Well, we're well into 2026 and I've been struggling to find the time to actually sit down and look back at 2025. My Christmas break was busy, then I had a work in early January, then catching up from several weeks of work I had away. Right now we're staring at the front of a storm that is promising a replay of the Great Texas Ice Storm of 2021. So this may double as my last will and testament.
2025 had a lot happening outside of us and a few things happen to us. I continue my same work at Lockheed Martin, Maria continues editing, and Jaden is now a Sophomore at Brewer High School.
Spencer was hired on a contract at American Airlines working on software in their financial department and lives in Arlington with his partner, Max. Colin and his partner Amber live in Lewisville and both were hired this past fall to work at "Netflix House" as hosts in the "Squid Games" experience. We all had the opportunity to attend early previews and really enjoyed "Squid Games" and got to (eventually) see the "Stranger Things" experience as well.
Some other notable events this year:
- I got a new 3D Printer (a Bambu A1, with 4 color feeder)
- I took a work trip to Dayton OH over my 52 birthday
- I attended the BGG Spring board game convention with Jaden
- Maria went on a book Cruise in October
- Maria had a friend fly into Fort Worth and attend another Anime convention together in December
- My back pain returned and I went to physical therapy for several months and now it's much improved (but still present)
- Maria had multiple eye surgeries (for corrective vision and to treat cataracts), dental surgeries (removal, implant and root canal), and ended the year with a hysterectomy that has had her recovering through Christmas and into the first few months of 2026.
Now on to my favorite things I saw/heard/did this year.
MUSIC
I continued to add to my record collection that I started last year. Last year I was approaching 400, this year I have over 560. So I'm mostly down to new records, new discoveries, and hard-to-find gems at this point.
Besides Spotify, I started tracking with my plays with Last.fm through a Discog's app to include my record listens. According to that app, in 2025 I listend to:
- 645 Artists
- 1,179 Albums
- 4,934 Tracks
Here are a few noteworthy songs/artists both new and renewed that I listened to this year:
- Greg Whitehead - "O Come All Ye Faithful"
I managed to complete a new Christmas melody this year. I'd started playing with ideas for this track last year but just couldn't get it to evolve into anything. I continued to think about it over the rest of 2025 and eventually decided to turn it into a Muse-inspired track. I thought it would be interesting to turn it into a minor key and add some Muse-like synths, chord patterns, and flourishes minus the guitar and singing. (I actually tried to sing a verse and eventually scrapped it because I'm just not Matt Bellamy.)
- Wooze - "Sabre Tooth Spider"
I've talked about these guys before. They've released several EPs and I've enjoyed just about everything they put out. Rather than putting them into an album, they released a whole album of new tracks (self-titled "Wooze") and this was the album I listened to more than anything else this year. They blend the lyrical wordplay and humor of Sparks with an 80s heavy guitar band and somehow it works. Highly recommended album!
- Wolf Alice - "Thorns"
I discovered Wolf Alice from a random YouTube feed recommend. I was immediately hooked and when their album "The Clearing" was released a few weeks later I was captivated by it. They play in a lot of different styles, the one I linked to sounding a lot like 70s Abba with a little Olivia Newton John, then there's also jaunty BritPop ("Bread Butter Tea Sugar"), Sheryl Crow-esque 90s country-adjacent rock ("Passenger Seat"), Tori Amos piano rock ("Bloom Baby Bloom"), 70s Yacht Rock ("Just Two Girls"), and much more. The closest album I can think of that compares to this album is Tori Amos' "Little Earthquakes" which I was equally taken with when it was released in the early 90s and remains one of my favorite albums of all time. Both female-lead albums with a high variety of music styles, with moments of head banging rock and then goosebumps-inducing beauty. And both have a single track that I completely skip every time I listen to the album! ;) The song I linked to above is just one of at least five songs that I highly recommend from this album. "White Horses", "Bloom Baby Bloom", "Bread Butter Tea Sugar", "The Sofa", and "Midnight Song" are all about as equally good and I had a hard time figuring out which to include.
- De'Wayne (with IDKHow) - "forever"
This song popped up in my Spotify new releases feed because of the partnership with I Don't Know How But They Found Me. I quite liked it and listened to the rest of the album and really liked it as well. De'Wayne has a very 80s pop/funk vibe going on that is like Prince and Lenny Kravitz. I'm very hit or miss with Prince, but De'Wayne seems to make it much more palatable. And way better than when IDKHow tried to do their own Prince-style song on their last album. Check out his album "june" and tracks "lady lady", "june", "highway robbery", or "biological."
