The New Year

Last time we spoke it was New Year's Eve. Now it's the new year. (Do you always capitalize New Year? I mean, I was using "new" as an adjective two sentences ago....whatever.) So I'd like to wish you a formal and official HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Are you sick of hearing that yet? Lord knows I am. I mean, it's even made it's way onto people's email signatures. Really? So, when do you stop celebrating the new year? Perhaps I'm just too jaded to really enjoy it. I've never, ever been "into" New Year's Eve or Day. I've rarely watched the ball drop. Frankly, I just can't stay awake that long. I mean, I can, but you probably don't want to know me the next day. Or see me. And definitely not talk to me.

But I digress (as I do in 99% of my blog posts.)

Anyway, it's a new year. The crazy, obsessive side of me loves to sorta sit back and watch everyone jump on their bandwagon of choice. Everyone's hustling and bustling around. I went to go make a deposit at the bank yesterday and you would have thought the entire town of Port St. Joe had refused to do any banking during the past two weeks. There were so many people inside. Doing all sorts of crazy banking.

I need to stop here and talk about banking.

I don't know what it is, perhaps it's a small town thing, but people here are always doing all these crazy transactions at the teller windows. Like it takes people like ten minutes at the window. People here love to do all their banking in person. I think it's a small town thing. Therefore, you may ask why I'm standing in line too? It's because I work directly across the street from the bank. It takes less time to walk over to it than it would to get in my car and drive over. So I'm in there a lot. I've never had a complicated transaction. All my transactions are only deposits. If I need a withdrawal, I just go to the ATM. Not the teller. So I always wonder what people are doing to take so long at the window.

So anyway, there are all these people in line at the bank. I simply sign my check, write my account number on it, bypass the line and hand my check to the teller and she looks at me and says, "checking, right?" I said, "Yes, that's right." I don't want to say I was skipping the line. Because it's not like she did my transaction before anyone else's, because she didn't. It actually took her like 40 minutes before she did mine because I was stalking her, I mean, monitoring the transaction online.

So yeah, anyway, everyone's hustling and bustling. It's like this new year is a slate cleaner. People like to reinvent themselves. They just wake up on Jan 1 and are a completely different person. So keeping with the theme of the new year, I would like to now give you my list of things that I will attempt to do better/differently this new year. Please keep in mind that most of these will be broken before Feb. 1.

Just being honest.

1. House love. I am resolved (no longer to linger, charmed by the world's delight - for you Baptists out there.) to make our home a priority. The things we've been putting off like crown moldings, a backsplash, the yard, the driveway are hopefully all going to be a reality this year. I know yard work is hard and it takes a lot of time away from family, but I'm just going to have to do it. The yard isn't bad, at all. It just needs some weed treatment, new sod in places, etc. So, my house will be a top priority this year.
2. Weight loss. I am starting back on Weight Watchers after we grocery shop this weekend. I want to shed about 45 pounds by summer. I lost 30 in three months on WW, so I think I'll be able to do 45 by July.
3. Husband / Father. I really want to be better at both of these. I want to, ok I don't want to, but I am GOING to help Sarah out more with house and child things. I want us to be a dynamic team where we tackle everything together. Meaning, instead of her cleaning the inside of the house all alone, I'll help her and we'll just tag team everything when we can - which is basically what we do now, I just need to support her better.
4. Musicianship. This is going to be the year of my choir. I plan on pushing them more this year than ever before. I don't want to waste a single minute of rehearsal time. I want to see at least six new members join.
5. I don't want to be annoyed with words and phrases like: "sexting," "teachable moment," "friend (used as a verb)," "Obama (used as a verb or adjective), "Economic Crisis," "Housing Market" or "laser focused."
6. Actually, I think I'm removing number five from the list because I think I do still want to be annoyed with those and other words.
7. I want to make sure that my loved ones know they are loved. I want to tell them more often because I don't think I do that enough. I'll start now. A big "I LOVE YOU" goes out to: Sarah, Celie, Mama, Daddy, Mammaw, Nanny, Adam, Marci, Joy, Phil, Jenny, Glen, Chris, Susan, Charlet, Ashley, Ken, Susan, Patrick, Yvette, Lori, Kevin, Brooke, Sarah, Boopas, Melaine, William.....ok, this is harder than I thought. I can't list everyone. I mean, I'd like to, but I'd end up hurting someone's feelings, which I probably already have.
8. I only want friends who are like family to me. Most of those are mentioned above.
9. I want to make sure that "things" don't get in the way of relationships. Just because my best friends live four hours away doesn't mean I can't put stuff on hold to visit them. We're visiting this year!!! It's the year of the visit!!! You may hate us by 2011.
10. I want to stop wasting energy being annoyed with BS-ers. They are who they are. They know everything about everything and they're gonna BS you until you believe them. I can't worry about these people any more. I spent way too much time in '09 worried about BS-ers. (as a note, I apologize for using "BS." It isn't a nice word, but I don't know how else to say that. Maybe BC-ers?)
11. No more fast food. As much as it speaks to my very soul, I want to stop eating it. Except for Chick-fil-a which I adore and do not consider it unhealthy except for the fact that it's a fried chicken sandwich and fried waffle fries.
12. I want to make an active attempt to back-hand college kids who think they have people fooled. So parents, if I accidentally drop a bow on your kid, please know it's for their own good and someone needs to put them back into reality. "Hey kids, yeah you, I know you're partying hard at college. Kraft mac and cheese doesn't put 25 pounds on you that quickly."
13. I want to stop relying on the Internet so much. It is a time suck.

I'm tired now. I can't list anymore. So let's see....in the time I've written this post, I've officially broken 3 of my resolutions.

If anything I'm consistent.

This was way too long.

I'm hungry. Off to MacDonald's!!