Rosalia Rambles

Tag: reviews

  • Redundancy Review: Day 175, “Multiples of Seven”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia Rambles)

    Good morning squares and factorials, welcome to Day 175 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    Tuesday is an important milestone day when it comes to writing these pieces, which makes it a shame that I have missed so many recently as part of my schedule slippage. We have the tradition of me making every Tuesday topic talking about something in the VTuber space, but the day also helps me keep track of how many weeks I have been doing the Redundancy Review, and by extension, making sure my day counter stays consistent.

    When it comes to writing a Tuesday piece, I will take the day and divide it by seven. Getting a whole number back means I am still consistent in my day tracking, and lets me know what week I am on.

    It is week twenty-five, if you are curious. Twenty-five weeks since I first got made redundant, with so much learnt about myself along the way, and yet… I still feel immature within the world as a whole.

    My birthday is coming up next week, and I will be twenty-eight years old, which coincidentally is also a multiple of seven, and my birthday is on Tuesday, which means it will be on a multiple of seven day for the review… okay I am getting tangential here, need to get back on track.

    Twenty-eight is a young age, all things considered, but I feel an immense amount of pressure from within my own mind to be beyond my own capabilities. For all intents and purposes, I have made an extraordinarily successful life for myself and my partner for people within our Gen Z age group, even through all the uncertainty and instability that my redundancy brought, we still had a very good lifestyle.

    I anticipate needing to do some amount of lifestyle trimming depending on the outcome of this contract and how easily I can come into new work after the contract ends. It will take a while for me to reach a point where I feel “stable” in terms of work again, and there is a real possibility that I will be in what I consider to be “unstable” work for a while yet.

    In the meantime though, I shall keep carrying on as I do, rambling about the nature of life as I see it and, when I actually make a post on a Tuesday, VTubers.

    Given the news this morning though, I feel I have to try highlight the work and career of Amane Kanata, a talent from Hololive Japan Fourth Generation who today announced they would be graduating at the end of December.

    This might be a little difficult, because I admittedly am not massively in tune to what work they have done outside of the few appearances I know off the top of my head, but I will sure try.

    First off, six years. Six years spent as a Hololive idol, working on streaming, original albums, and solo concerts. That is an impressive amount of time to spend in any career, let alone one that puts so much pressure on the talent to perform on a regular basis, so that level of dedication has to be respected.

    She listed her reasons for graduation in a document, the translated version of which I will link here (Twitter link) for full context, but it seems like she was taking on too many responsibilities above her position which led to her falling behind on her actual streamer activities, all of which took a toll on her health – all the more worrying considering she suffers from Meniere’s Disease, a very debilitating condition that causes vertigo, tinnitus, and fluctuating hearing loss.

    From the small bits I have seen of Kanata, she is an incredibly talented singer, being able to hold notes for extreme amounts of time whilst having complete control over her voice. Additionally, there was an absolutely massive outpouring of love on Twitter from other Holomems, finding out about her decision to graduate at the same time as the greater fanbase.

    People sharing good memories, saying how supportive she was of their activities, and saying that when things calm down, they should share good food together. It is the mark of a good colleague that everyone feels rough when you announce your departure.

    Though, it definitely highlights the rough nature of corporate VTubing in a way. Kanata taking on way more responsibility than her position dictated should not have happened, and suggests a lot of potential management issues behind the scenes that we as fans do not know about – something that has been speculated for a long time considering how often “disagreements with management” were cited as reasons for graduation.

    Any corporate entity is likely to have issues with management, but when the brand is built on the personas of these idols, taking time away from them which could be spent on brand building activities to instead fix problems above their station does not bode well, so hopefully after a rough year of multiple graduations for Hololive, the corporate structure going forward favours talents more and enables them to perform at their best without bureaucracy holding them back.

    For now, I wish Amane Kanata the best in whatever she does next. She explicitly stated she does not intend to reincarnate or return as a VTuber, preferring instead to be a private individual once more – which I can relate to.

    That covers everything for today, thank you for reading this edition of the Redundancy Review. Wherever you are, I hope your week is going well, and that you have positive things on the horizon.

  • Redundancy Review: Day 172-174: “Showing Up”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia Rambles)

    Good morning absentees and truants, welcome to Day 172-174 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    It finally looks as though I am heading out the other end of everything that kicked off last week. My pestilence symptoms have mostly abated aside from a particularly persistent cough that really does not want to go away, and after much pestering of my internet service provider, there is a… sort of resolution to the whole “internet line being cut” thing.

    Put simply, they have to go through a much longer process to reconnect us to the internet due to being on copper lines. Copper lines are being phased out in the UK in favour of fibre, rightfully so mind given how behind some infrastructure is in this country, but it means that old copper lines that get cut off without replacement have a layer of bureaucracy to them.

    On the plus side, the call I had to do this morning was with customer retention who managed to get me a lovely deal together to reduce my monthly payments as part of getting me back online, which I definitely cannot complain about – especially given as the guy I talked to was lovely.

    For now though I find myself working off my phone’s hotspot data, which I thankfully upgraded for this month with the hunch that it would still take a while for my situation to resolve itself. Unlimited data for working and scrolling, lets me keep busy this month at least.

    My hotspot does sort of lead into the topic I wanted to write about today, and ties into me jumping around all last week to co-working spaces and libraries in order to get my work done. It traces back to one of my qualities of “this is really good on paper but I somewhat resent having it”: no matter the hardship, I try my best to show up.

