Resolutions

It's time for me to start thinking about how to make 2013 a better year than 2012.  This year has been a bit of a challenge for yours truly, in the gainful employment-slash-keep your big mowf off the icecream-slash-is your bike a room accent or what?-slash-it's not cool to take out the recycling in your jammies-slash-I was surfing for job opportunities but look, funny cats! sense.  It's been a pretty tough year for all of us 47-percenters, certainly, what with trying to find the time to ask for hand-outs and learning how to scam the system in between naps, but in my case I can confidently point to an atrophy of discipline, which, like any muscle, needs to be exercised regularly and strenuously lest it shrivel to vestigiality like an appendix or T-Rex arms.  It's true, my discipline can't even reach my face to blow my nose.

Here are my proposed New Year resolutions:

Trim down to my optimum weight by my birthday.  That should be très easy if I can keep my teefs out of the pies and chips, and cutting off one finger for every trip back to the stove at dinner (I would imagine I'd only have to implement that last measure only a handful of times.  Nyuk!)

                                             Man, I really shouldn't have used this image, 'cause now guess what?

Log on to Facebook only every other half-hour.  Or maybe that should be fifteen minutes at first and work up?  Depends upon the color of my addiction; that strategy works okay for some people who are trying to quit smoking, but not so great for alcoholics and the methily-prone.  But don't all my friends deserve to know what I think at all times?  It's against my nature to be selfish. Hmmm.

Just.  Finally.  For Christ's sake.  Publish something!  Hub page, eBook, whatever!  And for the love of the godz, learn to stop re-reading every damned sentence I type fifty damned times.  It's not a users manual for a nuclear missile silo, and all I succeed in doing is making myself sick of my own stuff.  Grrr.

Expand my volunteerism.  I haven't even stopped by Free Geek in quite a while because of weirdo temporary work schedules, but I start fresh with that organization right after New Year's Day.  Also, explore opportunities with Habitat For Humanity (I don't know how good this will be for them since I tend to be “handy-challenged”, but I feel the need to at least try) and look into volunteering as a reader at the library.  That will be pushing the envelope – communing with kids, for me, is always a challenge, and the thought of a roomful of them doing that village-of-the-damned stare is freakin' frightening.  But you know, what doesn't kill you only gives you intense nightmares for a couple of years.

There.  Those are ones I've declared for myself.  Now to yours.  I didn't tell you I was going to write some for you?  It's no troube, really.

Motorists:  Please find every excuse not to drive your car downtown.  Walk, ride the bus, bicycle.  Think about how much better even our great downtown district would be without so much motorized traffic.  Also, share the road with your one-, two-, and three-wheeled brethren and sistren.  You're on the whole better at this than almost everybody in the nation, but there's always room for improvement.

While on the subject of driving:  Next year when you want to go cruise Peacock Lane at Christmastime, leave the car at home!  Those of us on the sidewalk want to breathe the brisk evening air as we stroll looking at the lights, not inhale the vapor of ever-dwindling fossil fuels.

                                                                     photo by pnGREENWAY, Flickr

Hikers and walkers:  Keep your junk in your pockets.  I'm not just talking to the flashers.  Please help to make our trails and sidewalks litter-free.  I include your pets' leavings here as well.

Taggers:  STOP.  Few of you are Banksy-level, most of you apparently aren't even Squiggy-level.  Spraying with a can in each hand doesn't make you an artist, it just increases your chances of brain damage.  Judging from some “work” I've seen around town, you don't need any help in that regard.

PBOT/ODOT:  Can we please switch to another color or pattern besides orange for at least this coming year?  Make it PDX-friendly and relevant, like maybe a forest green or a hipster paisley?  Really, I'm starting to suffer retinal saturation over here, and if some of those cones start mysteriously disappearing, well, I tried to be a stand-up guy and warn you.

                                                                         Mmmm.  Calm.

Enjoy the New Year, all. Be nice to each other.