Synfull

Whilst I'm not overly active on dA any more, I still pop in once in a while and thought I'd do a bit of a life update for anyone else who still lurks around here. The last few months have been a bit of a whirlwind for me. At the end of June, the software company I worked for failed to get the investment it needed, meaning that I lost my job along with the majority of out Dev and QA team. I'd been working in the same company for nearly 10 years and really enjoyed my time there, so it was a shame I had to leave. Luckily for me, I had quite a long notice period (9 weeks) which was long enough to find a new job and then have a few weeks off. This gave me the chance to spend a lot of time with my sister and her family (who were visiting from America) and go for a number of walks in my local national park called The Peak District. I started my new role a few weeks ago. I think it's going ok but it will take some time to adjust to working in a new company. It didn't help that I caught

Happy New Year! I just realised that I didn't write a single journal in 2022. Whoops. I am still lurking around here and pop in a few times a week, but I haven't had much to post/update. So what was 2022 like for me? Quite mixed. The year started off strong. I spent the Spring months working on my house - I painted the fences, shed and decking, decorated a blank wall in my office and then spent a few days painting my bathroom. Over the summer, things hit a bump in the road. I had a number of fun plans arranged, which all had to be scrapped as I (and a friend staying with me) caught Covid. Fortunately no long lasting effects, and we both made the most of the situation, but it wasn't quite the relaxing week we had planned. Oh well. In Autumn, I tried to make up for missed opportunities, and think I took on a little too much at once. I filled a lot of my free time with meetups or walks or other house improvements, which resulted in feeling exhausted since around the end of

With the blink of an eye it's now December and NaNoEmo has finished for another year. It has been an absolute delight to see a number of emoticonist take part, breathing some life back into a community that is dormant for much of the year. To add to the celebrations, two of the entries received a Daily Deviation (DD) and one emoticonist ( @MerelyCubed) managed to complete the "30 in 30" challenge - a truly impressive achievement. Without further ado, here are a selection of the entries from this year: @MerelyCubed 30 entries @Phlum 6 entries @BlissfullySarcastic 7 entries @nillemotes 11 entries Emotes submitted privately