Just over 1001 days ago, I posted this list, boldly memeing where all kinds of people had memed before. It was a moderate success. Mostly, the goals I fell short on were lame to begin with, and a few others were just never gonna happened. To review my successes, you can click through here. In this post, I’ll just be apologizing for my failures.
4. Run a 22 minute 5K – I closed in on this one last year, but only got down to about 24:55. This was doable (I think), but I strayed from the gym and backslid, and then just forgot about it entirely.
5. Run another half-marathon – I’m still flip-flopping over whether I’ll ever do one of these again.
8. Learn enough HTML to redesign this site – Sorry, but that shit’s just a mystery to me. I figured out enough to change a few colours and mess with margins, but I’d have to look it up all over again if I wanted to make more changes.
10. Bench press my own weight five times (in a row, folks) – Forty pounds shy on this one. And that was about two years ago. These days I’d be lucky to bench press Moe.
12. Figure out Ottawa – Yeah, I know how to get to the grocery store, and where work is, but I haven’t really figured out this city. I’d have to sit down with a map for a few days and actually try. And trying’s for suckers.
18. Visit Macchu Picchu – Not so much. This one showed up because Sarah was watching The Amazing Race one day, and the teams went to Peru, and for about two weeks we were totally gung-ho about it. But then we had so many trips booked already that my vacation time for the next three years was accounted for.
19. Learn to make two more go-to meals (I've gotten a lot of mileage out of omelettes but it's time to move on) – Sarah has accomplished this one in spades, but I’ve only managed to add ghetto eggy sandwiches to my retinue (or if you prefer—Egg McMaster)
28. Spend a day at the National Gallery (maybe not an entire day, but at least do more than check out the Group of Seven stuff and bail) – I blame our visitors on this one. We have enough cool people that visit that we play tourist a few times a year, and while the Diefenbunker, the War Museum, and Parliament Hill tours have been popular, no one has ever wanted to go to the National Gallery. So yeah: this one is everyone else’s fault but mine.
29. Watch the first season of Carnivale – Just didn’t.
34. Compile a personal top 50 films list – When I wrote the other two top 50 lists, I had all kinds of time on my hands (that’s excuse number one). Also, people generally don’t enjoy posts in excess of 2000 words (excuse number two). For those interested, my top three would be Casablanca, Fight Club, and Hard Core Logo.
37. Learn how to make an impressive mixed drink (something that involves a stylishly cut orange peel or Cocktail-like bottle tossing) – Nope. It’s just too easy to crack open a beer or pour three fingers of rum into a glass instead.
38. Learn three brand new songs on guitar, start to finish – Turns out I’m not in University anymore.
39. One of these songs must be recognizable to the general populace – And that song would have been: Thunderstruck.
41. See three local bands – We may actually have accomplished this. Not sure. I know we saw fightfightfight and Your Dad Versus Mine at Bluesfest, but I can’t think of a third.
46. Get to Chandler's Pub at least once a year – 2005: yes! 2006: yes! 2007: failure.
56. Be more sensitive to Sarah when she is sick (apparently smug distain isn't as comforting as I'd thought) – Yeah, this just didn’t happen.
57. Finish watching all the DVDs I own – Curse you, Canada: A People’s History! Why do the 50s have to be so boring?
58. Identify the gaps in my wardrobe
59. Fill them – I came very close on this one after a shopping trip to Vermont where Sarah made me buy an entirely new winter wardrobe. Too bad my summer wardrobe was so crappy. I think I’ve bought one new T-shirt per year since then.
61. Learn the bridge to At the Hundredth Meridian – I can get this far: "If I die of vanity promise me, promise me you’ll bury me some place I don’t want to be, and then dig me up and transport me, unceremoniously away from the gobeshdon dees, something something bees, whispers of Belize…"
63. Buy Jay a drink; preferably rye – Disappointed on this failure, but maybe 2008 will be the year of the Touch You Last/ Kill the Goat summit.
70. See the sun go down on Sacre Coeur (and so have lived the best verse of Rosy and Grey) – Just didn’t.
74. Write a blog entry entitled Word to Your Moms, I Came to Drop Bombs – This entry would have been how I’d really like to be able to rap. V. funny when I thought of it, but then too much time passed and I totally lost interest.
76. Give blood (and, ideally, bleed effectively. Haven't done this one since high school where the technician kept accusing me of playing with the needle. Back then, my blood ran like tar, apparently) – No good reason to have failed here, but I failed. Probably because this is something I’d have to pursue entirely on my own with no outside prompting, and that’s not a circumstance under which things usually get done.
77. Lose five pounds – Nope. But I gained ten if that’s any consolation.
82. See a local play – In our apartment, we lived two streets down from Ottawa Little Theatre, so that makes this failure especially sad.
84. Make a dime off my Amazon links – Does this ever actually happen for anyone?
87. Play NTN at Don Cherry's – Turns out there is no NTN at Don Cherry’s.
88. Beat Sarah at both – I can beat Sarah in a footrace, I can beat Sarah in a Being Older competition, I can beat her in the sport of beard growing, but I can’t beat the girl at trivia.
90. Gamble, win a small fortune, and walk away – Nope, unless you consider forty bucks a small fortune. And unless you consider sliding over to the next slot machine to be walking away.
4. Run a 22 minute 5K – I closed in on this one last year, but only got down to about 24:55. This was doable (I think), but I strayed from the gym and backslid, and then just forgot about it entirely.
5. Run another half-marathon – I’m still flip-flopping over whether I’ll ever do one of these again.
8. Learn enough HTML to redesign this site – Sorry, but that shit’s just a mystery to me. I figured out enough to change a few colours and mess with margins, but I’d have to look it up all over again if I wanted to make more changes.
