Hello everyone and welcome to part 2 of the November + December wombo combo of Dal Reports! I’m sure this is the most important thing you’ll be doing this New Year’s Eve.

Various Wrapped Things

One of the coolest parts about the end of year is when it’s time to look at what all my friends have been up to in the last year. I think it’s really fucking cool to see what everyone’s been listening to or watching. Here’s what I’ve been up to, starting with Spotify.

Spotify wrapped summary. Dal's top artists are 1. Poppy 2. Jazmin Bean 3. Dorian Electra 4. AFK 5. Suicideboys. The top songs are 1. crystalized 2. TRUST! 3. Two-Headed Trout 4. PUSH UR T3MPURR 5. GODZILLA. He's listened to 50k minutes and his top genre is Metal.

Pretty standard stuff and no surprises really. I’ve been loving Negative Spaces by Poppy so I’ve been listening to that a bunch, and I also discovered Jazmin Bean’s Traumatic Livelihood which took over my life once I listened for the first time. Other than that, it’s just been some pretty solid artists and songs that I think are really fun. There were a couple of albums I thought might make an appearance this year, but they released too late. Specifically Flesh Stays Together by Dying Wish and Do Not Disturb by Creep-p, which might be my own personal pick for AOTY.

YouTube also had a wrapped thing? It was weird. I’ve been using YouTube pretty strangely for the last couple years, whenever I’m on mobile I used it in browser version on the Brave app, which has a built in ad blocker. And since I also used it in the browser, I could use the picture-in-picture mode and turn my phone off with the audio still playing. There were some strange quirks with this set up, it was prone to glitches and weird happenings. But I had mostly grown used to it. Until my recommendation page got limited to 3 videos at a time. Most of which repeated whenever I refreshed. So I was unable to use my recommendations feed and I went back to the subscriptions tab like the old days, but now it’s filled with shorts on top of shorts! So eventually, I caved. I’m now a YouTube Premium subscriber and use the app. Like a fucking scrub. It brings me more shame to say I use YouTube Premium than it does to say I use Discord Nitro. Discord’s cringe but at least it isn’t Google. Anyway, I wrote that entire preamble because I suspect that most of my YouTube history wasn’t actually counted. Because these are NOT my interests!!

YouTube summarizing Dal's top interests. 1. Analyzing music trends 2. Exploring video game lore 3. Digging into social media drama 4. Exaimining financial decisions 5. Watching true story documentaries. YouTube summarizing Dal's entire recap. His personality type is 'Curious Mind' and shows his top 3 interests. The top channels are Smosh Games, Smosh Pit, and Caleb Hammer.

Speaking of Discord Nitro, Discord also had a wrapped thing. I hated it. I’ve been too embarrassed to share mine because I haven’t seen a singular person send more messages than me. I don’t even think this should be a thing I’m embarrassed of, but alas, I am. I also got this ugly orange duck that completely clashes with my current vibe on Discord so. That’s cool I guess.

Discord summarizing Dal's activity. He has a yellow duck with a purple hat as a profile accessory. The number of messages sent, time spent in voice calls, and emojis used are censored. The most used emoji is a heart. The most played game is Cookie Clicker. The most used server is Soup2.

Wake Up Dead Man

Wake Up Dead Man is the third movie in a series of Benoit Blanc lead mysteries sprouting from Knives Out. And it is potentially the best one. Cass and I went to see it in theaters with our friend Zack and it is such an amazing fucking movie. It’s one that’s going to be rightfully glazed until the end of time. I don’t really have words that can fully capture how it feels. Everyone should watch it. Everyone is invited to my place for a movie night anytime. pleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleasepleaseplease

Art Stuff

I believe I touched a bit on this in The November Dal Report, but Procreate released some newer and better brushes for painting and shading. I made Big Clyde’s portrait using the new brushes, and so now I’m going back through and redoing the shading on all the previous portraits! I can’t explain why because I know this doesn’t really matter, but I feel like I can’t move onward to continuing Vidar’s portrait until these are all finished so… Yeah, sorry Carver.

Digital illustration of a robot holding a female cardinal. Digital illustration of a man drinking alcohol.

It was also while redoing the shading on Larry I realized I don’t draw him and Javier enough so. Back on my bullshit again.

Digital illustration of Larry and Javier sharing a cigar.

