Collecting hobbies like they're pokemon

I'm writing this blog to remember all the hobbies/random obsessions I've had (and abandoned) throughout different phases of my life, so I can remember the good old days and maybe pick some of these things back up.

I used to really enjoy reading pretty much all genres back in elementary school, and the library was my favorite place to go to. Now that I'm in college, I can't remember the last time I read something that wasn't a textbook or academic in some way. I think I also watched a bit of Pokemon (DVDs from the library!).

I used to also bike around the neighborhood a lot, and played tennis at the tennis courts.

The Golden Era

Starting in 5th grade (after my mom was no longer around), I started getting into more Pokemon since my foster family had Netflix, and they also had a Wii U. I played Splatoon, Pikmin, Mario Party and all the traditional wii games like smash, and got my first tablet. On my tablet, I played pixel gun 3D, clash royale/clash of clans, pokemon go, dragon mania legends, battle camp, Roblox jailbreak, and Minecraft. There's definitely a bunch that I'm missing. I collected a ton of Pokemon cards during this era.

My foster family also had laser tag guns and pogo sticks, so we were outside playing with those a lot, or inside playing the floor is lava or hide and seek.

In 6th grade, I still played a lot of those games, but was also super into NCS, Doki doki literature club, and FNAF lore. I think this was the golden age of YouTube, so that checks out.

Then in middle school came the Fortnite addiction. I was on that everyday 5am - 2am. It's the reason I'm still currently the same height I was in 6th grade. I was grinding dailies for myself and other people CONSTANTLY.

High School

I started getting into first person shooters in high school, like Valorant. I still didn't have a personal laptop for the first half of high school, so until then, I played a lot of Call of duty mobile (I was really grinding for the gold skins on all the smgs and snipers). I tried to play Osu for aim training but got bored quick since I sucked at it (it didn't help that the only map I tried on it was super hard).

During Covid, I did a bit of drawing, painting (only as gifts for friends though), and crocheting. What stood out the most though, was the Genshin Impact obsession. I was winning every 50/50, and had all the archons. I quit in early senior year I think (around the Chasm update). I remember getting through all of Dragonspine in one day, during online classes. At some point during this time I also had a short BTS obsession, although I was already really familiar with kpop. A friend had introduced me to Nflying back in freshman year of high school, if not middle school. I also played a ton of Minecraft. I miss all the old servers and worlds we created with everyone who is too busy to play now.

I also spent a lot of time walking around the neighborhood with my friends, and we hung out at playgrounds to yap.

College

I got into cake decorating, but since I hate fondant and super heavy/sweet frostings, I only used whipped cream, which was a melty, unstable mess. I'm still looking for a good stabilized whipped cream recipe to use for my next cake decorating attempt. I did this pretty much every semester: a blueberry whimsical forest themed cake, a frog sitting on a log with a pond of ducks, Pochacco, an elephant (I'll try to find more pictures later).

As I started becoming more comfortable with spending money (I went from being unable to buy $10 worth of vbucks to being able to order $600 worth of clothes), I began doing a lot more online shopping for clothes, and eventually for makeup. I was obsessed with a brand called Lacemade for a bit, and also Lewkin. One of my goals is to learn how to sew and design things myself.

I started getting into cosplaying as well. I've cosplayed as Maki Zenin from JJK (to Anime Boston) and Zero Two from Darling in the Franxx (I went with my friends as a squad of pink haired girls for Halloween, and we won a prize for best group costumes in our dorm). I have lots planned for senior year as well (this fueled some of my absurd spending in junior year).

During black Friday in the fall of my junior year, I bought and decorated an electric guitar. It was an impulsive purchase that I haven't regretted. I just really need to buy a better amp, but until then, I'll keep practicing in the MacGregor music room. I practiced using an acoustic guitar there, and the thicker strings absolutely destroyed my fingers.

Ice skating was something I got into as well, thanks to MIT's PE requirement. I am dreading having to swim on a day full of classes though, since I haven't done that requirement yet. I also started doing yoga because of the PE requirement, which was actually super relaxing and a great way to start the day. I signed up for the 8am class to force myself to get up early, but that just caused me to miss too many classes and have to start it in the following quarter.

As for video games, I still played a lot of Minecraft, got into Honkai Star Rail (and all of its lore), and VRising.

I've been into anime for a long time now (I think my first one was Jojo over winter break of my freshman year of high school, if you don't count Pokemon), but I started One Piece halfway through my internship this summer. Before that, the longest anime I watched was probably Black Clover at 171. I have a blog dedicated to this masterpiece.

This summer I also got into running. I was really athletic in elementary school (think 70+ on the pacer, 7 min mile) but became a couch potato afterwards. After about a week, I was doing a 5k and a half in 40 minutes, but it never lasted for more than a week because I got sick, which seems to happen every summer.

Going forward

I brought all my art supplies and crochet materials to college but haven't had a chance to use them yet. Senior year's my last chance. We'll see how this semester goes. I hope to get more into baking this semester as well; I have a bad habit of tweaking recipes to try to make them healthier and they always turn out worse for it.

My (abridged) hobby bucketlist:

• Create my own recipes and publish my own baking book
• Get good at drawing
• Be able to design/create my own clothing/jewelry (inspired by cosplaying)
• Get into calisthenics
• Write a book (I started this with a friend in high school but never finished it)
• Make video games (I have a list of ideas that has been sitting there for years) and create my own assets for it by getting into pixel art and also Blender
• Keep running consistently