    World collapsing? Trauma resurfacing? Period pains? Does not matter, I will push myself to show face at work and do what I can on a given day. Does this usually lead to me being way below where I would normally be in terms of productivity? Obviously, but I still believe that any progress is good progress, even if it takes an hour to do a test run because of a hacking cough that gets irritated by moving about in VR too much.

    It is what marked me as someone reliable, and that reliability is what people came to appreciate about me. Even as I find myself doubting what this means for me as a professional in the current world, the fact I try to keep up an output of any sorts even when under stress or strain is something that can be considered admirable about me.

    Something to consider when I inevitably end up redrafting my CV after the end of this contract, trying to spin a more consistent story about myself as an individual and selling myself that way. Part of me worries that this site will put me at a disadvantage when it comes to applying to jobs in future given I quite literally wear my heart on my sleeve in these pieces, but, I would rather die honest than live any more days with my mind caged up…

    …that got needlessly dramatic, but hey ho.

    Anyway, as expected for this end of year period, I have not got much to explicitly review, but I do have a screenshot from my latest Stardew session played with only a minor amount of scuff due to the hotspot which I want to talk about.

    This is the inside of my house on my main Stardew playthrough with a friend of mine, and whilst the farm is gradually approaching its final form; the interior decorating side of things is taking up a bit more time.

    The main achievement from this latest play session is down in the bottom-left corner, where a retro-styled cafe has started to take shape next to my kitchen in the dining room extension, something which was added in the most recent 1.6 update. Outside of that I have a fish tank going on with the majority of the legendary fish in there, though there is a lot of empty space to still fill up.

    In Stardew at least, I like using my in-game houses as museums to my achievements, collecting every sort of unique reward or challenging collectibles, as you can probably tell from all the paintings on the wall that I have gathered throughout the game.

    Considering there is still much more to do in this playthrough, I am almost certain I will be able to show a better version of this house in the near future.

    That will cover everything for today, a short journal updating where I am, rambling about something in my head, and talking about something I have done recently. A pretty formulaic article, but thank you all the same for reading today’s edition of the Redundancy Review. Wherever you are, I hope you have a wonderful December to finish out your year, and that the season does not bring you too much chaos.

  • Redundancy Review: Day 171, “Libraries Are Great”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia Rambles)

    Good morning librarians and archivists, welcome to Day 171 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    Yeah, I know, a single day entry – what a concept. A daily series writing an entry on the day it should go up.

    Okay I am being snarky and facetious, but given the fact I had another thing not go my way yesterday you can forgive me for being a little cynical.

    Specifically, I was unable to book the co-working space for a second day in a row, which meant needing to find another place to park my posterior to attempt to be productive. I briefly considered taking a visit back to my parent’s place, especially given they have full Fibre To The Premises meaning an absolutely gorgeous three-hundred megabits down speed with around a hundred megabits in up speed… but given my dad has also started taking all my old Warhammer bits out of the loft, I would certainly get distracted with that instead of working.

    There was also the option of becoming one of those insufferable people who squat in local cafes to do their work, although I would aim to be a bit more polite than them and actually order proper drinks regularly to my table rather than doing the bare minimum, but then I run into the problem of looking like an absolute weirdo wearing virtual reality kit in a public space, which might mean I get kicked out of wherever I have parked myself.

    My options were not looking favourable, until I started my walk home from the “office” and realised the perfect solution had been right on my doorstep the entire time.

    Shrewsbury Library, an absolutely gorgeous building, and my refuge for today to get myself connected with the hope of getting some work done. Whilst this location carries the same amount of risk that a cafe does in terms of wearing VR kit and looking weird, the table I have perched myself on is in a corner away from the main public areas. This means that I might still get a few weird looks thrown my way, but so long as I keep my voice down during any test runs I should be able to stay productive.

    The major upside to working from the library is that it is a way cheaper alternative compared to booking a co-working space or regular ordering drinks in a cafe, the only expectation is being respectful to my surroundings.

    In general though, I have always loved libraries as the free public spaces that they are, and without the local library back in my home town I do not think I would have been exposed to all of the hobbies I currently enjoy.

    If you cannot tell from the general contents of the website, I am a massive nerd, and a huge part of my formative years were spent in a library. There was a Warhammer tabletop group hosted every Saturday at my local library where I was introduced by an old friend of mine, eventually becoming a regular member at the group.

    It is interesting playing an involved tabletop game in a library, especially as whilst we were allowed to make a modicum of noise, there were moments where we did get told to reign it in a little bit as, after all, it was still a public library. Eventually though as the years shifted on at the club we were moved from a central area of the library to the space at the rear, pushing us out of sight of normal patrons and giving us a bit more freedom to express ourselves.

    This group was actually where I got into the deckbuilding card game “Star Realms” as well. I noticed it in my old friend’s bag one day and got curious, asking what it was. We played a round and I ended up enjoying it so much that I picked up my own copy to introduce to my friends at some of my other gaming groups at the time. This then evolved into me becoming an avid Star Realms collector, and to this day I still place it as my favourite card game of all time – even over Magic: the Gathering.

    Though it was not just the Saturday group that I used the library for. During my summer breaks at university there was usually very little for me to do during the week… granted I should have been studying and actually improving myself on being a game developer but there was also a lot of mental shit going on during that time which held me back. 

