Lately, there have been plenty of articles regarding employees returning to their offices full time (or, in many cases, quitting altogether rather than returning). Employers are trying to find incentives to bring back their employees, making compromises with allowing a day or two for working remotely, so their business can stay afloat after the country lost 600k people to the pandemic.

Then there are offices like mine where us employees have never left.

When offices first began closing due to the pandemic back in February or March 2020, myself and my coworkers stayed in the office. There was a brief period of time — about a month, maybe a month and a…

The alarms were set and the front doors were locked, keeping everyone else out and me in as the building’s solitary human.

When I worked at a boarding facility for dogs and cats, with doggie day camp during the day, we boasted being staffed 24/7. Holidays, bad weather, it didn’t matter. We were on par with the United States’ post office when it came to being present and delivering service. Having someone on-site at all times put pet parents at ease when they wanted to leave their dog or cat in our care.

My shifts at the day camp and…

Back in 2017, Nintendo released Mario Party: The Top 100 for the Nintendo DS. While, critically, the game did well enough, it was a disappointment for fans of the Mario Party series.

The Top 100 had boasted the most popular mini-games from the Mario Party series, but it sorely lacked the board mode that made the series so popular. Super Mario Party for the Nintendo Switch was the next installment in the series, and the excited response from fans when it was discovered boards would return was huge.

It would take a few years for Super Mario Party to be…

I remember back in 2012. The first Avengers movie came out, rounding out the multiple solo movies that had come before it to bring the original team together. Captain America, Iron Man, the Hulk, Thor, Black Widow, and Hawkeye showed off their skills as a team against Loki and the aliens appearing out of the wormhole.

Like with most major franchises, fanfiction exploded within the fandom.

Fanfiction, in my opinion, is a wonderful way for people to show their love for a franchise. It allows people to exercise their creative muscles, to continue the adventures, to answer what ifs, to further develop characters, to fix any plot holes or even…

This article contains spoilers for the game Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity.

Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity, the second love child between Nintendo and Omega Force, was released on November 20, 2020, giving Nintendo Switch owners a hack-and-slash spin-off to the beloved The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild game. Honed as a prequel, Age of Calamity gives players the ability to control and experience the stories of characters that were little more than spiritual guides to Link in the Breath of the Wild adventure.

Considering the popularity of Breath of the Wild and said spiritual guides, Age of…

Hair up, face over the toilet bowl, I hadn’t been sick in such a way in a few years. Although I couldn’t see her, I could hear our little dog — a mostly chihuahua and mini-schnauzer mix — whining from the bathroom’s threshold before darting in to paw at my leg while I was ill.

She was content to cuddle with me while I lied pathetically on the couch after that bout in the bathroom.

While it’s been a few years since then, and our little dog is a bit older, the amount of empathy that she exhibits hasn’t changed…

Wonder Woman 1984 is the sequel to 2017’s big Wonder Woman hit. Both star Gal Gadot and Chris Pine, and were directed by Patty Jenkins. With how acclaimed the original movie was, the sequel was highly anticipated by many.

The year 2020 happened with a pandemic that ravaged the theater industry and WW84 was released last week both in theaters and on the streaming service HBO Max. My family and I took a chance on the streaming service and were excited to finally watch the sequel the day after Christmas.

And it was good.

Not great, not in the same category as the original…

The new year is right around the corner, and with that comes the mentality of starting over, of setting and achieving new goals, of a beginning. Considering 2020 was a bit of a lost year with the pandemic, many folks are hopeful for 2021 with the approval of multiple vaccines against Covid-19.

This time last year, I had grand plans for 2020. I was going to write more. I was going to read more. My big goal, though, was to further improve my visual art skills, whether that be by traditional drawing, painting, or digital art.

Unfortunately, my perfectionism got in the way.

When creating art, I’ve…