My name is Cal, and I feel like the oldest 28-year-old to ever live.

I've often felt a little shy about sharing my interests with others, but over the past couple of years, I've been fortunate enough to surround myself with people who encourage and celebrate creative output, to the point where I'm comfortable having a space like this to chat absolute wham. Besides, I've been making a real effort to wean myself off social media, which has gone relatively well, but I now find myself twiddling my thumbs for large parts of the day. This is just something for me to pass the time by, and to have an outlet for discussing things I enjoy discussing.

My interests vary wildly, from music to gaming, football to politics, so there's no topic I'll ever shy away from posting about if it's something I'd like to write about.

I like to think of myself as a somewhat self-aware boomer when it comes to music, with a huge love for dad-rock, yacht rock, and pretty much anything with the -rock suffix attached. I always half-jokingly tell people I'll enjoy almost anything as long as it was recorded before about 1987. Why? Who knows. Maybe I'll write about that. I have a small group of my all-time favourite bands that I like to call “The Big Three”: Rush, Thin Lizzy, and Steely Dan. I've also attempted to write music in the past both serious and unserious, though I've never really posted anything online other than MIDI tracks. I have a BSc in Music Technology, which means I'm incredibly well-versed in how expensive a decent DAW can be. Writing has taken a back seat in recent years, though. Put it down to a 12″ mix of “Writer's Block”. There's a little joke for you.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not a huge “Capital-G Gamer” by any stretch of the imagination, but I did play video games for a living for the best part of three years, so I have to like them a little bit. To get a decent idea, check this page to see my most-streamed games on Twitch (though that doesn't necessarily correlate with my most-enjoyed games). I also like to dabble in modding, albeit on a basic level. GameRant even called one of my mods “amusing” once!

Football-wise, I was a huge Liverpool supporter since I was a child, until around 2020, when I stopped paying as much attention, and in the past few years, have made a concerted attempt to be more neutral, after realising it's not nice to have your weekend mood depend on something you have no control over. Watching football when you don't really care who wins is a much more enjoyable experience. Having said that, I've started to make a slight attempt to follow a couple of local teams a bit closer, including Bradford City and Guiseley AFC, especially after having successful Football Manager careers with both of them in recent years.

Politics? Let's just say I try my hardest (with varying success) to not be a tosser, and I think others should aspire to be the same. I know that sounds oh so enlightened and smug, but I'm astounded at the amount of people who don't seem to agree with me.

I don't have any dreams of becoming a journalist or anything like that. I use the same words too often, for starters. That helps though, going into this with too many hopes and expectations will only stress me out more. You'd imagine my writing will only get better over time.

Getting very personal: I'm currently on a bit of a “mental health journey”, as much as I dislike the phrase. A lot of it has been building up for years and years, and it probably didn't help that I largely ignored it in favour of putting all my effort into my “content creation” escapades during COVID times. I'm not sure whether I'll actually post about any of that sort of thing, as I can still be very reserved about a lot of it, but it's possible.

But for now, and ideally forever, no pressure.

Thanks for taking the time to read this, and I hope you enjoy whatever nonsense I put out there.