Tag: 2012

My best things of 2012

Let’s do this!
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Best Comic Book – Hawkeye

Screen shot 2012-12-31 at 12.07.18

(followed by Saga and maybe New 52 Batwoman too)

Best Blog – Super Punch
(with Marginal Revolution and Screenrant also getting worthy nods)

Best Music – we’ll ask Last.fm ———–>Screen shot 2012-12-22 at 12.54.00
(which is plugged into my Spotify and probably knows my music tastes from the year behind better than anything else)

Best Friend – Jennifer Miller

Best Place – Venice

Best Fancy Dress – Wolfmother

Best Film – Skyfall
(followed by Looper and Avengers)

Best Play – Hedda Gabler
(it was SO good)

Best Musical – Sweeney Todd

Best Premiere – Dark Knight Rises

Best Book(s) – Done that already (what’s yours?)

Best Day – August 17th
(I found out I won my first pitch for the big O just I was boarding a flight to Cape Verde for a (well-deserved) holiday with the girl; it was perfect timing. December 30th comes in a close second, see next item)

Best Celeb Spot -  JOHN LANDIS!

Best Event – TEDxObserver
(small mention on Five Things, but I still have ALL my notes to write up)

Best Coffee – Foxcroft & Ginger
(with an honourable mention for Taylor St. Canary Wharf)

Best Presentation (that I got to give) – Word of Mouth Marketing at SOF, Slovenia

Best blog posts (according to stats)

  1. Marvel: Disassembled
  2. Review: The Amazing Spider-Man
  3. On Facebook? I can see your private messages
  4. DRIVE (posted last year, but still top-billed)
  5. Review: Skyfall

Best blog posts (according to opinion)

  1. Current attempts at television-based social media integration are failing, hard.
  2. the pressure of immediacy
  3. Never-ending enjoyment (for a limited time only)
  4. 2013 Social Media Predictions
  5. In defence of Superman Returns

Best overall stats – Jetpack did that for me

Best New Personal Projects – Five things on Friday and The Voicemail

Best Blogger Engagement – Tsingtao, Motorola and Visit Switzerland

Best Food – Spuntino – I love it there
(Hakkasan comes a close second)

Best App – Paper by Fifty-Three (example output)

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Bit of a random list all in all, but hey – it’s my list and I can do what I like. This past year has been an astonishing year for stats and stuff, YOY growth has been mental –

Screen shot 2012-12-31 at 13.10.06

I’m putting this down to two things. First, a solid commitment to blogging; this year I published 164 new posts. That works out at an average of just over three posts per week. Having blogging projects to work towards helped with this a lot. If you’re looking to grow your readership, I’d recommend this.

Second, StumbleUpon. This year, I started sharing my links to the social/interest/serendipity-led search engine and my YTD referrers put SU in at the number two position (with Search coming first and Twitter coming third).

Finally I put a lot of my 2012 reflection stuff into my last Five things on Friday post so, instead of going over similar ground, I just want to say a big thank you – all of you – who have stopped by to read, comment on, or share anything you’ve found on this here blog of mine.

I really, really appreciate it.

Happy New Year to you and I’ll see you in 2013!

😀 😀 😀

 

 

Above Par

This time last year I was saying ‘So Long 2010‘ with an air of the unknown and a wariness of the uncertain.

Life had changed rather dramatically and – as alive as I felt, as invigorating the sense of endless possibility was – I didn’t know what would happen next. And, truth be told, I continued not knowing for most of the year.

Today however? I am above par.

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Imagine tumbling through darkness:

You’ve slipped from a mountainside and a blizzard roars up and around as you desperately flail and fall through the cold, black nothing.

In that never-ending gloom, in that deafening storm, peaceful acceptance eventually takes over and calm reigns throughout.

Do you feel it?

The ground is far, far away. The air on your face is a blanket of ice smothering your face as it burns… Yet it somehow refreshes; filling your lungs forcefully as further still you cascade through the bleak unknown.

In that tranquil nothingness, thoughts spark and race through your mind, freshly cut to rage, rage against the dying of the light. Upwards, around you, chinks  of sunlight break through and, in that moment, in that quiet deathly moment, your hands shoot out and cling and claw – like grappling hooks – at the rocks around.

You catch one, two.. three… and pull.

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My light has shone, my hooks have been launched and at last I’m climbing.
Better yet, I’m climbing higher than I’ve ever been before.

And the view is breathtaking.

The Alps - Sept 3rd

Happy New Year friends and readers, I wish you all the very best for 2012 and everything wonderful that it brings.

As a certain chap said to me recently: it’s going to be epic.