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A Look Back at 2024 (and 2023)
7 months ago
Preface
It is that time of the year again where I do the yearly wrap up.
You might be asking, what about the 2023 wrap up? Well, I did write one, actually. Several, in fact. But, no matter how I changed the format or tried to be positive with it, I couldn’t. 2023 was a really bad year. I consider it the worst of my life. I struggled to find any positives in it. I am sure they were there, but when you are buried in shit so deep you forget what the sun looks like, you can’t help but only see the negatives. So to the do 2023 wrap up in a sentence: 2023 fucking sucked and was traumatic all things considered.
So in any case, onto the 2024 wrap up. Considering that I am actually posting this one, I’ll spoil it and say that 2024 does have some positives and will end on a good note. But to wrap up 2024, I’ve got to go back to 2022 first.
In November 2022, I was laid off very suddenly from a job I loved. My time in that job was one of the golden eras of your life that you back fondly of. It was one of the few periods of my life that I can look back and say that I was finally happy and content with myself and the world. That fragile happiness was shattered by my layoff, but I didn’t really know how bad. I had assumed that I’d be back on my feet in no time. Many of yall know how that went, but those who don’t, it took me 22 months to find a new full-time position that paid well and isn’t going to treat me like trash (fuck you Meta). Those 22 months were not easy. As the funds I saved from every paycheck began to dry up and job applications seemingly sent into the void, it became abundantly clear to me that I was going to lose nearly everything and I did. I was fortunately that I could rely on my parents, as much as I loathed the loss of independence and how I’d have to be around them all the time again. I do love them, but they’re frustrating people at times. What I am getting at is that all the things that had made me happy had evaporated and I was constantly faced with letdown after rejection after letdown after rejection. So many times I’d see the finish line. I’d be so close that it was within my reach, but not within my grasp. And then it would slip away. Sometimes it was that someone was just better than me. More often than not though, I would fail because of the incompetence of someone else. A maintenance worker that was explicitly told to not enter my apartment for repairs between a certain time on a specific date. An HR staffer who rescheduled one of my final panel interviews but neglected to tell me. A landscaper who happened to sever the internet cable in the ground during one of my interviews. It just kept fucking happening man. Time and again, I’d be so close just to have some unavoidable bullshit happen. It felt like I was cursed by black swans. From losing my dream job from COVID to getting hit by a car to repeatedly failing to show any worth for all my efforts through my life to build something, it felt like I’d fallen into a nightmare and it is hard to wake up from a nightmare when you’re not even asleep.
But, I’m relieved now that I have woken up from that nightmare. Earlier this month (I’m starting this first draft in November lol), I landed a job in my niche field at a reputable and well-known tech company. It’s only been a week so far, but fuck dude, it almost feels like old times again back when my last company was still fun to work at (that’s a whole other messy story).
So, I guess this is all to preface that 2024 ends on the damn good note. I’m out of the mire finally. The nightmare is finally fuckin’ over. I don’t feel the weight of extreme depression or the struggle to just get out of bed. Instead, I feel the tears of relief on my face. I feel the disbelief that I made it through that chapter. I also feel the exhaustion from two years of insanely high stress and have been resting A LOT outside of work hahaha!
And so, I’m happy to write and post a wrap-up this year. Let’s get to it.
The Retrospective
I’m sure this is going to change a lot over the next month as I go through drafts. A fun fact about previous wrap-ups is that each had multiple drafts that were vastly different. This one is sure to follow. I write them like this because these are supposed to sound like me. I want someone who knows me to read this and hear my voice saying it. Sometimes, that takes a few tries to get right. The thoughts are there, but the words aren’t. Going through these drafts helps turns those jumbled thoughts into something that sounds like me: a mixture of stupid, insightful, and seasoned with a bit of pretentiousness. Without further rambling, let’s hit the highlights or lowlights of the months.
Editor Gylphie here: this dumbfuck forgot to backup the document when he transferred it to the computer he was on for the entire month of December while he was working on this, so now he has to go through and update it all over again without knowing what exactly he wrote because WOW he was shitfaced every night after work lmao
December
OOOOOOOOO I can divine the future OOOOOOOO I’m going to get some super self indulgent smut of Gideon and Tiddyon and then some cool ass SFW art of Luum OOoOOOOOOooo
I’ll probably also get to spend some awesome R&R at my parent’s new house.
