Without a doubt, 2013 had been the greatest year of my life, I had done so many awesome things, I have been to so many places, and basically everything that I could want could happen happened to me. It would be too much of a hassle to do some sort of chronological list of everything I did, so I’m going to list everything by topic.

   Also, this thread is for you guys to talk about how your year has gone as well. If you want, do ahead and reply with the five biggest things that have happened to you in 2013.

Movies

   By the end of 2012, the most times I had gone to the movies was about 10 times and that was in 2012, however that record has long been broken as I had seen 18 movies in 2013, four of those movies I had seen twice which brought my total movie total of 2013 to 22.

   The five best movies that I saw this year in order were Prisoners, The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty, Enders game, The Great Gatsby, and Getaway. Sure, I saw a bunch of other awesome movies such as the second Hobbit Movie, Catching Fire, Iron Man 3, and Man Of Steel, but I kind of rate movies differently because I also like to see a good story in my movie.

   It was August Second, I went to the premiere of Sea Of Monsters at an AMC Theatre and I decided to get an AMC Stubs Membership for 12 dollars. Most people don’t like AMC Stubs, but that membership was the reason that I was able to see so many movies, as a matter of fact, since August 2^nd, I had gone to the movies 17 times. You get a 10 dollar bonus after every hundred dollars you spend, and we spent over 400 dollars already at AMC, we also get free upgrades on Popcorn and Soda, so the 12 dollar fee was worth it.

   Prisoners was my favorite movie of the year because of the drama and the acting, Hugh Jackman and Jake Gylanhall made a great team and the entire movie was so suspenseful. I saw The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty on Christmas and I really liked it because of the adventure and what the movie had meant. I really liked the other three movies as well because of the story and the acting.

Sports.

   Next up we have sports, which is where some of my biggest events come from. First of all, I am a huge baseball, so most of my sports events revolve around that sport.  I have gone to about a dozen Mets games and some of them were really good. My first game of the year was the second game of the season and it was a great game where Matt Harvey pitched a great game. Harvey is my favorite player of all current MLB players.

   I went to another two games during opening week which the Mets won both of those games. That third game was against the Marlins and it also happened to be the major league debut of Jose Fernandez. Jose ended up winning Rookie of The Year, took third in Cy Young voting and is easily one of the 5 best pitchers in Baseball.

   There was one game I remember going to during the first or second week of June against the Marlins. It was a matchup between Harvey and Fernandez. The Mets lost that game, but the game took a whole 20 innings to decide. I stayed for the entire game and it was the fourth longest game in Mets history and longest game in Marlins history.

   There have been a couple other games I went to where I received awesome gifts or discounts, I went to a Quasi-double header against the Braves for 10 dollars. This means that they finished the last couple innings of the rained out game and then they began that day’s game. I received two tickets to a Harvey game on May 22^nd. I sold the second ticket for 30 dollars, and the ticket came with a 5 dollar Dunkin Donuts card and free access to the Ceasers Club. I even went to a double header against the Marlins in September for free.

   On May 14^th, after I took my AP Government exam, I went to my first Yankees game. It was against the Mariners and it was Sabathia versus Felix Hernandez. The Yankees ended up winning, but that was after Felix threw a few no hit innings.

   I had also gone to two Brooklyn Cyclones games. The first game came with free fireworks at the end, and the second game cost a dollar and came with a free hot dog and soda.

   I had gone to my first soccer match in August, but it was nothing big, it was a NCAA Division 1 Soccer Match that my school had won. But just a few months later, I had gone to my first MLS match between the Red Bulls and the Chicago Fire. This was the last game of the season and the Red Bulls won. Because they won, the Red Bulls received the Supporters Shield which goes to the team with the best record. It had been their first time winning that award.

   About half way through December, I went to my first football game. It was at Metlife Stadium and it was between the Giants and the Seahawks. The Giants were destroyed in that game, but it was still an amazing experience. I received a couple of autographs, I played a little football, and I watched some great plays.

  I also received a lot of autographs, up until the end of 2012, I had received just one autograph from an athlete. In 2013, I had received a grand total of 8 autographs. Two from the Mets, one from the Cyclones, three from the Red Bulls, and two from the Giants. The biggest athlete that I received an autograph from was Antonio Pierce, he owns one Super Bowl ring and one Pro Bowl appearance.