- White Lies - "In The Middle"
The new White Lies album "Night Lights" came late in the year and was released about the same time as about 5-6 other bands I was following decided to release albums. So I didn't get to give it's proper listening due. Part of it was that while I enjoyed it, there was nothing that fully grabbed me as much I did on their last two albums. I chose "In the Middle" because it was one of the few that had a full video and it had a great spacey, psychedelic rock/extended jam element to it that reminds me a lot of Super Furry Animals. The rest of the album has some highs and lows. The singer tends to have a "Woe is Me, everything is terrible" attitude that brings things down a lot. And there's a couple times he tries to do a gritty Bruce Springsteen-style vocal that grates on me. So while I enjoy it overall, I do tend to skip a few tracks while listening.
- STYX - "Build & Destroy"
STYX put out a new album this year "Circling From Above". I haven't really paid much attention to the band since they parted ways with Dennis DeYoung in the 80s, since he was responsible for most of my favorite songs from the band. However, this particular track, despite modern themes of AI and older-sounding singers, sounds like a track straight out of the late 70s. This could easily fit in to "The Grand Illusion." The rest of the album didn't particularly grab me, but this track really stands out.
- OKGO - "Love"
A new OKGO video is always an event. And while I don't always love their music, they are one of the few bands where the video always elevates and endears the music. This continues to be the case with "Love" with another amazing video. The rest of the new album is so-so, but that's likely because they have yet to do more videos to make me like the songs more.
- Genesis & Peter Gabriel
- Wang Chung/Re-Flex
- The Darkness: Last year I was looking forward to two albums: Wooze (which was my favorite of the year) and the Darkness. Their new album "Dreams on Toast" was okay. But nothing was as good as their early track "The Longest Kiss" that I featured last year. I got the re-released vinyl of "One Way Ticket..." at the end of the year and was reminded how amazing The Darkness could be.
- Peter Murphy: New album this year "Silver Shade". I was never able to get into it but it was much closer to his early 90s rock style.
- C Duncan: I've liked all his previous albums, or at least multiple songs on each. This new one, "It's Only a Love Song" was a dud to me.
- Sparks - "Mad!": New album. Some cute songs. Nothing particularly innovative or interesting.
- Men Without Hats had a new album this year. "I Love the 80s" is a pretty catchy humorous track.
- Midlake, Hatchie, Circles Around the Sun all put out new albums at the same time and I just didn't have the bandwidth to catch back up to them.
What am I looking forward to in 2026? Possibly yet another new Peter Gabriel album: o/i. It's coming, just no date yet. Kula Shaker has been putting out some early songs for a new album that have been pretty good. And there's the possibility Muse might have a new album this year. Hopefully another video or two from OKGo would be great.
MOVIES
This year I watched 216 movies, less than the 228 in 2024 but more than 206 in 2023. So about average for me. I saw 59 movies in theaters, 29 new movies at home, 59 new old movies at home, and 69 re-watches. Here are some favorites or notables for 2025:
- Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl
- Companion
- The Naked Gun
- Predator: Badlands
- Weapons
The marketing for "Companion" made it sound like it was Zach Cregger's follow up movie to 2022's "Barbarian" which I really liked (though somehow did not mention on my year wrap-up.) I was surprised when the director credit came up and it was someone else. "Weapons" was the true follow-up and it is one of the craziest and most amazing movies of the year. Told from multiple perspectives and out of order, it starts with a mystery where an entire classroom of children all left their homes at the same time in the middle of the night and somehow gets to a satisfying conclusion to the mystery that is scary, messed up, and hilarious simultaneously.
- Lilo & Stitch/How to Train Your Dragon (live action)
Two live action remakes of movies I originally enjoyed and found both of these to be just as enjoyable. In contrast to the "Snow White" remake from earlier in the year which was a complete trainwreck and one of the worst movies of the year.
- Weird Wednesdays
Other movies of note for the year:
- No Star Wars or Marvel movies made my favorites for the year. There were no Star Wars movies, and there were two pretty good Marvels: "Thunderbolts*" and "Fantastic Four: First Steps" and one bad: "Captain America: Brave New World." There was also "Superman" which was okay to good, and "Kraven the Hunter" which was terrible.
- Mission Impossible: The Final Reckoning was too busy with a previously established plot and Ethan Hunt god-complex to make for a good finale. There were awesome moments, but the film as a whole just sank like the submarine. The team feeling was gone, the story was a mess, the humor was mostly non-existant, so it had to just rely on spectacle which was fun in the theater but quickly trickled away afterwards.
