Caffeineforge

Well, the bad news is that my posting didn’t become as regular as I’d hoped. The good news, is that it’s slowly getting better on that front. 2025 has been a very hectic year for me, but its showing signs of improvement. A few months back, I sold my beloved van and shipped my belongings from America to Germany. A whole life of stuff reduced to a single a pallet and half a ton.

That’s okay. After spending 2 years in the van I needed a lot less than I ever thought I did. In 2020 I had a house full of belongings. Of those I kept a third (and gave away a third, and sold a third). In in my 2022 trip I reduced that third in half, and in 2024 I reduced it in half again. So, of all my original stuff I kept perhaps 8%. I could have saved a lot of money if I’d known that a decade or two ago, but what can you do.

What did I keep? By weight mostly books. Also some of my favorite board games, some clothes, and a fair few miniatures. Its a nostalgic collection of odds and ends. All in all, 2025 was a good year for me. I wrote a lot of words, got a lot of readers, made progress on my degree, and I got my life more in order. I even have the German tax stuff handled now.

Unfortunately, not everything went that well. My Tenebroum launch on Amazon underperformed, confirming I might in fact be a one hit wonder. My Patreon took a pretty steep dive too, but I won’t get into the weeds on that. We also weren’t able to find a newer (and cheaper) apartment to move into, so that sucked.

You heard me right. Paint. For the first time in a decade, I actually sat down and painted a miniature this month, and it was good for my soul. He could still use a highlight layer… but I only had 8 colors, so I did what I could. Still, getting the blog back to it’s roots!

2026, more painting and posting, less writing and stress. They are good goals. We will see if I can meet them.