    Anyway, back on topic, I would often meet up with a good friend of mine to grab a quiet table somewhere in the library and play card games for a bit, getting both much needed time out of the house and socialisation.

    That is the beauty of public libraries, they go beyond what most people assume as simply being a place to take out books or use the computer, although the latter is definitely a vital service in the current age. Libraries are spaces for anyone to use for whatever purpose, they can act as social hubs, medical centres, or even just a warm place for people to come during the day. 

    They are essential public services, ones that should be funded to the highest degree because of what they can be for people in need. I would not be in the position I am in life without public libraries, and future generations should benefit from the same perks I received from having a good public library in their life.

    Think that covers everything for today, and gets in a somewhat usual dose of left-leaning politics into the mix. Thank you for reading today’s edition of the Redundancy Review. Wherever you are I hope you are able to take a relaxing weekend and recover from whatever has brought you low – treat yourself, you deserve it.

  • Redundancy Review: Day 159, “It Still Feels Weird To Rest”

    for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia Rambles)

    Good morning daydreamers and fantasists, welcome to Day 159 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    It is a wonderfully brisk autumn Sunday, and events have moved at a very slow pace today. Woke up later than usual, saw my partner off to work, laid in a little bit longer before heading to the kitchen to mess around with food plans for the rest of the week, hung out with a very close friend of mine, and then once my partner came home from work, we threw our heads against the wall at the last major challenge we have to face in Expedition 33.

    By all accounts, today was good and restful… so, why am I sitting here feeling guilty about how today has gone?

    I have talked at length about how weird it feels for me to rest sometimes, that I am somehow undeserving of taking time for myself, especially when those moments often come after prolonged periods of stressful circumstances where any person would consider it a reasonable reaction to want to rest.

    It is definitely part of my mindset that I need to change the most, that not every waking hour needs to have a defined end product and I am okay to do things solely for myself than in service of other goals…

    …of course this is very much easier said than done when you consider I am running a blog where I try to review something in my life that I have experienced recently and I have weaved myself into a trap where my every waking moment can become “content” for me to write about if so desired along with the fact that I will be paranoid if I cannot write about anything interesting on a given day and the desire to tell a story from my past is not present.

    That did not start out with me meaning to get extremely real with my perspective on things.

    The structure I have given myself does not do much to help things. Something I have reflected on over the course of writing this series, and finding myself planning ahead for when I find myself in a permanent role once more, is that having the structure based on days makes things more difficult for myself when I inevitably fall behind due to life circumstances, leading to filler posts or massive anthology posts.

    When I can eventually transition the Redundancy Review into the “Rosa Review” (maintaining alliteration at all times of course), I will instead be calling each post an episode instead, lessening the pressure on myself if I wanted to step away for a day or two to focus solely on taking time to rest and providing a more broad scope of what to talk about.

    Posts would still be created, just at a lesser frequency. I would hate to give up on what I have created here, and letting my skills atrophy again would be a damn shame considering how much I feel I have improved over the course of writing these posts.

    Even if my mind is still not fully where I want it to be right now, I still want to do my best to tell this ongoing story.

    For those who come after.

    I am… so excited to talk about Expedition 33 once I finally 100% it, there is so much I love about that game that I want to write about at length but I still have not actually hit the ending yet, want to beat the superboss before I do that.

    Though, it does sort of leave me without a “formal” review topic today, but I have got some cool pictures from the walk I took with my friend.

    The place where I live has had a lot of rain lately, and living right on the banks of a river leaves the local area prone to flooding. This resulted in the very amusing shot of the public life preserver being decently submerged by the rising water, but the picture of the coffee shop on stilts is the more impactful one.

    It is a place called “Coffee Evolution”, and it is actually where my partner & I had one of our first dates together as a formal couple. Staff have moved since that point leading the quality of the coffee to sadly decline, but I still appreciate the memories I have of the place.

    Plus, this is the first time I have been able to see it on its stilts up close and personal, considering when this area floods it usually blocks access off entirely. It is only because the flooding was not as severe as usual that I was able to take these shots properly.

    That will cover everything for today. Thank you very much for reading this edition of the Redundancy Review. Wherever you are I hope you are able to relax and not have the impending Monday blues bring you down too much.

  • Redundancy Review: Day 152-158, “A Not So Good Writing Week”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia Rambles)

    Good morning puppies and kittens, welcome to me trying to catch up for a week of not writing in a post that covers day 152 to 158 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    Yup.

    This week has not been a productive week at all for writing. Taking into account work stress, personal stress, regular depression, seasonal depression, adjusting to my antidepressant medication,  and somehow getting a migraine even though I am not prone to them, there was very little time to sit down and write after completing daily activities alongside decompression time.

    And I feel perfectly okay with this.

    In the past I would have experienced an extreme amount of guilt over this fact, feeling as if I had failed as a writer due to not being able to keep to a regular posting schedule which forms the basis of my writing practice, working towards my goal of being able to make a living out of this passion.

    But I feel good, possibly down to the sertraline kicking in properly removing the sluggishness I had been experiencing as part of the adjustment period, leaving me feeling less physically tired today than I have been during the week. There is still a degree of “existential tiredness” as I call it, less a physical state of exhaustion and more feeling worn out by my current routine.

