I’ve done everything the Bible says - even the stuff that contradicts the other stuff!

Happy new year everyone, unless you don't believe in new year, in which case insert politicly correct good wishes for getting round the sun once more, with no offence intended to you or your friends and loved ones.

2011 was certainly a year, thats for sure. In my final semester of University I helped create a pretty awesome multiplayer flash game, I learned Object-C and created an iPhone app for my final year project and I graduated from the course with first class honours (go me!). I also got a little full-time job with some folk who sell fermented vegetable drinks online and was tricked into doing terrible things to my facial hair. 

It wasn't all sunshine and victory laps though. It rained a lot for one and the final few months of University were some of the most stressful of my life. It didn't help that at the same time as trying to complete my final year project and maintain a part-time job, I had the consecutive loss of both Tabby and Hamish, two long-term members of the family. They say a dog is for life, but you forget that it's their life, not yours. His death hit everyone hard, but my mum most of all, who became physically ill for over a week and caught an eye infection that could have made her blind (fortunately she fully recovered). On a more up beat note we also got a couple new members of the family in ones of the most unexpected ways (my older sister nearly tripped over a stray cat giving birth on her doorstep). 

The last month has also been "an experience". Working for an online e-commerce company means everything is about Christmas, and this one was the busiest yet. On one day in December the website took more orders than the entirety of 2008, so to help support the team and fix any issues that arose we had to move from our nice warm office to a very cold warehouse. Christmas was a success though, mostly because it didn't snow and we made order processing much more efficient, so yay us and all that. Next year our systems will be so efficient the whisky will be picked and packed by little robots and I can spend the last two weeks of December in Malaga instead of High Brooms, aka the coldest place in Britain.

Christmas wasn't all cold warehouses though, as for a person who doesn't drink very much, I did a lot of drinking. This included a surprise party in London for an old college and uni friend and consecutive days of going to work and hitting the pubs in the evening, which I'm positive did wonders for my programming. It was great to see a lot of people again and we defeantly need to do it more often.

I also learned in 2011 that I am terrible at ice skating. So there is that.