mood: 
ambitious
music: fireworks
New Year's has never been that much of a big deal for me. Perhaps it's because, growing up in southern Illinois, we generally didn't have someplace to go like Times Square to celebrate. I do remember sometimes feeling a bit embarrassed that I didn't have someone to kiss at the stroke of midnight, but that's about it.
One thing that I did do from time to time was make some New Year's resolutions. These tended not to really stick, of course, but I did make the attempt. One problem is the weather. Who feels motivated and energized when the days are short and the temperature is cold? That's one thing I like about the SCA -- their year starts on May 1, when the days are long, the temperatures are pleasant, and the world is bursting with life! That's a time of year to feel energized!
It's been many years since I've made any resolutions, but I feel the urge to give it another try. Two of the best ways to keep resolutions are to (1) write them down, and (2) tell people about them. Thus, this post!
So here they are:
Wally's Resolutions for 2008!
1. Make better use of my time.
This pretty much boils down to 2 things: (1) Stop procrastinating; (2) Waste less time on TV, video games, and the Internet.
Stop procrastinating.
When I was growing up, my parents had a rule: Do your homework before you go play. Simple, huh? Basically, homework is finite, play is infinite. In other words, there isn't a point where you would be finished with your playing. You could play forever! It's easy to get so wrapped up in your playing that you forget to do your homework, or simply don't leave enough time to get it done. And even if you do leave enough time to get your homework done, all the time that you're playing, there will be a little voice in your head worrying about your homework and making you feel guilty about playing. Do your homework first and that little voice goes away!
Now just replace "homework" with "chores" or "errands" or "housework" or whatever.
Waste less time on TV, the Internet, and video games.
I used to watch quite a bit of TV. You can recognize people who watch lots of TV: At parties, that's pretty much all they talk about. They ask whether you saw some show, then tell you what happened. (I plead guilty to having done the same thing in the past!) If you watch quite a bit of TV, you might not notice it, but if you don't, it's quite obvious. I guess in a strange way it's a bit like secondhand smoke: If you're a smoker, you don't notice others smoking, but if you're not, even a single cigarette is quite noticeable.
In recent years, however, I've whittled down my TV watching quite a bit, to the point where now I pretty much only watch The Daily Show and Mythbusters, as well as the occasional episode of Nova. However, to pretend that I don't watch any other TV would be to ignore the fact that I watch a lot of Lando's TV shows: Peep and the Big Wide World; The Backyardigans; Oobi; The Upside Down Show; etc. When you add that in, I still watch quite a lot of TV. Not to mention the fact that it means that Lando watches quite a lot of TV.
I don't know if I'm ready to give up TV entirely, but I do think that I need to cut back significantly. And I think I need to ensure that Lando watches less TV.
Many people have reduced the time that they spend watching TV, but only because they now spend that time on the Internet or playing video games. I admit that to a large degree I fall into that category.
I generally don't spend all that much time playing video games any more, but I do spend quite a bit of time browsing the Internet. Way too much time, really. I read news sites, blogs, more news sites, more blogs.... I admit that I think I'm very well-informed on the issues of the day, but do I really need to be that informed? To the extent that I know quite a lot but do very little? I don't think so.
Suppose that I spend an average of 2 hours per day on TV, the Internet, and video games. That's 14 hours per week, or nearly 2 full workdays. If your boss said that you could have an extra 2 days off each week, imagine how much you could accomplish! You could get all of your chores and errands done and still have plenty of time to write the great American novel! Or whatever.
That sounds like a lot of time. But guess what? The average American watches twice that amount. That's 4 hours per day, 28 hours per week, or nearly 4 full workdays. If your boss said that you could have an extra 4 days off each week....
Wow. And now you know why we never seem to have enough time to get stuff done: We're spending 28 hours a week watching TV.
That's also a large part of the reason why fewer and fewer people participate in their community, attend meetings, volunteer, etc. -- we're glued to the TV.
Of course, given that there's a writers' strike at the moment, cutting down on my TV viewing might be a bit easier! I might try going cold turkey for a month and see how that goes. (One thing I've noticed: If you watch one TV show, you see ads for other TV shows, which makes you more likely to watch two TV shows, where you'll see ads for still more TV shows, etc. I don't watch any network TV shows, so I don't see any ads for network TV shows, which makes it less likely that I'll decide to watch one. A nice little Catch-22.)