    That said, yesterday was actually one of my best work days in a while. I was actually able to find my rhythm in my tasks and get a substantial chunk of work done in a day, something I had found a great deal of struggle in earlier in the week. Stuff would get chunked down throughout the week as I was still on shift, but I ended the day feeling behind the curve on what I had set out to do.

    I am still taking steps to change my current situation, there are a handful of jobs I need to apply for over the weekend that sound right up my alley, and even outside of that the fact I have found my rhythm in working again should mean that the days go by quicker than before, pushing me towards more exciting events in my life such as my birthday, Christmas, and the obligatory Christmas break where I can find time to indulge in all sorts of gaming activities as I finally have proper, uninterrupted rest.

    There is still much on the horizon that I could worry about, but, I find myself oddly at peace right now…

    …god antidepressants are great, it has actually been so damn long since I have had this level of stability. 

    Suppose I should actually do a proper review segment today as well to make the most of this energy, and there has been something in the back of my mind I have wanted to discuss on the Redundancy Review ever since my partner and I watched it together on the sofa, the final race of Umamusume: Pretty Derby Season 2.

    Spoilers ahead for Umamusume: Pretty Derby Season 2, so uh, look away if you care about horse girls

    Still with me? Rad, time to embed the clip in.

    Small bit of admin before I get into this, I do not endorse Crunchyroll as a service, especially after they have swapped their subtitle company to one that heavily advertises the use of AI in their transcription services. Localisation is an art form that is extremely underappreciated and the use of AI in this area leaves a lot of nuance to be lost from the delicate fine tuning a skilled human localisation specialist can provide.

    However, this is the best clip I could find on Youtube of the “Miracle Run” as it is called, Tokai Teio’s final race after a series of injuries, hurdles, and setbacks. Throughout this season there are several moments where Teio is told she will not be able to race the same way as she used to, and whilst she has moments of victory, there is still a lot of difficulty in trying to run to the standard she wants to be.

    This is likened and contrasted with the struggles of her friend, Mejiro McQueen, who has developed a muscular disorder that also threatens to end her career as a professional racer for fear of losing her mobility entirely. Teio uses this as fuel on her journey to win the Arima Kinen, a race where fans vote on the participants.

    What the clip does not show is the preamble before the final stretch, Teio is close to the rear of the pack, not being able to make up positions as her trainer, teammates, and fans all wonder if she is now truly past her prime as an elite horse girl…

    …right up until the moment where she starts zooming through the competition, moving up several positions as the commentator says:

    “Tokai Teio is moving up!”

    And pauses.

    “Tokai Teio is moving up?!”

    Everyone was surprised by Teio being able to run like she used to, taking over several similarly skilled competitors, right up until she gets behind Biwa Hayahide, acknowledging the amount of strain her body is under as she flashes back to the challenges she has faced over the season, several moments where she could have quit for good.

    And as she builds up for the final spurt, McQueen, her trainer, and her idol Symboli Rudolf all egg her on to give it her all. Several other fans all encourage her, including the doctor who told her she might never be able to run the same way again,  seeing a legend be made in real time in front of them, as Tokai Teio, someone who has not step foot on a racetrack in over a year, wins the Arima Kinen.

    Being real, the entire Season 2 of Umamusume made both me and my partner cry at a lot of different moments – especially when being presented with Teio’s struggles. There is a moment in the tenth episode where footage is shown of Twin Turbo winning a race for her to dedicate it to Teio in the hopes she would run again, which is followed by all of Teio’s friends encouraging her not to quit as well, eventually leading to the events of the miracle run.

    We bawled our eyes out at that scene, as we both found relatedness in Teio’s struggles of feeling like she was not good enough no matter how hard she tried to overcome her challenges. In general watching Umamusume is way more emotional that either of us realised, we got super invested in all of the character’s arcs across all three seasons currently released in a way that caught us completely off guard. There is a surprising amount of emotion in an anime about reincarnated horse girls racing together.

    As always, need a thumbnail when I am talking about a video, and got this pretty decent screengrab from the clip above of Team Spica and their trainer cheering on Teio. 

    My favourite out of the bunch is Daiwa Scarlet, which is the orange-haired one with the tiara. She has such a cool design and I always find her rivalry with Vodka to be entertaining.

    Good to see I can still write after being out of practice for so long, and that will do it all for today’s edition of the Redundancy Review. Thank you very much for reading. Wherever you are I hope you are able to enjoy the weekend and recover from whatever might have brought you down during the week.

    Go watch Umamusume: Pretty Derby through your streaming method of choice.

  • Redundancy ‘Review’: Day 148-151, “Finally Slowing Down”

    Redundancy ‘Review’: Day 148-151, “Finally Slowing Down”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia Rambles)

    Good morning tortoises and hares, welcome to one big ass catch up post for Day 148 to 151 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    Work has been utter chaos this week, preparing for a big launch requiring all hands on deck for all manner of tasks, which had the net result of me ultimately having very little time for writing between managing period symptoms, managing sinus infection symptoms, and engaging in what small self-care activities my remaining time & energy would allow.

    Not entirely out of the woods yet either with work, but at the very least I have the weekend now to enact some basic recovery plan and actually engage with my hobbies once more: gaming, cooking, and of course, writing.

    Admittedly it has been a while since I have had something like this at work. My entire career has been marked by various points where a massive effort was needed to get something out the door on a Friday, usually leaving me exhausted by the time everything wrapped up and just wanting nothing more than to sleep for fourteen hours.