- The Running Man - A remake of The Running Man by Edgar Wright?! Sign me up. Then cancel my subscription. This movie is missing everything that made Edgar Wright movies great. Even the last one which I didn't care for, "Last Night in Soho" was oozing with style. This was about as plain as you can get. Very little inventiveness, very little fun, very little humor. The only thing consistent with Edgar Wright movies is it has a terrible ending.
- Avatar: Fire and Ash - I've been a slight apologist for Avatar as film spectacle. The prior two have had terrible stories but the visuals and the new worlds that we were introduced to along with the action made up for the absolutely terrible story. This new Avatar introduces us to nothing new, retreads story elements from both the last two movies, and so it has to rely on only action. But action with nothing to hold on to outside of it, means nothing more than maybe almost keeping you awake for the 3+ hours movie.
- Paddington in Peru: Many people consider Paddington 2 to be one of the best films ever made. This was cute.
- Twins in film: Mickey 17, Sinners, Predator Badlands, The Monkey, Superman, and Alto Nights (didn't see) all had the same actor playing against him (or her) self as a twin or clone.
- Normal people suddenly acting wrong: Weapons, Companion, Bring Her Back, The Monkey, and Together were just a few of the horror movies this year where the main theme was a normal person suddenly acting in terrible, evil ways.
- Stephen King: "IT: Welcome To Derry" (TV), "The Running Man," "The Long Walk", "The Monkey", "The Life of Chuck" and "The Institute" (TV, didn't watch).
Interestingly last year I had 4 movies on my most anticipated list: Wallace & Gromit, Mission Impossible, Paddington, and Fantastic 4. Only one became a favorite, the others only made it to mentions.
In 2026 I'm looking forward to: Project Hail Mary, Ready or Not 2, Star Wars: The Mandalorian & Grogu, and Avengers: Doomsday.
TV/STREAMING
- Taskmaster UK, Taskmaster NZ, Taskmaster Australia - Still my favorite series with no sign of stopping. This year in Series 19 of Taskmaster UK they had their first full American celebrity, Jason Mantzoukas who had a lot of fun bringing his unique chaos to the game. (There's been other Americans on the show, but they were all UK based at the time.)
- Panel Shows: I continually watch and enjoy comedy panel shows. Guy Montgomery's Guy Montspelling Bee was probably my f avorite for the year. Dropout's "Make Some Noise" and "Game Changer" I still really love, 8 out of 10 Cats Does Countdown, Big Fat Quiz of the Year, Would I Lie To You, and QI were also still regularly watched.
- Sci-Fi Serial Series: Murderbot / Severance / Plur1bus. I really enjoyed watching "Murderbot" with Maria this year. We got an Apple subscription just to watch it. I continued to watch/catch up on "Severance." And at the end of the year I found "Plur1bus" which has the most amazingly original take on the tropes of "last man on earth" mixed with zombies mixed with "invasion of the body snatchers" mixed with Charlton Heston apocalypse movies. And all done completely straight-faced and serious, yet somehow quite funny and insightful. Really interested to see where that goes next.
- Horror Serial Series: Alien Earth / IT: Welcome to Derry. Although "Alien Earth" could easily fall under Sci-Fi Serials, I think it fits better as a horror series. I enjoyed the unique take on Aliens as just one of a multitude of dangerous alien creatures in this series and the children in synthetic adult bodies was also an original concept for the franchise. It was less greatest hits than Alien Romulus was the year before which I appreciated. "Welcome To Derry" took a while to get going and never fully succeeded, but it had some absolutely wild moments which I appreciated and had fun with. It also had the best opening credits sequence of the year.
- Saturday Night Live: Seasons 50 & 51. SNL Celebrated 50 years this past year with a special and several documentaries. Each documentary focused on something completely different from cast, to making an episode, to all the music. I enjoyed each one. There's a particularly awesome music mashup segment from the music documentary that was a highlight of the year. I doubt this will still be available in the future but here's someone's video of it:
- Cunk on Life/Mandy - Philomena Cunk is the worst documentary host in the world and its hilarious. I discovered the actress Diane Morgan had also starred in another series called "Mandy" which was also pretty funny and interesting to see her playing a completely different but just as stupid character.
