What was the hardest personal goal you’ve set for yourself?

Daily writing prompt
What was the hardest personal goal you’ve set for yourself?

Good job to whoever came up with this writing prompt! I have two candidates.

  • Buying my first computer. I knew I wanted one ever since I was 7, so I began saving my pocket cash. The world changed—communism fell, the world moved from 8086 to the 8088XT, 286, 386, 486, and eventually the Pentium. By the time I finished high school, I had saved just enough for about half a computer. With a little help from my family, I finally managed to buy one. I met all kinds of characters along the way, wrote two books that never saw the light of day, and worked part-time jobs. Learned Basic and math. It felt almost like a journey out of The Lord of the Rings, culminating in that moment when I disposed of my savings at the mountain of Doom to get a shiny new K5 computer—only to realize I didn’t know how to use it.
  • Overcoming panic attacks. That one took more than 8 years and involved the Sermon, two therapists, many books, a deep research on the subject of thinking errors, and some bad luck. I could also write a book about it but it would be grossly incompetent. Maybe a blog post one day. Also, with panic attacks, there’s no guarantee they’re gone for good.

I’m now after 10k steps/day average over the course of a year and climbing Vihren in 2025.

Blackberries

Found this in Sofia. First time I see anything resembling blackberries in my area.

I spent years of my childhood in Stara Zagora where blackberries are common. I liked the blackberry jam my grandmother made.

WordCamp Sofia 2024

I joined WordCamp Sofia 2024 this weekend by responding to the call for organizers.

WordCamp Sofia will be held on 24th of November in Sofia Tech Park.

I’ve been out of touch with the local community for years. My last WordCamp where I was part of the team was WordCamp Europe 2018 in Belgrade. Wanted to do Varna 2019 but it was cancelled due to Covid, and never returned to the WordCamp work after that. Sadly, I even missed the WCEU in Athens, which is reachable by car from Sofia.

I’m thankful that the organizers welcomed me to the team. I hope I didn’t forget how this type of work is done and will be able to help. It’s been awhile.

Bean soup

It’s been awhile 🙂 I post photos of the bean soup that’s sold in the Cherni Vrah shelter as a mark of achievement that I managed to get there one more time.

The mountain was moist, slippery and foggy today. It rained a bit and I even had a chance to walk in hail for about a minute or two. Thankfully, no thunders. Found some berries.