    The fact that I am awake, aware, and engaging in something mentally stimulating after nine hours of sleep shows that I have built a resilience to this kind of thing… when you ignore the fact that my dual-afflictions this week meant I had to take Wednesday morning off because I felt like I was going to die if I put on a VR headset and every day outside of that it was a challenge to drag myself to my desk each day…

    …but I kept going, even in the face of adversity, and that is what I am going to be proud of. Through anxiety, pain, and exhaustion, I always choose to keep moving so I am able to see the better days on the horizon.

    Trying to write things down after a period of not writing for a bit always feels difficult, as if somehow I need to shake the rust and cobwebs out of my system even though I have been practicing for several months now, although my usual stumbling block is finding areas to elaborate on in a positive way rather than harping on the negative aspects of what I have been experiencing.

    I believe it is important to let yourself experience negative feelings, but not to let them consume you – a balancing act that is most definitely easier said than done. Suppressing negative feelings can result in them escaping out at the worst of times, lashing out at those around you when everything becomes too hard to bear, a painful experience I know all too well. But constantly dwelling on whatever is bringing negativity to your life ultimately lowers your resting mood which can make it harder to appreciate what few positive moments come your way.

    For all my struggles, there is still a lot I have going for me in this life, and I want to try focus on that more than what is not exactly going my way right now.

    Think that will cover everything for today, a bit of a shorter post but given my exhaustion and minor addiction to Clair Obscur right now, it does the job of hopefully starting a new streak.

    Need a thumbnail though, so I will use some pictures of the burgers I made tonight. My first proper bit of cooking this entire week.

    Thank you for reading today’s edition of the Redundancy Review. Wherever you are I hope you are able to have a relaxing weekend and that you are able to recover from whatever might have happened during your week.

  • Redundancy Review: Day 145-146, “The Albert Hall Diaries”

    Redundancy Review: Day 145-146, “The Albert Hall Diaries”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia Rambles)

    Good morning thespians and troupers, welcome to Day 145 and 146 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    I have returned from my trip to London and a brief excursion to hang out with my board game friends only to find myself afflicted with a pestilence alongside my period starting…

    …my luck is really something else sometimes.

    But, as is the overarching message of the Redundancy Review, we keep moving, even when the circumstances are against us, and considering how much I enjoyed writing the VeXPo Diaries piece I want to do a similar thing for the Saturday I spent in London going to Metal Gear In Concert at the Royal Albert Hall.

    Waking up

    As mentioned in Day 144, I did not have the best night’s sleep in the hotel bed. A shower was enough to shake off the grogginess before I sat in the bed and passed the time by writing that day’s review whilst watching old TV clips on Youtube. I was under the assumption that my check-out time was at twelve so I had plenty of time to relax and just exist in the pleasingly liminal space of my hotel room.

    Yeah, no, I double checked my booking, revealing that my check-out time was at eleven instead – a fact I discovered at quarter to eleven. This forced me to suddenly drop everything I was doing, focus on rapidly packing and getting myself dressed ready to leave. A ten-minute task all told, my previous experience of needing to run out the door when I was late to classes at uni coming in handy once again.

    Wandering around

    Given I was out of the hotel at eleven and my concert was not until half-two, I had a fair bit of time to kill, and given this was the first time in forever I have been to London without a work engagement, I was presented with the perfect opportunity to just wander around aimlessly using the tourist maps for guidance.

    My first port of call was getting to the Albert Hall itself, a task which only took me around twenty minutes to navigate, letting me grab a picture of the external TV screen showing Metal Gear In Concert being on that night

    I wish I had taken some more photos of the outside of the Albert Hall, as it is a stunningly beautiful building, but alas, my desire to keep wandering took over, leading me down towards the centre of South Kensington where my destination for a big lunch to fill me up for the day revealed itself.

    Honest Burger

    After trying Bleecker, you might have thought I would not be in the mood for another burger, but I am never one to turn down delicious meats, vegetables, and cheese sandwiched between two pillowy buns.

    Honest Burger is a place I have been curious about since seeing it on a Food Tours video, with a focus on simple ingredients to make something delicious. Given my intention that this was going to be my only meal until I got home that evening, I went a little indulgent with a homemade mint lemonade, a small portion of frankly massive onion rings, and the Honest Smash burger with bacon, served with a side of rosemary fries.

    This meal cost a total of £23.49, which broke down into £14.55 for the burger and fries, £3.30 for the small onion rings, and £3.50 for the drink, plus a £2.14 service charge which is listed as optional/discretionary but personally I believe they are a mandatory part of eating out, especially as tipping culture in the UK is not exactly strong. 

    Overall the price lined up with what I have paid for burger meals in London in the £20-25 range, and this was absolutely gorgeous. Again, I have to highlight the fucking enormous onion rings which were crunchy and perfectly seasoned, I could envision myself eating a full plate of those with a variety of dips. 

    The meal as a whole fulfilled its purpose, I did not need to eat the rest of the day minus a few drinks on the way home to keep my energy up.

    Albert Hall time

    Meal finished, I did a brief bit of wandering around and managed to get myself thoroughly lost meaning I had to rely on Google Maps rather than any of the tourist maps to find my bearing again, but I got my way back to the Albert Hall where the cafe bar was open meaning I could get my first (and only) coffee of the day in the form of a £4.60 mocha. Pretty standard for takeaway coffee in the UK, with a pretty standard taste that came along with it.

