January 1, 2009

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year, everybody!

If my new year's resolution was to get the first post of the day up early, I have already broken it.

Have you broken your resolutions yet? Do you have the classic cliché resolution to lose weight? At this point, you can probably remember everything you've eaten this year. Have you eaten the wrong thing yet? Me, I've eaten nothing this year but a glass of skim milk.

Vows of abstemiousness are all well and good, but the more interesting resolutions are about doing something, not avoiding doing things. And going to the gym doesn't count. That's still in the abstemiousness category. I'm interested in your resolve to live a larger, more expressive, more fully dimensional life.

49 comments:

rhhardin said...

I'm narrowing my interests this year. Specialization is the secret to happiness.

William said...

I vow to be the first person to post a comment of the New Year on the Althouse blog.

William said...

Well, maybe next year. Ditto with the other resolutions.

Ron said...

Having achieved my goal of being the 4th commenter on this post, I can retire fulfilled! Bring on 2010!

vet66 said...

I outsourced my abstemiousness to China where it will be infused with the appropriate amount of hopelessness and levity.

Anonymous said...

I have vowed to have my physician check me for attention deficit disord...hey look, a butterfly!

Simon said...

Actually, for the first time in my lfe, I do feel the need to make losing a little weight a new year's resolution - I've been "liv[ing] a larger, ... more fully dimensional life" recently, and losing twenty pounds wouldn't hurt.

I have a couple of other resolutions for this year, but those I'm keeping to myself.

Paddy O said...

My New Year comes with it a new place to live. I'm moving back to Pasadena. From rural to urban. I lose my forest, and the birds and beasts that have become my daily visitors, and with that a fair amount of beauty.

But, this move now puts me back where I can listen to more public lectures on all kinds of topics, make regular visits to museums, and otherwise embrace a wide variety of culture--high and low.

That's my resolution this year: To find the beauty of human creativity in expected and unexpected places.

Darcy said...

Aww, William.

Happy New Year, everyone.

I haven't made any resolutions. But one that I could really benefit from is trying to be more patient.

BJM said...

I just scarfed two pieces of cold pizza for breakfast, which is a breathtakingly quick fail.

I signed up to do more volunteering this year and complete a Master Gardener's course.

Chip Ahoy said...

the more interesting resolutions are about doing something

That's a very good idea.

I hereby resolve to begin starting the onset of getting on with initiating the commencement and genesis of embarking to initiate the preparation of possibly thinking about that.

Dust Bunny Queen said...

I'm resolving to get my files and collections of craft, idea, recipe clippings in order. I've collected over the years. They are in files, lots and lots of paper files. I resolve to scan and organize on DVDs.

Plus, I resolve not to start a new project until I have finished the last one. I think I must have Michael H's attention deficit disorder.

chickelit said...

I resolve to continue not wearing ridiculous shorts (Althouse's greatest effect on me in 2008).

Happy New Year dear Professor!

john said...

I resolve to look for the good in everyone this year, except for certain trolls. To see Milk, maybe. To stop boring everyone about how great Slumdog is, next week. To try to become a dad again, with my current children, and become a husband again, with my current wife.

To thank Ann for hosting the best website on the internets.

Thanks, Ann.

Anonymous said...

Darcy, more patient? Going for the full-on St. Francis of Assisi or Mahatma Gandhi position? I've yet to see you be impatient!

Anonymous said...

I want to sort out a few things that have troubled me during 2008.

For example, what are the differences between hoedown, jamboree, jubilee and hootenanny?

Also, how do these scale: tiny, dinky, itty bitty, teensy weensy, shrimpy and smallish?

Regarding the first, I think a hoedown includes fiddles, whereas a hootenanny is mostly guitars, but either can include a banjo. A jamboree is much like a jubilee, except that a jamboree includes the use of legs whereas a jubilee includes the waving of arms and maybe some shouting. I think. I dunno.

chickelit said...

@Michael_H: I'm pretty sure that a hoedown involves Rindercella

chickelit said...

Oopps- sorry Michael, that was in the Pee Little Thrigs.

Anonymous said...

Rincdercella want to a ball - something beyond the hoedown, jubilee, jamboree, and hootenanny categories due to the wearing of fancy duds, I think.

Jen Bradford said...

wait, no cowbell?

Zachary Sire said...

I am extremely hungover. Not a good way to start off the year! Oh well.

I am also drinking a beer and preparing for my family brunch in Newport Beach.

My New Year's Resolution is not to argue with commenters on Althouse.

chickelit said...

Zach said: I am extremely hungover.

rehydrate Zach--rehydrate

Sprezzatura said...

I want to work at McDowell's and live the life of a McDowell's employee (the Eddy one, not the Arsenio one) for a couple months. I'll do this instead of going on my usual (long and self indulgent) vacation. Then, I'll donate all the money I would have spent on the traditional vacation.