Update: It is now February. I did get some very self indulgent smut of Gideon and Tiddyon. Sorry Luum ☹
November
So it is *checks date* currently 3:07AM on November 11th. I went to San Francisco and got started at my new job. I’m now back in Omaha, where I work remotely from. I’m happy with my new job. I’m chilling right now drinking some Bacardi 10 Year mixed into Diet Coke and writing this. Life feels pretty good right now.
October
In October, I moved to Omaha, Nebraska to start my new job. The drive was ass and took two days. Driving through northwest Missouri had finally made me understand how well-rested people can just doze off while driving.
September
It was over. I got the kind of job offer I’d been searching to get for over 22 months. I cried. A lot. I remember seeing the offer letter and just breaking down at my desk. I don’t know how to describe the catharsis of nearly two years of stress, frustration, and despondency leaving me all at once. I got extremely wasted that night and slept the best I ever had.
Muscular Demon Tiddyon also happened and now I am considering making that her default appearance. God I love strong women.
I also played The Beginner’s Guide for the first time. More about that later.
August
I fucking burned up in my no A/C room in the middle of Tennessee summer.
This is how I survived: https://x.com/Gylphie/status/1826341500621307928
This is how
nawka depicted me surviving: https://x.com/NawkaArts/status/1826404332126044432
I also worked for Meta for one week before saying fuuuuuck that. What a disaster of a company.
July
For about 2 months, I got back to swimming half a mile daily after a joint pain cream somehow dulled the pain enough in my wrist and elbow. The daily laps strengthened my entire arm to where things felt and still feel normal again in them.
June
I moved my parents into their new and very nice house. I never thought I would say that I want to live with my parents again.
Salvation’s Edge Day 1 also happened. Shoutout to Team Goated With The Sauce (Sexual Style). SO fucking proud of us for beating Verity and getting Witness down pat. It’s a shame we didn’t clear Witness, but fuck me if I wasn’t still proud of us. Love yall <3
May
Dragon-Flayer Luum was made and I am so down bad for illithids.
Also I had a dream when I threw pinto beans at Deshaun Watson to prove he is a terrible person and the beans exploded on contact with him, which obviously proved me to be right. Fuck the Browns man.
I also apparently had a dream where I had to fight someone so I pulled a 3 foot long baguette out of my mouth and it made an unsheathing sound like a sword.
April
I got rejected by a company I was kind of excited for. And then a week later they came crawling back to my doorstep. IT WAS MY TURN TO GHOST HR. They emailed, called, and texted me more desperate each time. Pretty much the person they decided to hire got cold feet after a week, which is a HUGE red flag. I also wasn’t going to give them the time of day for how they rejected me. They also lied about the final interview being a final interview and they were late for every interview along the way. Fuuuuuuck those people.
I also, according to my D&D group’s notetaker, “delivered a fuckin banger of a promo” during one of our sessions where I prevented an important NPC from fully undergoing ceremorphosis, which gave us a half ancient dragon/half-illithid ally for a little bit.
I also improved my golf skills enough to finally beat my dad by nailing 5 shots in a row. That felt great.
I picked up a new car too. I bought a 2024 VW Tiguan and have been loving it.
March
I was extremely paw brained in March. That is all.
February
Forget not.
January
I went to the Atlanta Aquarium for the first time in over a decade. It was wonderful. I was also wasted which was even cooler. Highly recommend going to it if you are going to FWA!
The Grapeside Chat 2024
I completely forgot about this section until literally right now while I am about to post this.
This is just the part where I say that I am sorry that I missed your message I am processing a nonstop 24/7 onslaught of information with a brain designed to eat berries in a cave. But to be serious about it, I do apologize if I've missed messages or left people on read. While the insane stress might be gone, I'm still kind of in a massive recovery mode from all of that and am still knee-capped on social energy. Some weekends I just stare at my ceiling in a pitch-black cold dark room for hours because I get that tired (I swear I am ok). But yeah, it is definitely me and not you. If I missed a message or didn't respond to something, please do not feel like it is you. I'll try and get back to you when I'm like mentally/emotionally/fuck me IDK able to. Shits weird, but shits alright.