    Took a while for me to notice but the front desk was actually selling programmes, and as someone who loves little mementos and souvenirs from their nerdy trips I had to get one – especially with this gorgeous front art:

    Additionally I bought myself a t-shirt and a poster with the same art. I want the organisers to see this event as a success because this was an amazing experience I would love to see repeated elsewhere.

    The doors to the auditorium opened, and upon getting my ticket checked I encountered something I have not really seen before: I was offered a ticket to go down to the stalls instead. I had picked the matinee performance rather than the evening performance because I was initially intending to rawdog the entire event in a day before deciding to make it an overnight once I was re-employed, but it was surprising to have that as an option.

    I did not take them up on the offer though, as I was curious to see what my ticket got me.

    I think I made the right decision, I had an end-of-row seat and no one ended up sitting next to me, giving me a lovely bit of private space to immerse myself fully in the music.

    The concert itself

    I did not take any pictures during the show itself, initially I did want to quickly take some stealth photos to get good accompanying pictures for the article, but I found myself enjoying the show so much I did not want to look away for a moment.

    The structure of the show confused me initially, but once it clicked in my mind I was thoroughly impressed. Act I contained music from MGS3: Snake Eater, MGS: Peace Walker, and MGSV: The Phantom Pain – the story of Big Boss, the legendary soldier and clonefather of the protagonist most people know of: Solid Snake, which was the focus of Act II with MGS, MGS2: Sons of Liberty, and MGS4: Guns of the Patriots.

    For someone who has more attachment from the franchise for the Solid Snake games rather than the Big Boss games, I found myself enjoying Act I more than I anticipated, especially as someone who has never properly played Peace Walker. When the orchestra started playing the Main Theme of the game I found myself having this almost proud feeling upon hearing it, the whole “music that makes you patriotic for a country that does not exist” kind of vibe.

    Act II definitely resonated more with me, but because of my attachment to those games than the others I did find myself finding a few criticisms in the setlist… well, nitpicks more than anything else.

    First off, there was no Encounter. The first ever “ALERT” song in the franchise and it was not put into the setlist as part of MGS. It really could have replaced Mantis Hymn which would make for an absolutely exhilarating flow of music to go from Encounter to Hind D, but I recognise that Mantis Hymn is iconic.

    Another nitpick from the MGS setlist is the end theme “The Best Is Yet To Come” did not have a vocalist performing the lyrics, which is especially disappointing considering Donna Burke was one of the guest performers and she sang an English version of the song on the MGSV OST. I know it might have disrupted the flow of the show a little bit because Donna and Stefanie Joosten performed solos at the end of each act but this is such an iconic song due to the lyrics, and missing them out is a shame.

    For all of my other nitpicks though, they were blown out of the water with the conclusion of Act II: Metal Gear Saga, the main theme of MGS4 followed by Stefanie Joosten performing Snake Eater which was then followed up by Donna Burke performing Heavens Divide, a conga line of iconic Metal Gear songs all of which yielded massive cheers from the crowd.

    Speaking of the crowd, one funny audience moment during the MGS2 segment of Act II was someone wolf whistling when the cutscene revealed Raiden for the first time, prompting a wave of laughter to rush over the audience.

    The game footage being in the background was an extremely nice touch to the show, it helped contextualise the music in a greater way and helped the immersion, especially when my nostalgia neurons got triggered from hearing certain songs alongside certain moments.

    Overall, the trip as a whole was well worth it, and a nice time to actually get to explore London on foot without needing to worry about a work meeting or anything else… that said it killed my feet, even with me wearing proper walking shoes. For someone who will extoll the virtues of good public transport links I will seldom use them myself, preferring to walk almost everywhere within towns and cities.

    That covers everything for the Albert Hall diaries, thank you for reading today’s edition of the Redundancy Review. Wherever you are I hope the Monday blues are not hitting you too hard and that you are able to take some time to relax.

  • Redundancy Review: Day 144, “Been in worse beds”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia Rambles)

    Good morning bed bugs and dust mites, welcome to Day 144 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    Sleep was a rough time for me last night, the hotel bed is comfy enough for sitting up in to write and watch TV but was lacking when it came to actually settle down. The pillows did not offer much support, the mattress is too firm for my tastes, and I forgot to bring a plushie with me to cuddle as I slept.

    It was at least a single bed, meaning I did not have to sleep in a space larger than what I needed, which would make me miss my partner more than I already do.

    Silly, in a way. We spend so much time together that it should, in theory, be easy for me to be away for a couple days – especially considering we were long distance for two and a half years with very infrequent visits for the majority of that time period. 

    But I am most definitely someone who struggles without him, which partially drives some of my recent fear, paranoia, and catastrophising. I am terrified of losing the life we have built together through any period of sustained joblessness on my part, especially because I would be absolutely loathe to move back in with my parents. Not because I do not like them – our relationship has actually improved massively over recent years – but because it would represent a major stumble in my path forward.

    Everything I have I view as the product of all the hard work I have put in over the last five years, and me of five years ago would never imagine in her wildest dreams that she would have any of what she has today. “Where do you see yourself in five years?” is such a bizarre question to me because outside of a few key moments, none of this I could have predicted or planned for.

