Helpful -- Resolutions

Time to check back on last year's resolutions and adjust for 2005:

Health/Fitness: Run 4 10K's, wear 36" pants. Didn't happen. Only ran 1 race this year. True, most races are on Sunday mornings, and my church responsibilities this year kept me quite busy, but I completely dropped running and subsequently ballooned up. Yeah, I know I hide it well, but thanks to Men's Health, I now know that guys my size have what's called visceral fat, fat that attaches to internal organs and such. Not healthy.

Reading: 12 books. I did a bad job of tracking this, but I know I made this one. Favorite book of the year was Moral Politics by George Lakoff. I have much more to say about Lakoff -- I just haven't put in the hours I need to actually organize it into writing. As Cindy will tell you, I can babble about it for hours, but that's what vacation is for, right?

Blogging: I began the blog in February, and have always seen it as something fun to do, but this year, I would like to take it more seriously. I will still have plenty cheap posts with tawdry links and such, but I would like to double my word count. In 2004, I posted 14,000 words. This year I'm shooting for 30,000. I figure that if I'm going to run for office or become a speechwriter or some other powerful liberal elitist power broker, I'd better start acting the part. Letters to the editor, an essay or two. Gotta start somewhere.

So, here's the plan for 2005:

Fitness: Work out 4X a week. I'm not far from this average right now, but it should be non-negotiable. 36" pants
Reading: 20 books. My "Do-it-Yourself Poly Sci Degree" won't be easy -- there are a lot of textbooks I still need to get to make this work, but it should be fun.
Advocacy: The Democratic Party and the United Methodist Church will get the bulk of my attention this year.
Career: Work hard at Kaplan, see what shakes out.
Blogging: 30,000 words.

Bring it on.