The Gylphie Awards
Welcome to the first annual Gylphie Awards, a set of incredibly subjective awards that are designed solely around things I want to talk about, spotlight, and soapbox about. It will also include people I want to specifically mention outside of the standard Roll Credits section.
Album of the Year
Angel Youth by Vansire
For those know my tastes, this one might be a bit out of pocket. I’m a pretty big prog metal/rock and space/stoner rock kind of guy, so an alt/indie pop album ranking out #1 might come as a surprise. I think in worse or better years, my typical tastes might come ahead, but in a year with such a flurry of emotions, failures, and ultimately, success—I think an album like Angel Youth is perfect.
I love this album because the emotions in it. You feel nostalgia, you feel love, you feel loss, you feel self-hate and despondency. All of it is there. And all of that was there in no small amount in 2024. Highlights on the album for me include Moon Hits and the eponymous Angel Youth. These two songs have a poignant and wistful feel to them that hits me at the core. If I were describe much of the two years with a single word, it would be “wistful”.
Band of the Year
VOLA
I’ve known about VOLA for a few years now. Back during grad school, I came across Stray the Skies and it was on hard repeat for me. Besides that though, I never listened to any more of VOLA besides Ruby Pool until earlier this year. Massive mistake because I missed out. I will not be surprised if my 2024 Spotify Rewind has them as my #1.
Highlights of VOLA for me this year as: Gutter Moon and 24 Light-Years.
Gutter Moon’s keyboard solo makes me hard and the bass, bridge, and final verse in 24 Light-Years fucks me up beyond belief. Fantastic songs.
Song of the Year
dullscythe by Porter Robinson
It is kind of funny how I am mainly a prog/death metal guy, but Porter Robinson is arguably my favorite musician ever (even though I still haven’t listened to the new album yet lol). Nurture was a super meaningful album to me for a lot of reasons. If I were to talk about that, we’d be here all night, so I’ll just talk about dullscythe making a comeback this year for me and why it has taken on this whole new meaning for me.
dullscythe, to me, is about struggle, perseverance, and finally fucking getting it all to come together. When I hear the disjointed beginning, it seems to me like it is when you try over and over again at the same thing, but fail almost right at the outset. Sometimes though, you get a little further. Other times you try something completely new and it gets you nowhere, so you go back to what you know got you a little further. Other times, you get real far and are almost there to making something complete, but it just doesn’t work. But then, that one difference comes across and all the racket and bullshit just comes together and makes sense. That’s kind of what I get from how disjointed the song sounds before it stops the rapid attacks and turns into something resembling more of a song than just sounds. That’s kind of summed up the last two years for me, so hearing this song again after I’ve reached the ending and brought it all together into something beautiful and real and complete hit me hard. I’ve always loved this album and damn near every song on it (Wind Tempos fucks me up hard), but dullscythe is the one this year that really spoke to me. I hope I can be fucking insane next year and fly to Ireland to catch the final show of the Smile tour in March. That would be awesome.
Game of the Year
Windblown and The Beginner’s Guide
This one is split between the most fun game I played this year (Windblown) and the game that hurt me to my core the most (The Beginner’s Guide.
Windblown
This game is in its first early access build and is fucking awesome already. The combat and gameplay are smooth. It is easy to learn, hard to master. While not everything feels viable yet, more things feel viable rather than not and become a preference depending on your playstyle. I think that when this game hits 1.0, it will be a strong GOTY contender at The Game Awards.
The Beginner’s Guide
Yeah, yeah, I know I’m a few years late. I’d bought this game and had it on the shelf for a long time. I have a certain list of games that I buy when I hear enough people say incredible things about a game, but won’t tell you a damn thing about it because it is THAT good. These are the kind of games that I keep set aside for when it is the right time. I don’t know when that time will be, but I know when it arrives. Typically, it is during times of doubt, strife, and sorrow that I play these games. I busted out The Beginner’s Guide during a difficult time this summer and bawled my fucking eyes out. Similar to Outer Wilds, it is a game so special that I, like others, will say nothing about it other than to go play it.
Meme Format of the Year
The fucking subtle foreshadowing meme.
https://x.com/Acro1954/status/1844577591887646963
This fuckin video nearly made me pass out.
Songs Worth Mentioning That I Didn’t Want To Create Individual Awards For
I will make you look at my eclectic ass music tastes.