    So as I slowly lose my relationship with the work that has enabled my current lifestyle, I find fear creeping in that I will lose everything, which I can recognise is catastrophising because I have proof I can minimise my lifestyle to a sustainable degree, and even if I was unable to find full time work, there are options I would be able to take.

    Making a change is hard, and even as I take the required steps to try enact that change in myself, I find myself struggling to keep the momentum going. For all my talk of “I will make it”, there is a fear deep within me that I will be in this pain forever.

    But I will make it.

    This is only temporary, despite everything my mind is telling me.

    Sometimes, a moment’s peace is all I need, which segues me nicely into the review topic.

    For all the problems I had with the hotel bed, there is one thing this room has that I very rarely encounter in hotels: a bath.

    There is a certain appeal I find in taking a bath, sure it might be lovingly described as “soaking in your own filth” by some, but the ability to immerse yourself in a tub of warm water to soothe your aching muscles, lift the weight off your shoulder, and weld together the broken parts of your soul once more is something I will always take advantage of.

    This bath was surprisingly accommodating to my height as well, being someone above six feet tall there are a lot of baths that force me to hunch up my legs if I want to get myself properly inside. Whilst I could not fully lay flat in the bath, this one was long enough for me to stretch my legs out and get just below my shoulders submerged in the water.

    Additionally, I went to Waitrose before the bath to grab some supplies for the evening, which included two bottles of low-alcohol cider, one of which was the accompaniment to my bath.

    Soaking in the water, stretching my legs out, and sipping a crisp apple cider put me at peace like nothing else has in recent weeks. My mind felt quiet, and even though the bath lasted a relatively short twenty minutes, that period of time was absolute bliss.

    That covers everything for today, I should probably consider getting ready for Metal Gear tonight. Thank you for reading today’s edition of the Redundancy Review. Wherever you are I hope you are able to enjoy your Saturday, take it easy, have a good drink in the company of great people.

  • Redundancy Review: Day 143, “Away from the desk”

    Redundancy Review: Day 143, “Away from the desk”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia Rambles)

    Good morning receptionists and secretaries, welcome to Day 143 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    Today’s review is being written from a cozy London hotel room after a pretty intense day of travel, and in finding myself away from my desk I can once more take a moment of reflection on my current situation – or more realistically, do a bit of public rubber ducking for a bit whilst I recline.

    There is definitely a lot I am scared of in the near future. This is a feeling that exists almost perpetually within me, but what makes this current instance different is that my coping strategies have been thrown all out of whack by my initial redundancy.

    Before, I was someone who very much had their moments of catastrophising and overthinking. Once I had got that all out of my system I would return to what I consider my “natural” state: go with the flow, relatively level-headed, and willing to fuck up any challenge that came in my way.

    My old mentor said this mindset was the reason she became interested in, and once described it as one of my greatest strengths before following it up with how she saw my catastrophising nature:

    “I see you throw boulders towards yourself and you never flinch, but then you go ‘oh no a pebble’ and completely collapse.”

    She was always someone I could turn to if I was in a moment of overthinking, a process I lovingly called “unfucking my brain”, and in recalling this bit of analysis she did on me, it has given me some perspective on how I feel about my current situation.

    I have always prided myself on adaptability throughout my career, that even in my moments of panic I could turn those emotions into a positive development experience. Making myself stronger through adversity.

    And I know I can become that person again, but right now I feel unable to balance my desire for professional progression with my borderline need for personal recovery from burnout.

    The problem looming over me, as looms over many others, is of course capitalism, why would it be anything else.

    My financial situation is stronger than a lot of my Gen Z peers. In the event of sudden job loss or my physical health catching up with me, I am not in imminent financial ruin, in fact both my partner and some of my closest friends have said I should pull the plug on my contract at the end of the year in order to take a prolonged break.

    But I feel incapable of that, both for the anxiety that would come with losing my income stream and for the worry around the “implication” of what taking time away for burnout would look like. It is already hard enough to find a job in my desired field, and it feels just as impossible to find opportunities for branching out due to the elimination of junior roles at different organisations.

    The benefits of taking a break though would be unparalleled, as I could work more on writing in a given day, actually working on the books I want to write, I can develop out my VTuber concept further, and I could finally stop feeling the crushing weight on my soul that seems to persist into every work day right now.

    At some point I should try write a positive piece on my current roles, as for all the spiritual issues I am currently experiencing, there are still a good number of positive aspects within my current career – it is mainly the painful lack of a clear future right now that is bringing down my morale.

    For now, I am going to revel in the feeling that being away from my desk brings, along with the fact that I am in London for pleasure rather than business for the first time in forever. Not having to rush to a meeting or a function gave me enough time after getting off the coach to visit a place I had always been meaning to try but never found the opportunity to: Bleecker Burger.

    This one comes as a recommendation from my friend Aaron, who always said I should try hit up Bleecker whenever I was in London. Usually my burger of choice when visiting the capital for work was a Five Guys, which, yes, I recognise is a very low bar in terms of burgers but considering I do not have one nearby I always considered it a “treat”.

    Bleecker is a lot more simple than Five Guys – you get burgers, burgers with bacon, and stacked burgers with bacon. It is similar with the fries, you can get them plain, topped with “house” sauce, “angry” sauce, or both sauces.

    My meal of choice was a standard bacon cheeseburger, house angry fries, and an Oreo milkshake, costing me a total of £21.85, which is actually pretty damn similar to what I paid for a similar meal at Five Guys just over a year ago, £21.65.

