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0:02One of the things you'll see, and I sort of
0:04alluded to this early on,
0:06is that there were some huge gaps, not
0:09least right now.
0:10So if I just sort of highlight these gaps
0:13in blue,
0:13there's been a gap since basically November
0:16.
0:17There was a gap right at the beginning of
0:19the year,
0:19and then these sort of infrequent gaps.
0:23And you might just think, "Oh, this is Tim
0:24having a break."
0:25And actually, it's actually been a tougher
0:29story than that in earnest.
0:31If I sort of talk about just the last month
0:35,
0:35I've got two young kids, they go to nursery
0:37, they come back,
0:38they bring nasty things, I've just been ill
0:41.
0:41I just have no voice.
0:42I actually started recording, and I sounded
0:45like Yogi Bear one day.
0:46I listened to myself back.
0:48I only spent five minutes just talking to
0:50the thing,
0:50and I put my headphones on to edit the
0:52video,
0:52and I was like, "Oh, man, I can't put this
0:55out.
0:55I just sound like Yogi Bear, so I just have
0:57to stop."
0:57And frankly, only in the last week have I
1:00actually gotten my voice back.
1:02And I can talk and speak to the microphone,
1:06thank God, for this live stream.
1:07If not, I would have just sounded bunged up
1:09today.
1:09But I think that's partly health-related.
1:12I need to sort of get on top of that, stay
1:14healthy and fit and all that jazz.
1:17So big push for that in 2024.
1:20These smaller breaks were actually just due
1:22to me being busy with life,
1:24if that makes sense.
1:25So they're just odd weeks here and there
1:27where something happens in life
1:28and you need to step out.
1:30And this year had a lot of those.
1:31And then I actually managed to keep up this
1:36really nice stint here.
1:38This was basically right off the back of
1:40this long break.
1:41I'll explain that in a second.
1:43And I managed to get this really good
1:45momentum.
1:46And the good thing about momentum is that
1:47YouTube rewards you.
1:48It kind of gets more of your content out
1:50there.
1:51So every time you take a break on YouTube,
1:53it kind of assumes that you've sort of
1:55disappeared
1:55and it stops sharing your content out.
1:57And then if I go back to this very start,
2:01so this starting period, the start of the
2:06year, basically,
2:07was an absolute car crash.
2:10And it wasn't because anything bad happened
2:12.
2:13Just to cut a very, very long story short,
2:17the very beginning of the year,
2:18I found that had a very, very rare form of
2:20skin cancer.
2:21Thankfully, it was found, it was dealt with
2:24.
2:24And as of three months ago,
2:26I got the all-clear as much as you can get
2:29an all-clear with something like that.
2:31But nonetheless, in that amount of time,
2:35I went from just having a sort of a routine
2:38investigation on something.
2:40You know, "Oh, is this thing innocuous?"
2:42Initially got the answer that, "No, it was
2:44fine.
2:45You can not worry about it."
2:46I coincidentally had scheduled a second
2:49opinion anyway,
2:50because healthcare in the UK is just not in
2:52a great place.
2:53So the waiting times sort of put me off,
2:55and I went and got help through another
2:59source.
2:59And in essence, they came back and said,
3:01"Actually, we're going to do a biopsy."
3:03They did a biopsy and they found something.
3:04So I was super grateful I got that second
3:07opinion.
3:08But it also meant that everything had to
3:09kick into action,
3:10because it's the kind of thing that once
3:12you found it,
3:12you kind of have to deal with it.
3:14It was dealt with extremely quickly.
3:16I was very fortunate.
3:17Through a funny turn of events,
3:22I ended up getting help at an institution
3:25who supported by a charity that I'd worked
3:28at as a consultant
3:29just three years ago.
3:31It's just absolutely crazy.
3:32It's so funny how these things work out in
3:36life.
3:36But anyway, I was literally going in and
3:40out of appointments.
3:41I had a patch on my shoulder,
3:44and actually on this side, I actually
3:46recorded a video
3:47about the ideal version of Tableau on this.
3:51I think it was a week after the surgery,
3:56which was quite straightforward actually,
3:59because the surgery itself was just done
4:01under local anaesthetic.
4:02I was awake the whole time.
4:04It was more like a dental appointment, if I
4:06'm briefly honest.
4:07It was a very, very sort of gentle
4:10procedure, if that makes sense.
4:12And it was dealt with very quickly.
4:13Anyway, that knocked me for six.
4:16I literally had a whole ton of plans.
4:18And in the YouTube world,
4:20these first three months are the most
4:22important three months.
4:25If you set off the year with all the new
4:27year content on a good rhythm,
4:29it just compounds over the year.
4:31So in essence, April, May was my new year.
4:35And then I also changed jobs partway
4:38through this.
4:39And what these other gaps are is also just
4:42work
4:43and life being busy at the same time.
4:44So having to maintain all of that was
4:47pretty tough.
4:48But bearing in mind, I have a full-time job
4:50.
4:50This YouTube channel is something I do on
4:53the extra at this sort of time.
4:55It's 8 p.m. here in the UK.
4:56This, I think, was a pretty good year in
5:00terms of content.
5:02I didn't make as many videos as I planned
5:03to.
5:04I didn't make as much sort of impactful
5:07content as I planned to.
5:09But the great thing about that is when you
5:12have these ideas,
5:13they're not going anywhere.
5:14I can still do them.
5:15It doesn't matter if someone else does them
5:16either,
5:16because my opinion, at least on YouTube,
5:18is that multiple people can have an opinion
5:20on the same thing.
5:21And still both put out videos.
5:23And if you've ever watched the tech review,
5:24you tend to watch both of them, right?
5:26You don't just watch it from one person.
5:27You watch it from five people.
5:29So I did sort of struggle a little bit, you
5:31know,
5:31mentally with watching other people do
5:33types of content that I was going to do.
5:34I just hadn't had time to sort of kick into
5:36action.
5:37But I also was happy to see that other
5:39people are sort of taken to the platform
5:41and putting their own ideas out.
5:42And making fantastic content.
5:45So that is like a high level view of 2023.
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