Kit by KAUAN – Good, weirdly emotional song and album.
Halo Canticles by Kazuma Jinnouchi – 🚨HOT TAKE ALERT 🚨 Halo 5 was a decent game with a shit campaign. Both it and Halo 4 had some great tracks. Speaking of Halo 4…
Green and Blue by Neil Davidge – Neil had an impossible job of following up Marty and Salvatori’s OSTs, but I feel like he did a decent job. Arrival and Green and Blue were some good entries.
With Grace by We Lost the Sea – Did someone say 11 minutes of slow buildup to a climax that makes me climax? (Australian metal band moment)
El Duelo by Vita Imana – Man I hope the translated lyrics aren’t something really bad.
Country of the Year
Iceland. I flew through there during the “hottest” part of the year and it was like 60F. What an incredible place. Also please don’t explode while I am traveling through next time. Or do and get me trapped there for a free vacation. Hi Irish.
Fur Bait of the Year
Got to be Satan from Helluva Boss. Sorry hot werewolf man from Windblown, you might have my heart but demons got my soul.
NFL Team of the Year
Got to be the Buffalo Bills. I like the Lions and I’m a Bucs fan, but man Josh Allen is so fucking fun to watch and earned not only MVP, but more important, MY award with that ass-backwards snow shovel pass to Amari Cooper that was then lateral’d back to him. My vodka addled mind could not process what the fuck happened on that play.
Play in question: https://old.reddit.com/r/nfl/commen.....ri_cooper_who/
NFL Loser of the Year
Got to be the Cleveland Browns. Fuck the Cleveland Browns. The biggest loser is Deshaun “Groper Cleveland” Watson. I think he literally the only player I have ever seen who has elicited stadium-wide cheers when he suffered a major injury. Absolute piece of shit human on a piece of shit team that wears shit colors.
Artists of the Year
knightseternal Knightly is such a cool fuckin’ dude (hi Knightly). A lot of lads knew about the really difficult time I had during my 2-year long job search and the incredibly stupid things that happened during it. During one of the worst times of it, Knightly was like “HEY FUCKO LETS MAKE A QUAD GIDEON” and then we spent the next few nights chilling in call making quad Gideon into the early hours of the morning. It was a very kind and thoughtful thing to do and certainly helped me get my mind off the shit I was going through internally. Thank you Knightly for being the cool dude you are <3
Nebelviper (https://bsky.app/profile/nebelviper.bsky.social) : Some of my absolute favorite pieces this year have been from Nebel. She does such an AWESOME job with Demon Gideon that I just have to gush about it again. She’s also fantastic to work with. Highly recommend.
neltruin Neltruin brought my D&D characters and some very cool concepts to life for me this year that I still asdjkfhgjg at because my D&D characters live rent-free in my head all the time. Also that one smut of Demon Gideon WEW
Food of the Year
Burrito. If you didn’t know this one already, I’m disappointed in you.
Restaurant of the Year
Chipotle. If you didn’t know this one already, I’m very disappointed in you.
Alcohol of the Year
Casa Dragones Blanco my beloved
Kink of the Year
Paws. Guess what it’ll be next year.
Paws of the Year
It is a strong tie between the
killioma, 
tenaflux, and https://bsky.app/profile/nebelviper.bsky.social pieces from this year for many reasons. I mean *just look at them aaaa*
Roll Credits
Not me finishing this in February because I left the near finished draft on a different computer back in January…
Anyways, the 2024 credits
Team Goated With The Sauce (Sexual Style)
galeboomer 
gylph 
spiffyjuize
subitokurai 
asbellhant 
draxlerfox
O hi Mark and our team mascot
toumakthegryphon
knightseternal for being a fuckin amazing friend
themetaisreal for being a great conversationalist and getting me thinking a lot about my own characters
Chipotle
Burritos
The frequent lads of Lad’s Landing
Everyone who puts up with my brainrot and paw lust on Twitter and Bsky
I’m hopeful for this year. It has been 2 years since I could say that, but I mean it this time. Here’s hoping.
As for you, I hope only the best.
Until next time <3
It is that time of the year again where I do the yearly wrap up.
