amount of effort (and/or physical exertion) they have to put in, but sadly more often than not they simply aren't. What you end up with are a bunch of companies who are effectively paying their workers less than minimum wage while offering them no benefits, no National Insurance contributions, no Pay As You Earn tax deductions and little to no job satisfaction.

At the time of writing, I'm working two assignments on a self-employed basis. One of them pays a fair wage for some honest, specialised work, so I don't mind working for them in this way at all — though I do, at times, wish they'd pay me a bit sooner and provide me with enough assignments to make it a legitimate full-time job, as that would go a long way to assuaging my presently perpetual state of anxiety. The other, I'm feeling, does not feel like it has enough benefits to outweigh the drawbacks, even though it presents the prospect of more regular income. (That said, taking into account the expenses I incur while working this latter position makes said income look even more woeful than it already is.)

I don't know. I'm just currently feeling physically exhausted and incredibly disheartened at how things have been going for me, and I don't know the best thing to do about it. The vaguely rational part of my brain tells me that sucking it up and paying my dues is the sensible thing to do, regardless of how exhausting it is and how awful a work-life balance it affords me. But the part of me that wants to not collapse and actually have time to enjoy life — even if it's with tight purse strings — suggests that the healthy thing to do, mentally and physically, might be to nip things in the bud before I get too stressed out by the whole thing.

Goddammit, GamePro. Why'd you have to close down? I was happy working for you. Genuinely. More happy than I've ever been working any job since. All I want is to be happy and satisfied with what I do, and to be paid a fair wage for it. With every passing day, I worry more and more that I'm never going to achieve that.

2473: Closing Date

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It is the closing date for applications for a job I'd actually quite like tomorrow. Supposedly the closing date marks the time when said job will actually start shortlisting applicants, so no-one will have heard anything back from it yet.

This particular job application sticks in my mind because the process was much more than the usual CV and coverletter crapshoot that 95% of positions seem to require. Rather, the application process was more of a "virtual interview", with a number of questions specifically designed to let the applicant talk about the ways their skills and experience make them eminently suitable for the job.

This strikes me as a good way of finding someone that you would actually like to work for you, because it allows the applicant much more opportunity to talk specifics about how they think they will suit the position, and it allows the employer much more opportunity to judge the applicant through specific examples rather than the usual generic rubbish people put in cover letters about being "passionate" and "enthusiastic" about things no-one in their right mind is passionate and enthusiastic about.

I understand why the majority of positions advertise on the big sites and simply require a CV and cover letter, mind you — with the sheer number of positions each company has to fill, it would probably be impractical to 1) design a unique questionnaire for each position and 2) have someone actually go through the answers in detail rather than simply judging on the basis of a CV and cover letter — perhaps only superficially in some cases.

That said, the organisation that is recruiting for the position I mentioned — I'm not giving specifics just yet because I don't want to jinx anything — is not exactly a small operation, and doubtless employs hundreds of people for its various roles at the very least. And if they can find the time to produce a tailor-made questionnaire specifically for the position that I've applied for, it would be nice to see other companies following suit.

Surely it would be for the best in the long run? It's pretty easy to lie on CVs and in cover letters, whereas if you're given specific, directed questions it's a lot harder to bullshit your way through them if you don't actually have the answers. For once, I actually felt like I had the answers to the questions and could speak from a position of confidence rather than the subservient position of self-justification that I normally feel like I'm in. That made me feel pretty good about the application — though naturally it will also make me feel pretty bad if I don't get the position, because it feels like the first good opportunity that has come my way in quite a long time.

I would like a normal life with a normal job. Instead, I'm currently working 7 days a week for peanuts doing something mind-numbingly boring and physically tiring. But I guess I should be semi-grateful, at least: peanuts is, after all, greater than zero, and I hope — I wish more than anything — that this is only temporary, and that good things will come to me soon.

I have to hope that, because the other possibility is becoming increasingly unbearable to contemplate.

2352: Fuzzy Head

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I've had a horrible, fuzzy head today. I don't mean physically — although after getting my hair cut yesterday, my head is a bit fuzzy — but rather a not terribly pleasant feeling of "detachment"; of being slightly "out of phase" with the rest of the world. And a slight headache.

I've felt this before, and it's usually a symptom of depression and anxiety. In this instance, the fact I haven't been sleeping well for the past few nights and am feeling especially worried about my future have been contributing particularly to the way I'm feeling. It's not nice, so after writing this I'm going to go and sit in bed and relax with a bit of Ys: Memories of Celceta, then try and actually get off to sleep at a reasonable time if at all possible.

I actually have a job interview tomorrow. As usual when this happens, I'm being struck with anxiety over whether or not I'm actually suitable for the job and whether or not I'm going to make an idiot of myself in the interview. (Mind you, last time I thought I made an idiot of myself in the interview I ended up getting the job. Of course, that turned out to be the worst job I'd ever had, but that's perhaps beside the point.) The thing I've been telling myself — and Andie said the same earlier — is that if I looked completely unqualified and unsuitable for this job, the company wouldn't have got in touch and offered me an interview in the first place. This isn't any guarantee that I'll actually get the position, of course — given the geographical location, I'm not sure I'd want it, anyway, as it would mean a bit of a commute each day — but we'll see.

All in all, I haven't had a particularly good day. Not for any particular reason — nothing actually bad has happened, I just feel shitty.

Such is the way of things when your own mind likes to do its best to sabotage your life and happiness, though.

Oh well. All I can do, I guess, is take tomorrow as it comes and see how it goes. It's not as if the interview I have tomorrow is the only iron I have in the fire at the moment, so it doesn't really matter one way or the other as to whether I get it. But, you know, getting back into a routine and actually having an income would be nice.

One step at a time.