10. Bench press my own weight five times (in a row, folks) – Forty pounds shy on this one. And that was about two years ago. These days I’d be lucky to bench press Moe.
12. Figure out Ottawa – Yeah, I know how to get to the grocery store, and where work is, but I haven’t really figured out this city. I’d have to sit down with a map for a few days and actually try. And trying’s for suckers.
18. Visit Macchu Picchu – Not so much. This one showed up because Sarah was watching The Amazing Race one day, and the teams went to Peru, and for about two weeks we were totally gung-ho about it. But then we had so many trips booked already that my vacation time for the next three years was accounted for.
19. Learn to make two more go-to meals (I've gotten a lot of mileage out of omelettes but it's time to move on) – Sarah has accomplished this one in spades, but I’ve only managed to add ghetto eggy sandwiches to my retinue (or if you prefer—Egg McMaster)
28. Spend a day at the National Gallery (maybe not an entire day, but at least do more than check out the Group of Seven stuff and bail) – I blame our visitors on this one. We have enough cool people that visit that we play tourist a few times a year, and while the Diefenbunker, the War Museum, and Parliament Hill tours have been popular, no one has ever wanted to go to the National Gallery. So yeah: this one is everyone else’s fault but mine.
29. Watch the first season of Carnivale – Just didn’t.
34. Compile a personal top 50 films list – When I wrote the other two top 50 lists, I had all kinds of time on my hands (that’s excuse number one). Also, people generally don’t enjoy posts in excess of 2000 words (excuse number two). For those interested, my top three would be Casablanca, Fight Club, and Hard Core Logo.
37. Learn how to make an impressive mixed drink (something that involves a stylishly cut orange peel or Cocktail-like bottle tossing) – Nope. It’s just too easy to crack open a beer or pour three fingers of rum into a glass instead.
38. Learn three brand new songs on guitar, start to finish – Turns out I’m not in University anymore.
39. One of these songs must be recognizable to the general populace – And that song would have been: Thunderstruck.
41. See three local bands – We may actually have accomplished this. Not sure. I know we saw fightfightfight and Your Dad Versus Mine at Bluesfest, but I can’t think of a third.
46. Get to Chandler's Pub at least once a year – 2005: yes! 2006: yes! 2007: failure.
56. Be more sensitive to Sarah when she is sick (apparently smug distain isn't as comforting as I'd thought) – Yeah, this just didn’t happen.
57. Finish watching all the DVDs I own – Curse you, Canada: A People’s History! Why do the 50s have to be so boring?
58. Identify the gaps in my wardrobe
59. Fill them – I came very close on this one after a shopping trip to Vermont where Sarah made me buy an entirely new winter wardrobe. Too bad my summer wardrobe was so crappy. I think I’ve bought one new T-shirt per year since then.
61. Learn the bridge to At the Hundredth Meridian – I can get this far: "If I die of vanity promise me, promise me you’ll bury me some place I don’t want to be, and then dig me up and transport me, unceremoniously away from the gobeshdon dees, something something bees, whispers of Belize…"
63. Buy Jay a drink; preferably rye – Disappointed on this failure, but maybe 2008 will be the year of the Touch You Last/ Kill the Goat summit.
70. See the sun go down on Sacre Coeur (and so have lived the best verse of Rosy and Grey) – Just didn’t.
74. Write a blog entry entitled Word to Your Moms, I Came to Drop Bombs – This entry would have been how I’d really like to be able to rap. V. funny when I thought of it, but then too much time passed and I totally lost interest.
76. Give blood (and, ideally, bleed effectively. Haven't done this one since high school where the technician kept accusing me of playing with the needle. Back then, my blood ran like tar, apparently) – No good reason to have failed here, but I failed. Probably because this is something I’d have to pursue entirely on my own with no outside prompting, and that’s not a circumstance under which things usually get done.
77. Lose five pounds – Nope. But I gained ten if that’s any consolation.
82. See a local play – In our apartment, we lived two streets down from Ottawa Little Theatre, so that makes this failure especially sad.
84. Make a dime off my Amazon links – Does this ever actually happen for anyone?
87. Play NTN at Don Cherry's – Turns out there is no NTN at Don Cherry’s.
88. Beat Sarah at both – I can beat Sarah in a footrace, I can beat Sarah in a Being Older competition, I can beat her in the sport of beard growing, but I can’t beat the girl at trivia.
90. Gamble, win a small fortune, and walk away – Nope, unless you consider forty bucks a small fortune. And unless you consider sliding over to the next slot machine to be walking away.
Comments
ALL MUST BOW DOWN BEFORE ZOD!
1. Read Ulysses
7. Write four new stories that don’t suck rocks
23. Read something by Salman Rushdie
24. Find out what the deal is with Ayn Rand
73. Get something published on the McSweeney’s website
95. Institute some kind of writing regimen
96. Follow this regimen for one month
Let the record show that I offered to help you fix your post and you blatently refused. So there!
1. Didn't. Won't. Don't ask again.
7. Failed. Instead, I wrote zero stories. They were all awesome, though.
23. I've got a book of his essays in the library, and it's not entirely improbable that they will be read at some point in time.
24. Other than that she spells her name all fucked up, is there really more to know?
73. Failed, but it wasn't for lack of trying. Oh, wait--it was for lack of trying.
95 and 96. Nanowrimo would have accomplished this, but I pulled the ripcord too early.
28 - If the damn National Gallery would get rid of the freaking big spider statue out front, I'd totally go with you. Friggin' spider.
61 - Um, Google?
74 - I cried myself to sleep every night after checking your blog and not seeing this posting. No really, I did.
Dave - Damned right you bailed on Nanowriomo, fucko! I'm STILL WAITING FOR THE END OF THE STORY!