You might be asking, what about the 2023 wrap up? Well, I did write one, actually. Several, in fact. But, no matter how I changed the format or tried to be positive with it, I couldn’t. 2023 was a really bad year. I consider it the worst of my life. I struggled to find any positives in it. I am sure they were there, but when you are buried in shit so deep you forget what the sun looks like, you can’t help but only see the negatives. So to the do 2023 wrap up in a sentence: 2023 fucking sucked and was traumatic all things considered.
So in any case, onto the 2024 wrap up. Considering that I am actually posting this one, I’ll spoil it and say that 2024 does have some positives and will end on a good note. But to wrap up 2024, I’ve got to go back to 2022 first.
In November 2022, I was laid off very suddenly from a job I loved. My time in that job was one of the golden eras of your life that you back fondly of. It was one of the few periods of my life that I can look back and say that I was finally happy and content with myself and the world. That fragile happiness was shattered by my layoff, but I didn’t really know how bad. I had assumed that I’d be back on my feet in no time. Many of yall know how that went, but those who don’t, it took me 22 months to find a new full-time position that paid well and isn’t going to treat me like trash (fuck you Meta). Those 22 months were not easy. As the funds I saved from every paycheck began to dry up and job applications seemingly sent into the void, it became abundantly clear to me that I was going to lose nearly everything and I did. I was fortunately that I could rely on my parents, as much as I loathed the loss of independence and how I’d have to be around them all the time again. I do love them, but they’re frustrating people at times. What I am getting at is that all the things that had made me happy had evaporated and I was constantly faced with letdown after rejection after letdown after rejection. So many times I’d see the finish line. I’d be so close that it was within my reach, but not within my grasp. And then it would slip away. Sometimes it was that someone was just better than me. More often than not though, I would fail because of the incompetence of someone else. A maintenance worker that was explicitly told to not enter my apartment for repairs between a certain time on a specific date. An HR staffer who rescheduled one of my final panel interviews but neglected to tell me. A landscaper who happened to sever the internet cable in the ground during one of my interviews. It just kept fucking happening man. Time and again, I’d be so close just to have some unavoidable bullshit happen. It felt like I was cursed by black swans. From losing my dream job from COVID to getting hit by a car to repeatedly failing to show any worth for all my efforts through my life to build something, it felt like I’d fallen into a nightmare and it is hard to wake up from a nightmare when you’re not even asleep.
But, I’m relieved now that I have woken up from that nightmare. Earlier this month (I’m starting this first draft in November lol), I landed a job in my niche field at a reputable and well-known tech company. It’s only been a week so far, but fuck dude, it almost feels like old times again back when my last company was still fun to work at (that’s a whole other messy story).
So, I guess this is all to preface that 2024 ends on the damn good note. I’m out of the mire finally. The nightmare is finally fuckin’ over. I don’t feel the weight of extreme depression or the struggle to just get out of bed. Instead, I feel the tears of relief on my face. I feel the disbelief that I made it through that chapter. I also feel the exhaustion from two years of insanely high stress and have been resting A LOT outside of work hahaha!
And so, I’m happy to write and post a wrap-up this year. Let’s get to it.
The Retrospective
I’m sure this is going to change a lot over the next month as I go through drafts. A fun fact about previous wrap-ups is that each had multiple drafts that were vastly different. This one is sure to follow. I write them like this because these are supposed to sound like me. I want someone who knows me to read this and hear my voice saying it. Sometimes, that takes a few tries to get right. The thoughts are there, but the words aren’t. Going through these drafts helps turns those jumbled thoughts into something that sounds like me: a mixture of stupid, insightful, and seasoned with a bit of pretentiousness. Without further rambling, let’s hit the highlights or lowlights of the months.
Editor Gylphie here: this dumbfuck forgot to backup the document when he transferred it to the computer he was on for the entire month of December while he was working on this, so now he has to go through and update it all over again without knowing what exactly he wrote because WOW he was shitfaced every night after work lmao
December
OOOOOOOOO I can divine the future OOOOOOOO I’m going to get some super self indulgent smut of Gideon and Tiddyon and then some cool ass SFW art of Luum OOoOOOOOOooo
I’ll probably also get to spend some awesome R&R at my parent’s new house.