    So, given the almost identical meal and cost, how does it compare?

    First off, the burger. Bleecker definitely do things a lot more simply, and in terms of pure burger & bun quality they definitely exceed the Guys, but I did find myself missing some of the additional crunch and moisture that vegetable toppings or even mayonnaise would bring. 

    Next, the milkshake. Incredibly thick, creamy, and delicious, there is not much more to say beyond that. A perfect accompaniment to a somewhat indulgent lunch.

    Last, but most definitely not least, the house angry fries. These are far and away above the quality of Five Guys, you get a very generous portion for the price without the excess that can come from there, but the sauces drizzled over top are what make the difference. The house sauce is incredibly creamy with a little bit of tang whilst the angry sauce has a decent kick without being painfully spicy, adding a delicate tingle to the tongue forming a perfect side dish.

    Do I intend to return to Bleecker? That is a definite maybe. The quality and care is definitely there in the food, but there is still something oddly nostalgic in Five Guys for me. 

    Though there is definitely plenty in London for me to try in terms of burger joints, so maybe next time I have the privilege of coming by this part of the country.

    That covers everything for today, thank you for reading today’s edition of the Redundancy Review. Wherever you are I hope you are able to enjoy your weekend, you deserve all the relaxation time in the world.

    For more information on Bleecker, visit their website here: https://www.bleecker.co.uk/ 

  • Redundancy Review: Day 140-142, “Escapism”

    (for context on what this series is, please see my Day 1 post here: Redundancy Review: Day 1, “A New Beginning” – Rosalia Rambles)

    Good morning fugitives and escapees, welcome to Day 140 to 142 of Rosalia Rambles Redundancy Review.

    Coming back to write after a busy few days. On Tuesday I had no time to write between work slamming me down before going out with my dad for the evening, and Wednesday was trying to spend some social time with friends before once more playing Clair Obscur.

    And now that I finally have a moment to write I find myself mentally preparing for a trip to London tomorrow to go to Metal Gear in Concert on Saturday before returning that evening and hopefully heading out on Sunday to see a group of old friends.

    Hopefully I will be able to write in between all that, but honestly I am mainly looking forward to having some escapism for myself away from my work. 

    Time away from my desk has been the main saving grace of the stress I have been under lately, especially considering writing is still not coming as easily to me as I would like it to. Going out with my dad, immersing myself in a fantasy world, and taking trips away from the place I live have all helped me step back to gain some perspective on my current situation.

    Though, I have always been someone who appreciates good escapism – books, video games, or even just my own thoughts backed with some good music. Having the ability to disappear from the world for any length of time usually helps me out, but with the amount of pain I have been feeling lately, this is definitely harder than before.

    Sometimes I wonder whether I should be using words like pain, hurt, or any other synonym that can describe the emotions that my depression inflicts upon my soul. Part of me feels it would be better to not go into such detail considering this is a website that faces outwards as a representative of myself.

    But then I reflect.

    And know that out there, someone somewhere might need to hear what I have to say.

    As confirmation that they are not alone in this world, and that they can escape into my writings to get away from whatever may be causing them pain.

    It is a bit of wishful thinking, but it is the reason I believe the written word always needs to exist as an artform. 

    “Art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable”

    I do not know how much of the latter I am able to do, but if I can at least achieve the former through what I write down and achieve some sense of relatedness within people who are reading, then I will consider myself successful.

    Even through my own pain, and as my schedule slips for all manner of different reasons, I will try my best to continue writing. 

    For both my and your escapism.

    Good news is that I at least have some kind of a review topic thanks to going out on Tuesday… if the schedule had held together then I would have actually had a decent week worth of review material, but alas, balancing everything that is required of me is still a difficult task.

    As part of my adventure out with my dad on Tuesday evening, we went to an Indian restaurant called “Mowgli”, a British chain focusing on street food style dishes. Everything above was paid for by my dad, so thanks for that!

    Specifically what was recommended to me by my dad was the Diwali Cauliflower and Yoghurt Chat Bombs in the first picture. The former is a delicately spiced half-head of cauliflower while the latter was a crisp puff bread filled with yoghurt and chickpeas which, true to the name of “bomb”, exploded into flavour once you put it into your mouth.

    The dishes I tried are in the second picture: the Mowgli Chip Butty and the Monkey Wrap. Both on a foundation of roti bread, with the former being stuffed with their signature fenugreek fries and an assortment of chutneys, and the latter being an open roti wrap topped with spinach & mint leaves, tandoori chicken, and the same assorted chutneys.

    The Monkey Wrap was definitely my highlight, especially as after taking one or two bits of chicken off the top it was the perfect amount of filling to pick it up like a giant Indian street food taco and eat it with one hand.

    Plus this definitely scratches the itch more for me than curry does. I am not sure what it is, whether I am yet to find the specific sauce that appeals to my palate but I have never developed a fondness for curry. Indian snacks and tandoori? Cannot get enough, but sauce served with rice or naan? Nope, never got a taste for it.

    That will do it for today, hopefully I will be able to write a bit more tomorrow, but unsure what the rest of the weekend will look like. Thank you for reading today’s edition of the Redundancy Review. Wherever you are I hope you are able to relax and take heart that the weekend is soon upon us.

    For more information on Mowgli, visit their website here: https://www.mowglistreetfood.com/