- Ghosts UK & US - I started Ghosts UK a while ago but didn't get more than a few episodes in. Now that half the cast has been on Taskmaster, I decided to give it another go and zoomed through it. Hungry for more I turned to the US version, which, like the Office UK vs US, starts in nearly exactly the same place, but then quickly diverges into its own thing. I was much less fond of the soap opera-esque elements of the US version focusing too much on the love lives of the various ghosts. However both are ultimately quite charming and I like how it harkens back to the Bewitched-style "I've got a secret that no one will believe and I need to make sure no one finds out" tone of those old sitcoms. Both are best when they are silliest, but this one can occasionally actually be moving.
- Reacher S1-S3 - I binged 3 seasons of this show and enjoyed them, though in decreasing amounts each season. Let's see if Season 4 improves or not. It's hard to keep justifying how a man with no home or attachments can somehow summon an army of friends every season.
A few other TV items to note for the year:
- No Marvel, No Star Wars - I watched "Daredevil: Born Again," "Iron Heart," "What If...S3" and "Marvel Zombies." Didn't really care for any of them and struggled hard to finish Iron Heart. For Star Wars there was "Skeleton Crew", "Andor Season 2". The first was alright, but "Andor" continued to push my patience. I'm strongly in the minority it seems, as the consensus is that "Andor" is the greatest Star Wars property since the original series. To me it was boring, complicated, and seemed to drift out of focus while jumping every three episodes to something else. Plus, the only aliens, droids, and other sci-fi elements that showed up at all were purely because they were beholden to the occasional continuity element from Rogue One and other Star Wars bits. Otherwise, it's mostly a human political intrigue series that feels shackled to a Star Wars setting.
- Black Mirror S7 - Much better than the previous season with a full on sequel for the first time. However, I can barely remember anything from it when it aired in April, so I can't put it on my top of the year list.The first episode about a life-saving subscription service, though, was pure Black Mirror and definitely a worthy addition.
- Squid Games - S3 or S2.5 wrapped up the series, but not very satisfyingly.
- Stranger Things - S5 finished out the year. Everyone was too old, but I guess they felt compelled to wrap up the story. It was ultimately an okay ending, but I still think they should have left S1 alone and made it an anthology series instead.
I don't have much I'm looking forward to in 2026 that I'm currently aware of. Possibly Avatar, the Last Airbender live action Season 2? And of course, more Taskmaster. (Season 22 has another famous American contestant.)
ONLINE MEDIA/PODCASTS
Here are some of the other things I watched and listened to that weren't TV shows:
- Movie related: RedLetterMedia (YouTube)/ How Did This Get Made (Podcast) / We Hate Movies (Podcast)/ Filmcast (Podcast) / Screencrush (YouTube)
- Geography-based: Jetlag (YouTube)/ Geoguesser (YouTube) / Mapmen (YouTube)
- The George Lucas Talkshow
- Movie takedowns: Pitch Meeting (Ryan George) / Honest Trailers
- Music related: Professor of Rock (YouTube)/ Justin Hawkins Rides Again (YouTube)/ Doug Helvering (Classic Composer Reacts) (YouTube)/ The Charismatic Voice (YouTube)/ Isaac Brown (Gen Z Music Producer) (YouTube)
- GenXGrownup (YouTube) - Focusing mainly on retro-gaming which I discovered after diving into this new genre in September
VIDEO GAMES
Here's what I played this past year:
- Earn To Die: Rogue (iOS) - played every day this year and last.
- Supernatural VR (Quest) - My alternate exercise routine. Just learned in early 2026 that Meta shuttered the studio that produces this, and while the game still lives on with existing content, for now nothing new is likely to be added again.
- Power Wash Simulator / Power Wash Simulator 2 / Leaf Blower Inc (Steam) - Relaxing simulators that can be done while watching a movie or doing other things. We pretty much get every DLC that comes with the first Power Wash Simulator and look forward to more in PWS2 in 2026.
- Zen FX 3 Pinball / Zen FX Pinball / Zen M Pinball (Steam) / Williams Pinball / Zen Pinball World / Pinball Masters (iOS) / Zen FX VR Pinball / Star Wars Pinball VR(Quest) - I got really heavy into pinball at the end of the year. While I was researching making retro arcade machines, pinball came up a lot. So I pulled up some old apps I had to see if I still liked it and found myself falling hard for yet another new hobby. The Zen FX VR and Williams Pinball are the two I probably play the most. Playing in VR is probably the best way to play Pinball over even real life machines.
- Walkabout Mini Golf (Quest) - I continue to get just about every DLC that comes out for this.