2. Take better care of my health.
My dad has had 2 heart attacks. His dad died of a heart attack. My mom's mom had multiple strokes. Heart problems are definitely in my genes. Because we had Lando late in life, there's a significant chance that I could be dead before he's 20 years old. I'd really rather that didn't happen. My mother died just shy of my 36th birthday and even at that age I felt I was way too young to lose a parent.
I can't do anything about my family history, but I can reduce my other risk factors by taking better care of my health. To do this, I need to: (1) Lose weight; (2) Exercise; (3) Eat better.
Lose weight.
If I remember right, when I was in high school playing basketball and running cross country and track, I weighed about 175. (I'm 6 feet and 1 inch tall.) When I went to college, I stopped exercising and ate more junk food. When I moved to my first apartment in Springfield, I can still clearly remember weighing myself one day and being shocked to see that I weighed 190 pounds!
Now, 20+ years later, I'm in the neighborhood of 260 pounds. If I lose weight at the rate of 1.5 pounds per week, or 78 pounds in 52 weeks, that would put me at 182 pounds by the end of the year. Technically, I'm supposed to weigh less than that, but I'd be very happy with 182.
Exercise.
As important as it is to be the right weight, it is apparently even more important to be fit. If you are overweight, but exercise regularly, you're better off than someone who is the proper weight but is a couch potato. (Hey! Less TV and Internet! See how that ties together? It's almost like I planned it that way!)
Once upon a time, I ran cross country. I would get up early each morning and run 3 miles or more before school. These days, if I run across the street, I'm out of breath by the time I get to the other side!
We joke about how keeping up with Lando forces us to get some exercise, and in some ways that's slightly true, but the reality is that we mainly sit in a chair or on the floor and play with him from there. In addition, when he gets older, if he's going to want to get involved in sports, it would be nice to be in good enough shape that I could help out at least a little!
Eat better.
In addition to taking in fewer calories than I'm burning (i.e. losing weight), I really need to eat healthier foods. I don't eat nearly enough fresh foods, enough fruits and vegetables, etc. And I eat way too much processed food and snacks. Yes, it's very convenient. But if it were less convenient, I suspect I would eat less of it, wouldn't I? After all, if you had to make your own French fries, how often do you think you would really do so?
This ties in directly to the book that I mentioned the other day, Plenty by Alisa Smith and J.B. MacKinnon. The 100-mile diet involves attempting to eat food grown or raised within a 100-mile radius of where you are. The reasons for this are that it is better for the environment (rather than buying corn that traveled 2,000 miles to get to your door, buy corn that traveled 20 miles); it is generally better for your health, since you'll be more likely to eat fresh fruits, vegetables, and grains rather than, say, a microwave dinner or potato chips; and it is fun, because it increases your connections to people in the local community, you'll become more aware of the changing of the seasons and the direct effect that has one what foods are available, you'll increase the variety of foods you eat.
One quick statistic about that last point: Out of the 7,000 plant species that humans have used throughout history, today 90% of the world's food comes from just 20 species of plants! We've got supermarkets that might carry 45,000 different items, but we tend to keep eating the same things over and over and over....
3. Take better care of my finances.
We need to: (1) Pay down our debts; and (2) Create a budget and stick to it.
Pay down our debts.
We've got debts. We don't like having debts. We want to have smaller debts. How could we make that happen? Hmm....
Create a budget and stick to it.
There's one thing President Bush (aka the Worst President Ever) and I have in common: Neither of us can keep a balanced budget. However, Bush at least has a budget. We don't. When both of us were working, we didn't really pay much attention to what we were spending. When Dawn left the workforce shortly before Lando was born, we continued to spend money as pretty much the same rate as we always had. As a result, our income is exceeded by an outgo.
In short, we're running a deficit.
Everything I've ever read about personal finance says, "Create a budget and stick to it." So, we're going to create a budget and stick to it. Or at least that's the plan!
So those are my resolutions for 2008. How about you? What's your plan for correcting all of your imperfections by this time next year?
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