Things I want to do this year

I don't really like making new year's resolutions. I think that those sorts of decisions and goals shouldn't be reserved to a one-time, year-long commitment. Also, I don't like setting myself up to fail. I like setting goals that I know I can reach. Call me gutless, but that's how I do.

Of course, I have some fairly lofty goals for myself in the coming year. I want to finally finish at least one of my manuscripts so I can start rewrites. Maybe it won't be the first novel I publish, but it will be the first novel I finish, not counting the 300-handwritten-page epic I wrote about Hanson when I was 16. Oh yes, you read that right. Details may or may not be available upon request. Sadly, the notebooks in which I wrote this masterpiece are somewhere in my parents' house in Maine. The world suffers.

I also promised the boyfriend I would learn to drive this year. I'm really really REALLY terrified of driving. I took driver's ed. just after turning 17. FYI my birthday is in December (I like presents) and I grew up in suburban Maine. Do the weather-math and you'll realize exactly what I was up against. Throw in my crotchety, nervous instructor and my soon-to-be-diagnosed bipolar disorder (questions welcome) and panic disorder (funsies!), you can see why I remain a pedestrian at 26. That's why I moved to New York after college. However, I now live in Austin, and Mark is sick of driving me everywhere. Crap. Pray for me/send any extra Valiums this way.

I want to learn to read faster. Is this sort of lame? Maybe. If only because I don't know if it's possible. But I basically want to read twice as many books as I read this year (I think it was like 40-50 but I don't have an official count) without actually spending more time reading. This is only because I don't think I could actually spend anymore time reading than I already do while maintaining a social life, eating, sleeping, and keeping my job without ripping a huge hole in the spacetime continuum. Sad Christmas. But my rate of book intake > rate at which I read books > rate at which I get rid of books. In fact that last bit stands at a fairly certain 0. Again, Mark is none too pleased that when we move in a couple of weeks half of our boxes will be filled with words.

I want to walk more. Because a) Texas makes you fat and b) walking makes you un-fat. Also, carbon footprint blah blah blah. I already take the bus a ton, but walking is way more good for you. Plus, we're moving to a neighborhood where walking is more fun. Right now we live off a major roadway and there's really nowhere to walk to. Plus, most of the streets are dead ends and cul-de-sacs. So new place = more walking.

And, of course, an important goal for this year is to finish watching ALL SEVEN SEASONS of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I know I can accomplish this goal, since I bought the ENORMOUS box set and started watching it with Mark last week. Despite his initial protests, he's now as addicted as 16-year-old me was. We are halfway through season two and are having so much fun with it. Why can't Buffy still be on the air? The world would be a better place, you know it.