- A Game About Digging a Hole (Steam) - I randomly found this in the Steam family share library and lost several days to it. A very short game, but one that demands you keep playing.
- Megabonk (Steam) - This is another game I randomly found in the family library and tried out. There's so much content that even after playing for hours and hours, I only have little of it unlocked.
- Tormenture (Steam) - This is a meta game within a game similar to Inscryption. In this case it's about a kid who gets an 80s Atari-style game similar to the old 1980 "Adventure." A fun short puzzle adventure game with some truly creepy moments.
- Retro Gaming:
Last year my anticipation was for the Swtich 2 and Metroid. I'm still looking forward to playing someday, but there's not enough there yet to have the family convinced to start a new console.
There's nothing I'm specifically looking forward to in 2026 other than more DLC for Powerwash (Adventure Time coming soon), more Pinball tables, and more Mini Golf courses. And maybe a full release of Slay the Spire 2 and Pirates Outlaws 2 (I don't want to play early releases because I don't like how they change the balance of the game. I've been burned by Bloons TD and a few others by playing too early.)
BOARD GAMES
I still continue to enjoy and play board games. For the most part I mainly play solo or with family when they allow it.
This year I had 464 game plays across 67 games, 41 of them new to me.
The games I played/loved the most this year are:
- Legendary 007: A James Bond Deck Building Game + Thunderball / Live & Let Die Fan Expansion (107 plays)
This has been my favorite game for years and it continues to stay there. Legendary was pretty quiet among its other licenses save for a late release of Legendary Game of Thrones which is the first Legendary title I've skipped mainly due to my dislike of the license and because its competitive rather than solo/cooperative.
"Thunderball" was released in May and so in anticipation I, of course, played through all the other currently released movies and then played the heck out of "Thunderball." I decided I had to finally sleeve my game and then had to design and 3D print a whole new system to be able to store it all. I made a separate "core" box and separate custom boxes for each film.
Then later in the year someone posted a fan-made version of "Live & Let Die." Of course being the enthusiastic expert that I am, I jumped in to offer suggestions on how to tweak the game to better fit the other Legendary expansions and follow the less obvious rules Upper Deck uses for the game. Thus began a series of iterations as well as online game testing where the designer and I would test and play and then get together and play and brainstorm. The expansion transformed into something that is every bit as good as a real commercial game other than it's PnP or online. We are now potentially working on "You Only Live Twice."
- Dangerous Space (PNP) (68 plays)
Dangerous Space is a weekly roll and write that is on its second year. I started really strong playing it in 2024 until I was asked to be a tester. Then it turned into a chore and I gave up playing (and testing) altogether. I picked it back up in late 2025 and finished 2024 and started with the 2025 pages. They quoted me on their new Dungeon Pages 2026 Kickstarter page from my BGG review.
- Unstoppable (36 plays)
This was a new original solo or 2-player Deck Building game from the same Solo Hero Series that made Warp's Edge, one of my all-time favorite solo games. This stands right next to Warp's Edge as an amazing game. It has a unique momentum style method where the deck you are building has enemies on one side and your abilities on the other. So you use the ability card to defeat enemies that come to your hand to give you abilities to defeat more enemies. At first you are quite limited, but the enemies are fairly easy. But then you can upgrade your cards by adding new cards that slot into your main cards to become more powerful--but that also makes the enemies stronger. Eventually you either run out of the ability to play cards or you defeat everything including a Big Boss. At first the game seemed impossible, but that's mainly because it requires a completely different set of skills than any other Deck Builder game I've played. You have to be very careful about when and what to upgrade and what to fight. Every decision needs to be calculated and purposeful. And sometimes the shuffle just makes you fail.
I'm excited because they are adapting this game with the "Dungeon Crawler Carl" license this year (or at least the Kickstarter.) I'm anxious to see what they can do with the merging of the two properties.
- Final Girl (S3 + 3 films from S4 + Shriek) (29 plays)
I receive and painted (and painted and painted) and then played Series 3 of Final Girl early this year with Feature Films based on Terminator, Saw, A Quiet Place, Stranger Things, and Hellraiser.
Then Van Ryder Games decided this year they would release Series 4 individually leading up to a new Kickstarter in 2026 to finish out the series. Plus they had a "Special Feature" game thrown in as well which was a convention exclusive game outside of any regular Series. So far they released one inspired by "5 Nights at Freddy's", and one around "Children of the Corn", another around "The Nun"/"The Excorcist" and the Special Feature inspired by "Scream" (called "Shriek.") I have yet to paint the Nun or Corn boxes (they are primed and ready once I have the time) but I have painted the other two (and painted and painted--there were a TON of figures for those two boxes!)