Update: It is now February. I did get some very self indulgent smut of Gideon and Tiddyon. Sorry Luum ☹
November
So it is *checks date* currently 3:07AM on November 11th. I went to San Francisco and got started at my new job. I’m now back in Omaha, where I work remotely from. I’m happy with my new job. I’m chilling right now drinking some Bacardi 10 Year mixed into Diet Coke and writing this. Life feels pretty good right now.
October
In October, I moved to Omaha, Nebraska to start my new job. The drive was ass and took two days. Driving through northwest Missouri had finally made me understand how well-rested people can just doze off while driving.
September
It was over. I got the kind of job offer I’d been searching to get for over 22 months. I cried. A lot. I remember seeing the offer letter and just breaking down at my desk. I don’t know how to describe the catharsis of nearly two years of stress, frustration, and despondency leaving me all at once. I got extremely wasted that night and slept the best I ever had.
Muscular Demon Tiddyon also happened and now I am considering making that her default appearance. God I love strong women.
I also played The Beginner’s Guide for the first time. More about that later.
August
I fucking burned up in my no A/C room in the middle of Tennessee summer.
This is how I survived: https://x.com/Gylphie/status/1826341500621307928
This is how
nawka depicted me surviving: https://x.com/NawkaArts/status/1826404332126044432I also worked for Meta for one week before saying fuuuuuck that. What a disaster of a company.
July
For about 2 months, I got back to swimming half a mile daily after a joint pain cream somehow dulled the pain enough in my wrist and elbow. The daily laps strengthened my entire arm to where things felt and still feel normal again in them.
June
I moved my parents into their new and very nice house. I never thought I would say that I want to live with my parents again.
Salvation’s Edge Day 1 also happened. Shoutout to Team Goated With The Sauce (Sexual Style). SO fucking proud of us for beating Verity and getting Witness down pat. It’s a shame we didn’t clear Witness, but fuck me if I wasn’t still proud of us. Love yall <3
May
Dragon-Flayer Luum was made and I am so down bad for illithids.
Also I had a dream when I threw pinto beans at Deshaun Watson to prove he is a terrible person and the beans exploded on contact with him, which obviously proved me to be right. Fuck the Browns man.
I also apparently had a dream where I had to fight someone so I pulled a 3 foot long baguette out of my mouth and it made an unsheathing sound like a sword.
April
I got rejected by a company I was kind of excited for. And then a week later they came crawling back to my doorstep. IT WAS MY TURN TO GHOST HR. They emailed, called, and texted me more desperate each time. Pretty much the person they decided to hire got cold feet after a week, which is a HUGE red flag. I also wasn’t going to give them the time of day for how they rejected me. They also lied about the final interview being a final interview and they were late for every interview along the way. Fuuuuuuck those people.
I also, according to my D&D group’s notetaker, “delivered a fuckin banger of a promo” during one of our sessions where I prevented an important NPC from fully undergoing ceremorphosis, which gave us a half ancient dragon/half-illithid ally for a little bit.
I also improved my golf skills enough to finally beat my dad by nailing 5 shots in a row. That felt great.
I picked up a new car too. I bought a 2024 VW Tiguan and have been loving it.
March
I was extremely paw brained in March. That is all.
February
Forget not.
January
I went to the Atlanta Aquarium for the first time in over a decade. It was wonderful. I was also wasted which was even cooler. Highly recommend going to it if you are going to FWA!
The Grapeside Chat 2024
I completely forgot about this section until literally right now while I am about to post this.
This is just the part where I say that I am sorry that I missed your message I am processing a nonstop 24/7 onslaught of information with a brain designed to eat berries in a cave. But to be serious about it, I do apologize if I've missed messages or left people on read. While the insane stress might be gone, I'm still kind of in a massive recovery mode from all of that and am still knee-capped on social energy. Some weekends I just stare at my ceiling in a pitch-black cold dark room for hours because I get that tired (I swear I am ok). But yeah, it is definitely me and not you. If I missed a message or didn't respond to something, please do not feel like it is you. I'll try and get back to you when I'm like mentally/emotionally/fuck me IDK able to. Shits weird, but shits alright.
The Gylphie Awards
Welcome to the first annual Gylphie Awards, a set of incredibly subjective awards that are designed solely around things I want to talk about, spotlight, and soapbox about. It will also include people I want to specifically mention outside of the standard Roll Credits section.
