40 for 40: January

 If you’ve been following my social media, you’ll know that I’ve set myself a few challenges for 2025, the year I turn 40: try to achieve some goals related to that number through the year. I’ve been posting weekly updates, but now that we’re at the end of the month, I thought I’d give a more detailed breakdown on how I’ve been getting on.

Weight

Target weight loss: 40lbs. Net total weight lost so far: 3lbs.

I’ve been trying to make a few small changes to help me lose weight, rather than throw myself into a heavy exercise and diet regime that I know I’ll never stick to. Aside from trying to achieve at least 6,000 steps per day (although I tend to lose more weight when I don’t do this than when I do,) I’ve tried – more successfully than not – to limit the amount of Coke I’ve been drinking. While I very much doubt it will stop completely, I have been trying to make sure that if I have a drink of Pepsi Max, then my next one must be either water or squash. This has helped up to a point, but as my total weight loss indicates, if I’m going to lose 40lbs, I’m going to need to be doing more. I need to take some initiative over this, because Lent doesn’t start this year until the first week in March.

Board games

Total played so far: 11.

Through a combination of various family engagements and a games night that we sometimes do around our house on roughly a monthly basis, I managed to play the following games in January:

·        Taco Cat Goat Cheese Pizza: An energetic card game that I’d describe as Snap turned up to 11.

·        Kingdomino: A nice board-building game using domino concepts to build the richest possible kingdom, with some risk / reward style mechanics when choosing your next piece,

·        5 Second Rule Relay: A variation on Five Second Rule, where you’re all answering the same question, and passing the baton (which counts the five seconds) to the next person after every answer,

·        Timber!: Jenga with a different name,

·        Trivial Pursuit: Family Edition: A small version of this game that Jessie got for Christmas, with the font size to prove it. I enjoyed it, but if Trivial Pursuit is a game you’re interested in, you’d be better off with one of the bigger box editions!

·        Harmonies: A lovely game about building habitats for various animals,

·        Green Team Wins: If you’ve ever played Herd Mentality, it’s that, but with the fat chewed off, and without the cow gimmicks. We really enjoyed it!

·        Zombie Dice: A good push-your-luck experience that does what it says on the tin and doesn’t outstay its welcome,

·        Poetry for Neanderthals: An amusing game about trying to describe a clue using only one-syllable words, and getting bashed with a bat if you don’t.

·        Dixit: Odyssey: I’ve now played some iteration of Dixit three times but not the copy I own. Odyssey is a good version of it, designed for larger groups and trying to find a less-than-obvious way to describe abstract art is always fun!

·        5 Second Rule… I don’t know which version this was, but it comes in a small cylindrical container that is very light on the rules. We weren’t really playing, we were just trying to answer the clues on the cards, but we enjoyed it so I’m counting it here.

Interestingly, very few of these games were the heavy “Euro” board games that I got into this hobby to play. Board games don’t always have to be battles and war, and they have a decent range of experiences! And in any case, I now own enough of them to be able to cater to almost anybody who turns up, which is always a good thing.

Gigs

Total played so far: 2

I only managed two this month; owning to recent developments in my personal circumstances that I won’t go in to here, it didn’t leave a lot of time for going out and playing gigs. But it’s always a pleasure to be able to come to my mate Richard’s open mic at the Round Oak in Wombourne when time allows! I’ve also got a regular gig at a local assisted living centre, which is a really nice thing to be able to do. But some of the people I’m still in contact with from my regular gigging days still ask me to do open mics from time to time, so who knows.

Video Games

Total beaten so far: 2

Again, there wasn’t a lot of time. And the ones that I did beat were fighting games – my stipulation for beating these is to get through to the end of the Story / Tower / Arcade mode with all the fighters. I managed that with Mortal Kombat X and Tekken 2, and had a cracking time with both, although in the case of the latter I was ready to move on by the time I reached the end.

I also spent a lot of the time I had playing WW2K24. I love wrestling games, and in the absence of GamePass or PS+, this was a game I was really excited to play;I’m thoroughly enjoying it. The wrestling is great, all the best game modes from previous editions are in it, and the create mode has got just the right amount of depth. I’m mentioning this because games like this don’t get “beaten,” in the usual sense. If I manage to get all the achievement trophies, that would be brilliant – but it’s a long-term goal at the very least, by which time I expect 2K25 will be released…

Models

Models painted so far: 0

I have made a small amount of progress on the Votann Hearthkin I was working on before Christmas. The problem is that I’ve now reached the point where I have to do a lot of shading on the models, mixing some Contrast paint with the medium and getting it into a lot of very fiddly cracks on the models. Nothing I can’t do, but it’s going to take me some time, and I rarely have a long-enough gap in my day where I can do it. I find it hard to motivate myself to start a project knowing that I’m going to have to stop before I’ve finished, which given what else is going on in my day is a virtual certainty, so the ten models I’m painting now are still awaiting their shade! Hopefully I can pick up some of my own slack next month.