Or, I'll live the life of a McDowell's employee (Eddy) where I'll be a low level, unpaid, full time volunteer at the institution where I donate my vacation money. This would maximize the proverbial bird slaughter, 1) force myself to live w/o stuff, 2) donate time, 3) donate money, 4) get a ground level, anonymous view of how my money (since it's fungible) is being spent.

I'm starting on my birthday (toward the end of the first quarter.) I already bought a "cheap" car and other stuff for my adventure (it's a little ironic that I was so quick to complete the buying aspects of my plan to live w/o buying stuff, but at least I'm self aware enough to notice the irony.) I still haven't locked in where I'll go and what I'll do--am leaning toward some things in So Cal or Texas.

bearbee said...

Learn to play the piano.

Surprised Bush didn't make The List.... not even the Dishonorable Mentions!

Palladian said...

"I am extremely hungover. Not a good way to start off the year! Oh well."

Isn't that how everyone starts off the year? Actually, amazingly, I'm not hung over after two bottles of champagne and half a bottle of Scotch. Well, I drank about a gallon of mineral water between midnight and now so maybe that helped.

"I am also drinking a beer and preparing for my family brunch in Newport Beach."

Beer? How butch! I thought it would be Mimosas.

"My New Year's Resolution is not to argue with commenters on Althouse."

Hmmm....

Did you get laid last night, Zach?

This year I resolve to make back the FREAKING HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS OR SO that got belched away by the equity market. Sob sob.

Methadras said...

No resolutions for me. I figure it's the best way to keep myself out of trouble.

kjbe said...

I, too, resolve to learn to play piano (as I asked for and received an adult beginners lesson book for Christmas). Also, I resolve to not be so protective of myself and find ways to share my time/talents with others.

knox said...

Happy New Year, internet friends

chickelit said...

Beer? How butch!

Zach is bonding with Miller

I thought it would be Mimosas.

Don't knock it. It's actually good use of champagne in the morning.

Matt said...

Do you have the classic cliché resolution to lose weight?

Mine was actually to gain about 15 lbs. It's now after 2pm and I forgot to eat lunch, so I'm probably not doing so well.

TitusHappyNewYear said...

I am still actually a little freaked out by those Dore Alley pictures Pogo linked to.

I am not being judgey, if that's what people are into whatever but the pictures bothered me.

I guess I am really pretty vanilla.

TitusHappyNewYear said...

The Scifi TV Station is having Twilight Zone on all day.

chickelit said...

I am still actually a little freaked out by those Dore Alley pictures Pogo linked to

Oh Titus, rip us a yarn about Shakerag Alley to cleanse your system.

Darcy said...

chickenlittle said...Don't knock it. It's actually good use of champagne in the morning.

Yes!

And Paul Snively: How kind of you, really. I'm glad my impatience isn't revealed in my comments here.

chickelit said...

Happy New Year Darcy!

chickelit said...

Happy New Year Palladian!

Darcy said...

Happy New Year, chickenlittle!

chickelit said...

I resolve to drop fewer articles in my comments.

Darcy said...

Please don't quit wearing shorts altogether, chickenlittle.

Anonymous said...

That's it. My resolution is to do as good a job concealing my impatience as Darcy does.

I think I'm like many people on the Internet: the lack of non-verbal cues and being able to see who I'm "talking" with removes some important element of empathy and giving the other person the benefit of the doubt. I'm reminded of my miscommunication with mcg in an earlier thread, and how patient and forgiving he was.

So Darcy, whatever your secret is, if you could teach it to me, that would be terrific. :-)

Meanwhile, Happy New Year to everyone!

chickelit said...

LOL Darcy.
Don't worry, I would never go all the way. At least not in public. :)

chickelit said...

Palladian said This year I resolve to make back the FREAKING HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS OR SO that got belched away by the equity market.

I hope you didn't have to actually sell all those positions.

Mr. Forward said...

I resolved to wake up sober on New Year's Morning.

Great way to start the new year, no hangover, no pesky resolutions unresolved.

Now where's the damn party?

reader_iam said...

If I were still blogging, tonight I'd have put up a post with the elliptical title "Tears" and the the sole text Link.

But that would have been too elliptical. And thank goodness I already pre-implemented my 2009 resolution (to cut off reader_iam at her knees, if not to cut out her heart).

reader_iam said...

Which itself was part of larger resolution:

If you can't let sleeping dogs lie, or even resist awakening them, then at least--for crying out loud!--don't poke them in the eye.

reader_iam said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
reader_iam said...

I confess that I'm now listening to Abbey Lincoln's version of "Summer Wishes, Winter Dreams."

Something about reading some of these recent threads just put that to mind, and so I finally called it up from the archives.

Oddly peaceful, except for how it's not ... and then, yet again, still it is.

Darcy said...

Aww...Paul S. Happy New Year! :)

And reader: I need Cliffs Notes, but very entertaining, as usual. ;-)

reader_iam said...

Well, the first two comments actually were made with a discussion taking place elsewhere on this blog (in which I did not participate) in mind. The third was more inclusive, if, it seems, equally obscure.

That's about as much Cliffs as I'm going to offer on this one.