Album of the Year
Angel Youth by Vansire
For those know my tastes, this one might be a bit out of pocket. I’m a pretty big prog metal/rock and space/stoner rock kind of guy, so an alt/indie pop album ranking out #1 might come as a surprise. I think in worse or better years, my typical tastes might come ahead, but in a year with such a flurry of emotions, failures, and ultimately, success—I think an album like Angel Youth is perfect.
I love this album because the emotions in it. You feel nostalgia, you feel love, you feel loss, you feel self-hate and despondency. All of it is there. And all of that was there in no small amount in 2024. Highlights on the album for me include Moon Hits and the eponymous Angel Youth. These two songs have a poignant and wistful feel to them that hits me at the core. If I were describe much of the two years with a single word, it would be “wistful”.
Band of the Year
VOLA
I’ve known about VOLA for a few years now. Back during grad school, I came across Stray the Skies and it was on hard repeat for me. Besides that though, I never listened to any more of VOLA besides Ruby Pool until earlier this year. Massive mistake because I missed out. I will not be surprised if my 2024 Spotify Rewind has them as my #1.
Highlights of VOLA for me this year as: Gutter Moon and 24 Light-Years.
Gutter Moon’s keyboard solo makes me hard and the bass, bridge, and final verse in 24 Light-Years fucks me up beyond belief. Fantastic songs.
Song of the Year
dullscythe by Porter Robinson
It is kind of funny how I am mainly a prog/death metal guy, but Porter Robinson is arguably my favorite musician ever (even though I still haven’t listened to the new album yet lol). Nurture was a super meaningful album to me for a lot of reasons. If I were to talk about that, we’d be here all night, so I’ll just talk about dullscythe making a comeback this year for me and why it has taken on this whole new meaning for me.
dullscythe, to me, is about struggle, perseverance, and finally fucking getting it all to come together. When I hear the disjointed beginning, it seems to me like it is when you try over and over again at the same thing, but fail almost right at the outset. Sometimes though, you get a little further. Other times you try something completely new and it gets you nowhere, so you go back to what you know got you a little further. Other times, you get real far and are almost there to making something complete, but it just doesn’t work. But then, that one difference comes across and all the racket and bullshit just comes together and makes sense. That’s kind of what I get from how disjointed the song sounds before it stops the rapid attacks and turns into something resembling more of a song than just sounds. That’s kind of summed up the last two years for me, so hearing this song again after I’ve reached the ending and brought it all together into something beautiful and real and complete hit me hard. I’ve always loved this album and damn near every song on it (Wind Tempos fucks me up hard), but dullscythe is the one this year that really spoke to me. I hope I can be fucking insane next year and fly to Ireland to catch the final show of the Smile tour in March. That would be awesome.
Game of the Year
Windblown and The Beginner’s Guide
This one is split between the most fun game I played this year (Windblown) and the game that hurt me to my core the most (The Beginner’s Guide.
Windblown
This game is in its first early access build and is fucking awesome already. The combat and gameplay are smooth. It is easy to learn, hard to master. While not everything feels viable yet, more things feel viable rather than not and become a preference depending on your playstyle. I think that when this game hits 1.0, it will be a strong GOTY contender at The Game Awards.
The Beginner’s Guide
Yeah, yeah, I know I’m a few years late. I’d bought this game and had it on the shelf for a long time. I have a certain list of games that I buy when I hear enough people say incredible things about a game, but won’t tell you a damn thing about it because it is THAT good. These are the kind of games that I keep set aside for when it is the right time. I don’t know when that time will be, but I know when it arrives. Typically, it is during times of doubt, strife, and sorrow that I play these games. I busted out The Beginner’s Guide during a difficult time this summer and bawled my fucking eyes out. Similar to Outer Wilds, it is a game so special that I, like others, will say nothing about it other than to go play it.
Meme Format of the Year
The fucking subtle foreshadowing meme.
https://x.com/Acro1954/status/1844577591887646963
This fuckin video nearly made me pass out.
Songs Worth Mentioning That I Didn’t Want To Create Individual Awards For
I will make you look at my eclectic ass music tastes.
Kit by KAUAN – Good, weirdly emotional song and album.
