Reeling in the Years

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Three resolutions and one goal for 2005:

Resolution #1: Try to stay around my fighting weight of 160. Every year I attempt this and every year I creep back to 172 (or worse). At almost 5' 10", 172 gives me a Body Weight Index (BWI) of 24.7, which is just a little too close to the overweight mark of 25. I also do better at my races when I'm not dragging an extra 12 pounds around.

Resolution #2: Try to have a little more patience with my boys. It's easy to be patient with a baby, but as my two-year-old does more rebelling, I'm doing more yelling. Everything asked of the seven-year-old is met with a foot stomp and a whine - which is what seven-year-olds do - and yelling isn't going to change that.

Resolution #3: This is a selfish resolution, but I've got to get at least an hour of photo-taking time a week. It was easier when it was warm out and the camera was my new toy. But now that it's cold and I've taken a picture of everything within a ten-block radius of my urban workplace, I've going to have to be more resolute to getting out there and being more creative in finding new ideas. This includes realizing that the suburbs must have something interesting to shoot. I'm also considering taking an adult-education class in digital photography. Hopefully that will help me with this resolution.

THE 2005 GOAL: 52 New (to me) DVDs in 2005.

To take full advantage of our new Blockbuster DVD-by-mail service, my goal will be to watch 52 of the type of movies that I mean to see but never get around to seeing. No doubt this will include a lot of Paul Newman stuff (I considered making my goal watching 52 Newman movies but that might have been too much of a good thing) but other stuff, both old and new, as well. There's no excuse for never seeing films like Citizen Kane and North by Northwest. At the same time, there are too many newer movies like The Station Agent or Maria Full of Grace that get critical acclaim but I never get around to renting. Last year's goal of reading 52 novels wasn't as hard to complete as I thought it would be (I finished in October), but it did leave me burned out. I have a feeling that this year's goal may be the opposite. I'm pretty sure I'll still want to watch movies at the end of this but I think it's going to be hard to find time for a movie a week this year. Unlike my books I can't watch movies on the train. And a lot of these films are ones that the missus isn't interested in seeing, so I'll have to find time to watch them alone. I plan to use my new DVD drive at work and split movies over two lunchtimes. I've already done this last month, and while I get some funny looks my bosses don't seem to have a problem with it.

That's it. Wish me luck!

Here are the movies I've watched so far (clicking on the link will bring up my post about the film):

01.08.05: Garden State