   Now we go back to Baseball for a bit to talk about All Star Week. Sometime during January I signed up to volunteer at the 2013 T-Mobile All Star Fan Fest at the Jacob Javits Center. After a couple of months, I learned that I got a position. Two days before the Fan Fest began, I received my schedule and my uniform. I was scheduled to work Friday, 4-8PM, Saturday 12-5PM and Monday 4-8PM.

   One of the best parts of being a volunteer was that I was able to go into the Fan Fest for free when I was not working, so on Friday, I arrived when they opened at 9AM just to go and have fun for 7 hours. I played so many games, I met so many famous people including Rollie Fingers, Mookie Wilson, and Cal Ripken Jr.  I received a limited edition All Star Baseball, a bunch of All Star and team pins, and I had the opportunity to listen to Baseball Radio broadcasts live because they broadcasts were recorded at the Center.

   One of my favorite booths was set up by Sony, they had MLB 13 The Show set up for PS3, PS3 with Move, and PS Vita. Apparently, they were having a contest for the move and I decided to give it a try. The contest was for the Home Run Derby and the current leader I believe had 7 home runs. I tried and could only hit 3 home runs, I tried again and hit 4 home runs. I had used Edwin Encarnocion the first time and Jose Bautista the second time. For the third time, I used Robinson Cano and I hit 11 home runs to take the lead.

   I was winning, but the game was so much fun, that I decided to keep playing. I chose Cano again and b the time I was at 8 home runs, the person next to me had hit his 12^th home run to take the lead. He hit one more home run to finish with 13, but then moments later, I passed him and I made it to 21 home runs. (I believe)

   I took an hour break and when I came back, I was still in first place, but somebody came within 2 home runs of me, so I decided to try again. This time, I had about 20 people around me watching and I made it to 29 home runs. A couple hours later, I went back but I have lost my swing and each of the three times, I could not hit more than 5 home runs.

   At four, I began my shift and I was in the rookie league. I worked the Home Run Derby with the little kids for four hours and I had a lot of fun. At 8, when it was time to leave, I went back to the Sony station to see that I was still in first place.

   Saturday, I came in at 9 and I went straight to the Sony station to try to get my score higher. First off, I should say what the prize was. The top two players by Monday afternoon were going to go to the Home Run Derby at Citi Field for free and during the Home Run Derby, those two players were going to play PS3 Home Run Derby off the Jumbotron and the winner gets the ultimate Playstation prize.

   I remember the first game I played on Saturday, it was so funny because there was new people watching me. After I hit 3 home runs, some guy says “Just 26 more and you’ll be the leader.” I end up hitting 6 home runs in that game and another guy says “So close”. In my second game, when I made it to 11 home runs with 6 outs, one guy says “Maybe you can do it, let’s go!” and I end up losing at 13 home runs. Then when I start my third game, one of the workers comes and says “here’s Zander, our leader trying to break his own score.” All those people had the Wait what? Look on their faces.

   I ended up asking to move my Monday 4-8 shift to Saturday in case I did make it, so I ended up working 8 hours on Saturday. Right before my shift started, I learned that somebody hit 33 home runs and that I was in second place. Now I was getting nervous, because I was not going to be able to come in on Sunday to try again, so anybody could beat my score.

   On Sunday, I went to the Futures Game at Citi Field, that was the first All Star week event and it was a lot of fun. Noah Syndergaard started for the United States team and Rafael Montero started for the World team. Both of those players are top prospects in the Mets organization who may make their debuts in 2014. The World team won that game and shortly after that game ended, the Legends and Celebrities Softball game began. This game was hilarious and one of the stars of the game was Kevin James who made a few spectacular plays.

   On Sunday, I made it home at about 9PM and I received an E-mail from the Sony station at Fan Fest. They said that they ended the contest early and that I finished in second place. Monday morning, I went to Fan Fest and I had to pick who I was going to play as at Citi Field. I had to pick an NL team, so I went with harper.