Halo Canticles by Kazuma Jinnouchi – 🚨HOT TAKE ALERT 🚨 Halo 5 was a decent game with a shit campaign. Both it and Halo 4 had some great tracks. Speaking of Halo 4…
Green and Blue by Neil Davidge – Neil had an impossible job of following up Marty and Salvatori’s OSTs, but I feel like he did a decent job. Arrival and Green and Blue were some good entries.
With Grace by We Lost the Sea – Did someone say 11 minutes of slow buildup to a climax that makes me climax? (Australian metal band moment)
El Duelo by Vita Imana – Man I hope the translated lyrics aren’t something really bad.
Country of the Year
Iceland. I flew through there during the “hottest” part of the year and it was like 60F. What an incredible place. Also please don’t explode while I am traveling through next time. Or do and get me trapped there for a free vacation. Hi Irish.
Fur Bait of the Year
Got to be Satan from Helluva Boss. Sorry hot werewolf man from Windblown, you might have my heart but demons got my soul.
NFL Team of the Year
Got to be the Buffalo Bills. I like the Lions and I’m a Bucs fan, but man Josh Allen is so fucking fun to watch and earned not only MVP, but more important, MY award with that ass-backwards snow shovel pass to Amari Cooper that was then lateral’d back to him. My vodka addled mind could not process what the fuck happened on that play.
Play in question: https://old.reddit.com/r/nfl/commen.....ri_cooper_who/
NFL Loser of the Year
Got to be the Cleveland Browns. Fuck the Cleveland Browns. The biggest loser is Deshaun “Groper Cleveland” Watson. I think he literally the only player I have ever seen who has elicited stadium-wide cheers when he suffered a major injury. Absolute piece of shit human on a piece of shit team that wears shit colors.
Artists of the Year
knightseternal Knightly is such a cool fuckin’ dude (hi Knightly). A lot of lads knew about the really difficult time I had during my 2-year long job search and the incredibly stupid things that happened during it. During one of the worst times of it, Knightly was like “HEY FUCKO LETS MAKE A QUAD GIDEON” and then we spent the next few nights chilling in call making quad Gideon into the early hours of the morning. It was a very kind and thoughtful thing to do and certainly helped me get my mind off the shit I was going through internally. Thank you Knightly for being the cool dude you are <3Nebelviper (https://bsky.app/profile/nebelviper.bsky.social) : Some of my absolute favorite pieces this year have been from Nebel. She does such an AWESOME job with Demon Gideon that I just have to gush about it again. She’s also fantastic to work with. Highly recommend.
neltruin Neltruin brought my D&D characters and some very cool concepts to life for me this year that I still asdjkfhgjg at because my D&D characters live rent-free in my head all the time. Also that one smut of Demon Gideon WEWFood of the Year
Burrito. If you didn’t know this one already, I’m disappointed in you.
Restaurant of the Year
Chipotle. If you didn’t know this one already, I’m very disappointed in you.
Alcohol of the Year
Casa Dragones Blanco my beloved
Kink of the Year
Paws. Guess what it’ll be next year.
Paws of the Year
It is a strong tie between the
killioma, 
tenaflux, and https://bsky.app/profile/nebelviper.bsky.social pieces from this year for many reasons. I mean *just look at them aaaa*Roll Credits
Not me finishing this in February because I left the near finished draft on a different computer back in January…
Anyways, the 2024 credits
Team Goated With The Sauce (Sexual Style)
galeboomer 
gylph 
spiffyjuize
subitokurai 
asbellhant 
draxlerfoxO hi Mark and our team mascot
toumakthegryphon knightseternal for being a fuckin amazing friend
themetaisreal for being a great conversationalist and getting me thinking a lot about my own charactersChipotle
Burritos
The frequent lads of Lad’s Landing
Everyone who puts up with my brainrot and paw lust on Twitter and Bsky
I’m hopeful for this year. It has been 2 years since I could say that, but I mean it this time. Here’s hoping.
As for you, I hope only the best.
Until next time <3
I know the past couple of years have been harrowing to say the least, but I'm super happy to see things finally coming around for you, and I'm real proud of the fact that you stuck with it through it all. It takes a great deal of internal strength and mental fortitude to just keep getting back on the horse.
But I knew you could do it, and here's to an even better 2025!
lol (hi Gylphie). <3
(hi)
pawfully, enjoy life and things that make you happy, you are doing everything right. meow meow meow meow
meowowow