I’ve also been painting more minis this month! I finally got myself my own primer so I don’t have to run every new mini I get through Michaela to prime for me anymore. Definitely not as fancy as their airbrush, but it’s fine. I got some terrain pieces for Christmas so I’ve been working on those before the next session I’ll be GMing.

A miniature swordsman fully painted. Same miniature swordsman turned around to see his back.

Several miniature tents and bedrolls painted.

Same tents from behind.

Christmas

I had a very nice Christmas! But also a very busy one. If I’m being completely honest, probably too busy. Multiple times I felt burned out on just being around anyone who wasn’t Cass. My parents got an Airbnb in the area and we were able to visit whenever Cass and I weren’t doing stuff with her family. It was a lot of fun hanging out and stuff, but after a week and a half of continuous visits and different family members and long drives….. I wanted to explode. But I did have a lot of fun, I gave some gifts I was excited to give and got some things I’m really happy with. I got my brother a hat that said “PBR Golf Club” because he loves cheap beer and golfing. He laughed and tried it on pretty quickly, so I’m happy with that. Me, my mom, and my brother’s girlfriend all ended up giving each other the same exact candle. We all agreed it was our favorite scent - Yankee Candle Christmas Cookie btw. I also got Cass a really cute skirt I’m excited for her to wear when it warms up more.

I got some fun minis and things, some of which I talked about in the previous section. I got a really nice water bottle which I’ve been so excited for because I’ve been using a random aluminum bottle I found under our sink that leaked a lot and didn’t keep my water cold very well. I got a few LEGO sets I’m excited to put together the second we have a place to put them. With some of the money I also received, I bought some storage things to keep our place a lot more tidy. The big shelf I’m most excited for has yet to arrive, but I’ll finally have a place to put all my miniatures and ttrpg related combat things in one convenient location.

Therapy Arc

Ya boy finally has health insurance, so I’m back in therapy again. It’s been going really well so far! I’ve only had two sessions at this point, but my therapist really gets me so far. We make jokes and laugh while they poke holes in my sense of self. But like, in a good way. It makes me feel good to have a place where I can vent and see my blind spots in judgement. She’s spent time pointing out obvious things to me, like part of being reliable means you have to show up and be reliable for yourself too, and that not everyone values the same things I do, even if it’s to their detriment. It’s also been an interesting way for me to see where my values are. I didn’t realize I talk about my friends so much, but the bulk of my sessions have been me talking about my friends and about how I don’t feel I do enough to show up for them. I don’t think it’s true, but it feels that way. But that’s what my therapist is probably going to have me working on.

I’m also pursuing an autism assessment! She wants to have a few more sessions with me before referring me out to get assessed, so within a few months I hope to have some kind of diagnosis. Unless I’m just kinda like this, which would suck a lot to hear because there is simply no way I’m normal.

Furniture Moving

So there’s been something about the condo that has pissed me off from the moment I stepped foot in it more or less. It’s hard to explain and I don’t really have any photos of it, but if you’ve been over, you know Cass and I have a giant white rug in the middle of the living room. The point of it was mostly to hide some errant cables and things leading back to our desks behind the couch, but when Cass first placed it down six years ago, she didn’t know where these desks would eventually go exactly. Just that they’d be behind the couch. Once there were desks behind the couch, she came to a horrible realization. The rug prevented the office chairs from being able to get fully underneath the desks. You couldn’t pull the wheels over the rug easily and it has driven me insane for years. So a few weekends ago, I broke. I moved all the furniture, the giant bookshelf, the couch, the coffee table stuffed full of board games, the side tables, both of our desks. And fixed it. Finally.

Cupcake found the whole thing pretty amusing. She liked “riding” on the desks while I pushed them around. She had a fun time of exploring the more barren living room as well.

Image of Cupcake walking aorund an empty rug with random things strewn about. Similar image of Cupcake walking around sniffing.

Moving everything didn’t take near as long as Cass and I feared it would. We put off moving it for ages because we were afraid of how much effort and time it would take. Turns out, it only took about 3 hours. Probably would’ve been less if I wasn’t doing it alone and didn’t have a little rat following me around sniffing everything.

Image of a rug being pulled up over two desk legs.

Conclusion

So yeah! That’s it for 2025!! Later in January I’ll probably have my regular reflection and resolutions post, but I’m feeling good with how everything is now! Nothing more to really say, thanks for reading. here’s the photo dump.

Cupcake sitting with her feet folded in neatly underneath her. Cupcake sleeping in a small circle.