- Dead Cells (25 plays)
I got this a while ago and played a few games with Jaden, but they didn't seem anxious to keep going and this game requires you to play over and over again to actually progress. It's made to be like the video game where you repeat the game loop and die regularly but get new upgrades and weapons and abilities to eventually be able to defeat the next boss. I played through the entire campaign and unlocked everything (or at least mostly everything--everything important.) It has a fun progression system, but the game by itself is not that fun. So once you unlock everything there's no compelling reason to play any more.
- Fliptown (19 plays)
This is a Wild West themed Roll and Write with Poker-style cards rather than dice. You flip cards and assign the values to different places in the Western town like going mining or to the saloon or avoiding the sheriff. It had a separate solo campaign that I purchased with it and played through the campaign and had a lot of fun with it. I even played a few games with Jaden. There was a Kickstarter for standalone expansion and a spiritual sequel based on a Captain Nemo-style submarine adventure that I backed and expect in 2026.
- Dorfromantik Sakura (17 plays)
This is another campaign game and very similar to Dorfromantik but Japanese countryside themed. I played through this campaign with Maria and we had a lot of fun with it.
- Quacks (of Quedlinburg) (11 plays)
"Quacks of Quedlinburg" rebranded itself as "Quacks" for a new American release and I sold my original copy and expansions to buy the new version that had everything together plus the cool plastic ingredients (rather than cardboard.) I fired up my 3D printer and made a really cool storage system and decked everything out all fancy-like. Maria, Jaden, and I all played our own home campaign using all the different ingredient cards and adding the expansions as we went along. Jaden won pretty much every game and was the overall winner.
Some other games that I enjoyed playing this year:
- "Marvel Dice Throne Missions" & X-Men & Deadpool & Outcasts
- GI Joe Deck Building Game (Raise the Flagg + other expansions)
- Flash Point Legacy (Maria and I started this campaign but took a hiatus with her eye surgery and we both forgot to come back and finish)
- Gloomhaven Jaws of the Lion (I started a campaign with Jaden, we got about half way and then school started.)
- Small Time Heroes (a fun smaller solo game heavily inspired by Slay the Spire.)
- Flip 7 (a new press-your-luck party game that I learned at BGG Spring and got at Christmas and played with family here and when I went to Utah in January 2026)
Last year I was most looking forward to: Final Girl Series 3, a new Marvel Legendary Deck Building Game core set (which didn't release), Flash Point Legacy (started, not yet finished) and two Dice Throne games. Other than Legendary, I was happy playing all of those this past year.
In 2026 I'm looking forward to: Unstoppable: Dungeon Crawler Carl, Final Girl S4 (completed), Vampire Survivors, Tomb Raider, Flip Voyage, Tiny Epic Dungeon Adventures, The Living Maze, and Mini Rogue S2. All of which, save for the first two, I've already Kickstarted and just waiting for the fulfillment.
BOOK
I read one book this year. And it was a children's book. Pretty sad on my part.
- "Can You See What I See?: Curiosity Shop" by Walter Wick. I started and finished in January.
I also started but did not finish:
- Dungeon Crawler Carl Book 07 - While I love this series, the brief pause from book 1-6 and knowing there would be another year or more for book 08 kind of made me lose momentum. There were too many references that I no longer remembered and understood so I decided I needed to wait and probably re-read later.
- Cunk on Everything - A comedy encyclopedia book. I keep it in the bathroom and read a passage here and there. Usually only if I've forgotten my phone.
In 2026 I'm looking forward to finishing more than 1 book. I've already got 4 more from Christmas to get through.
Other Stuff
- 3D Printing.
I mentioned earlier that I got a new 3D Printer this year. The "Bambu A1" with a 4 color "AMS Lite" (which allows it to swap between 4 colors). I thought maybe the extra colors might just be a lot of extra money for little return, but I found the extra colors to be inspiring. I printed as much if not more than in 2020 when I got my first printer. (Jaden inherited that and has done their own printing on it.) Here are a few projects that I made:
Below is a lighted "Lithograph" of one of Mom's paintings made with a 3D printer. Next is a puzzle cube that I printed and assembled. Then a magnetic moving Mario Kart track. And a comb-knife that opens and closes.
Also, here is a picture of my new retro-arcade display with everything I got at Christmas including a Tron: Ares popcorn bucket.
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