   At about 7PM, I arrived at Citi Field and I was given my 260 dollar tickets and I was brought up to my seat. I was sitting next to the other contestant.  The game was just magical, it was one of the coolest things I have ever seen. The bright lights, with monstrous home runs going in every direction filled everybody with excitement. Half way through the first round, we were given our jerseys and we were brought down to the field. We stood along the foul line for about 15 minutes before it was time for us to play.

   The other guy was standing next to me and there was somebody standing in front of me. I had no idea who was in front of me, but 10 minutes later I realized it was Alex Gordon, one of the All Stars of the Kansas City Royals. For the first 10 minutes, I thought it was just a worker in a jersey, I had no idea it was actually him. I spent the next couple of minutes scanning the area around me until I found Mariano Rivera standing a few feet to my right. I took a picture of him on my phone and that was one great moment.

   Then it was game time, the other guy went first and because the screen was hundreds of feet away, there was quite a bit of lag, so neither of us performed well. Each of the four pitches that was thrown at him, he either missed or hit foul. I only did a little bit better, I only hit one ball fair and it only went half way into the outfield, the rest of the pitches went fowl. Because of this, all 40000 fans at the game booed at us.

   It was very embarrassing but I won since I was able to hit a ball fair, so I was okay with being booed at by so many people. The derby ended with Yoenis Cespedes beating Bryce Harper. A couple days later, my prizes arrived in the mail. I received A brand new PS Vita with a 16 GB memory stick, a limited edition leather PS3, limited edition MLB bags, a small MLB 13 The Show cabinet, and MLB 13 The Show for both systems.

   I was not able to go to the actual All Star Game, but Tuesday morning, I had gone to the Red Carpet parade in Manhattan, I took pictures of Matt Harvey, Carlos Beltran, and many other players. That weekend was easily the greatest weekend of my life.

   Those are really the two main topics that made this year great, but many other great events still took place. I went on a college tour in Texas during February and I loved it. The tour lasted a week and we went to a bunch of colleges located throughout Texas. We had visited Austin, San Antonio, and Houston. When we were in San Antonio, we went on a boat ride through the San Antonio River Walk which is pretty famous and I loved it.

   When we were in San Antonio, we bought these things called Happy rocks and for the next couple of weeks once we came back to New York, I took that with me wherever I went until I forgot about it. On Christmas Day, I was going through a bunch of my old stuff and I had found the rock for the first time since March, so I am going to start walking around with it again.

   2013 was the year that I had graduated High School and it was the year that I began college, and both of those events are pretty big. It just so happens that my high school graduation took place in the basketball arena of my college.

   Oh, and who could forget about vizzed? 2013 was the year that I joined the site and during my just under 3 months, I have made nearly 1500 posts, I came in third in the October tdv, first in the new member tdv, and I have made so many friends that I love, such as tgags123, mrfe, deg2000, TornadoMudkip, hilacle, and so many more. My most proud accomplishment on Vizzed though, would have to be my Pokemon Battle thread, it became so popular in its few short months, and I'm working to make it even more popular. Currently, I am working on a revival of the story version of the thread which will be released soon, and I plan on making  a hack based on the thread. Hopefully, I will be with Vizzed for a really long time.

   On Thanksgiving Day, I went with my friend to the parade and we had a great time, on Black Friday I went with the same friend to the NY Aquarium and we also went to Coney Island. Christmas Day was the day that I went with Red to see Walter Mitty and then we went to Dave and Busters for an hour. After that we went to his house and played video games for a couple of hours.

   On Monday, December 30^th, Min, the third member of our group was supposed to go to a museum in Manhattan to do something for school. He overslept and ended up not going. We agreed to go on New Year’s Eve. Early in the day, we went to his museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art and after about an hour there, we left. Then, we crossed through Central Park and we spent the next couple of hours at the American Museum of Natural History. After that, we made our way to Time Square and we spent the next bunch of hours waiting for the ball to drop. The event was kind of boring in the sense that we stood perfectly still for 6 hours and that we were so tired throughout most of it, but it was a really big event, so I am really happy that I was able to go with my friends. By the time I got home, it was a quarter after 1 in the morning and I passed out for a bit.

   I literally would not trade this year for millions of dollars, and I hope that each year just gets better and better for me and for all of you guys as well.