Tuesday, January 04, 2011

To picture my life, boy you need a higher resolution

Another good resolution pun.

Relationships
1. Create some forward motion in my love life
Last year I was able to take the big step of getting my head on straight again, but the fact remains that I’ve spent a long time single. Since last year I’ve met and grown closer to a lot of compelling individuals, so it seems like at some point I’ve got to at least step up and get a date or something. I’ve had this resolution in mind since summer of last year, and I’m hoping that it won’t be unresolved for long.

Experiences
2. Enjoy my first drink on my 21st birthday
I don’t have to do all that much to achieve this resolution, other than stay the teetotaling course and have a drink on December 22nd. However it’s something I’ve been working at for quite some time, so now that I’m in the homestretch there’s no reason to stop challenging myself now.

3. Attend a regular season NFL game
Now that I’ve got tickets for my first NHL game, I’d like to consider the possibility of filling in another hole in my much-treasured sports experience spectrum. While I did get the chance to go to a Packers preseason game against the Broncos in like, seventh grade, I’d like to take the leap and go to a game that matters now. Given the difficulty of getting Packers tickets for a first-generation Wisconsinite like myself, I like the idea of traveling somewhere to watch my first regular season game. Possibilities include a Bucs game during another Tampa vacation, weekend trips for the Vikings, Lions or Bears, a road trip to a Chiefs or Rams game to culminate in even more delicious barbeque, or a Panthers game if Evan ends up in North Carolina for grad school. The possibilities are there, and with my flair for US travel, they honestly all sound appealing to me.

4. Drive in TWO states in which I have not driven before
Yes, building off of last year’s resolution, this one is obviously harder because it requires not one, but two more states, and also because by now I’ve driven in all the gimme states touching Wisconsin. Which states will this resolution force me to visit on my own time this year? Missouri? Indiana? Oklahoma (where I’m presently writing this)? Beats me, man!

5. Attend a hip-hop concert
Haha...I don’t even know what I’d do with myself once I got there, and I also am well aware that Wisconsin is pretty incapable of drawing decent acts. However, there usually ends up being a handful of mid-tier hip-hop artists who find their way to Madison for JAMZ events or whatever, so it would be fun to see what one is like for once. To this day I’m still kicking myself for not going to the T.I. show in Tampa when I had the chance, regardless of how out of place I would have been (very much so).

Personal Improvement/Achievement
6. Fully pay off my sophomore and junior years of college
I couldn’t quite get sophomore year paid off last year, but the free rent involved in the equation this year gives me the hope that I might have only my senior year left to pay for by 2012, or even that I could be (temporarily) debt-free by the start of fall semester. It’s exciting! And it means I’m so close to being done with college.

7. Start playing some piano again
I took a good 6-8 years of piano lessons (I don’t really remember, actually), but I haven’t played consistently since grade school. I don’t feel the need to get back to a regular level, but I should at least start plunking around again, relearning some of the songs I knew and maybe learning some new ones. It’s not quite natural for me anymore, but I feel like it’s a good skill to have.

8. Accomplish things on Fridays
It wouldn’t be a resolution list if there wasn’t an incredibly vague one, eh? Friday is far and away my least productive day of the week during the school year (as I suppose it is for a lot of people), in which I generally only have morning classes, come back, watch Community and The Office on Hulu, and then be a worthless heap for the rest of the day. I generally just find myself too mentally exhausted and unmotivated to do anything constructive on Fridays. Sure, I’d still like to be able to relax and watch TV and go to parties on Fridays, but surely it wouldn’t kill me to find a way to get some productive use out of the day.

9. Get professionally published
Despite the non-cohesive ramblings on this blog, I like to consider myself a decent writer from time to time. I even have one (minor) magazine credit to my name. Though my time is pretty limited, I'd like to be able to try to get back to that a little and hone those skills a bit more. Obviously I'm not referring to a scholarly journal here, but instead I could see the possibility of writing an article for Cracked or a soccer site or something else along those lines. I'd have to step it up a bit and it would definitely challenge me to improve the entertainment value of my writing, but it's always been kind of a goal of mine.

10. Accomplish at least six of my first nine New Year's Resolutions
No more counting this last one in the tally.