Top 5 New Year's Resolutions

At the risk of being really cliche, I thought we should do a resolution list since it is a brand new year. Plus, it’s good to have goals and I need something to fill the next 8 months of my life ...

Honorable Mention: Watch More Movies - With all the year-end movie lists going around, I realized that I don’t watch nearly enough movies. Nor do I make use of my Netflix account in any way that makes the monthly payments worthwhile. I’m also sick of having to say “Oh, yeah I haven’t seen that yet, but I really want to,” in conversations — so really this resolution is about saving face. Aiming high would be 2 movies a week, a realistic goal is one.

5) Exercise - If the basic premise of this list wasn’t cliche enough to being with, this is a pretty cliche resolution to start with, but a good one to have nonetheless. I don't have a weight goal in mind, I think I'm pretty much going to be where I'm at from here on out; I’m really more concerned with being more healthy, fit and toned. I also spent $60 on that work out video (which I actually like), so I should really make use of it. I'd also include in this resolution dancing more on my own (outside of class), which will keep my basic skills and choreographies sharp.

4) Clean regularly, in general, and my garage, in particular - Cleaning and organizing the garage was something I had aimed to have done during the summer ... so much for that. It's amazing how quickly things pile up. Other than the garage, I run a pretty tight ship at my place, but lately things have gotten a little slovenly with the holidays and traveling (not that that's an excuse since I don't have a job or classes to take up my time ... how DO I fill my days??). So after getting things to an acceptable level of clean, I'm resolved to keep it that way the whole year through. This means developing and actually sticking to a cleaning schedule. The idea is that if I do a little often (i.e. every week), then I won't have one massive job to do all at once because someone is coming to visit or people are coming over for dinner, etc.

3) Reduce My Carbon Footprint - I’ve been trying to do this for a while now, but without a specific plan. So I guess I want to do it more methodically, which I suppose would mean, firstly, doing a carbon audit and setting a reduction goal. (Mother Jones suggested in their recent issue that everyone try to reduce their carbon footprint by 22%, which seems reasonable, but that might be because that number doesn’t mean anything substantive to me and I’m not good with numbers ...). This is a pretty nondescript so far, so here are three things in particular I'm planning to do in addition to a carbon footprint audit and setting a reduction goal: 1) Bike More, Drive Less - once I get a bike rack and side baskets, I can start biking to my groceries; 2) Eat Right - by joining the local grocery co-op - something that also requires the bike rack; 3)

2) Stay in Touch with Family - Visiting family made me realize how little I stay in touch with them, which is sad in today's world of technology and even more sad given that I am constantly wired (even more so now with this new handy-dandy iPhone). I really have no good reasons eyond my own laziness and the fact that I'm pretty bad at e-mail, which are both lame excuses rather than valid reasons. In order to remedy this, I will aim to get regular (every week?) e-mails going with my cousins.

1) Learn Tagalog - This is sort of a corollary to resolution #2. Visiting the Philippines has made me really regret that I didn't buckle down and learn tagalog before I got there, especially since I shelled out the $300+ for Rosetta Stone. Filipinos are an extremely friendly peoples and most of them speak English, but it just felt kind of weird not being able to converse. I also wish I knew tagalog so I could talk with my grandma, who's English has become pretty rusty. So the plan is to do an hour of Rosetta Stone every day (at least during the week).