Welcome to my new blog, here to start the new year with a new plan of action. As is the case with a lot of people, when new year came around, I thought about the things I’d hoped to do last year but never got round to actually doing. And there was a lot. So I decided to do something different this year. Make a plan. Make a blog so that people could follow me and help motivate me to keep going.
But what to do?
I decided that I wanted to do a couple of things actually. Partly because I can never decide on just one thing to do, and partly because I thought it might be too easy. So I’ve decided to do 52 of each item on my list. So far it’s a short list, because I don’t want to over-extend myself, and also because one of them is a little daunting depending on what I choose for it. It’s also worth noting that one of my own pet peeves is that I don’t finish things. I have a tendency to start something and never actually finish it. So my hope is that this list not only helps me towards that, but also that I finish this list too!
I’ve also decided to do some items every day of the year because I feel like I already do them quite a lot anyway. They’ll be on a separate list a little further down, but you’ll see that soon enough.
The 52s
1 – Complete 52 video games.
2 – Finish 52 books.
3 – Try 52 new foods.
4 – Watch 52 recommended films.
So I think each item needs a bit of an explanation including the rules I’ve set myself for them, as each one is a tad vague.
Video Games
Speaking of things I don’t finish, this is probably my worst habit. I have finished video games, but surprisingly more often than not, I will start a game and then stop playing about 10-20 hours into it. And then never touch it again because something else has come along. So the rules for video games are as follows:
– Must be a new save file. No continuing old saves to the end.
– Can be a game I’ve completed before, as long as I follow the above rule.
– Must be a game with an obvious end point.
– Do not need to get every trophy/achievement, just finish the story (or whatever it is).
Books
Similar to video games, if I get bored with a book, there is a high tendency to leave it for eternity. Unless it’s part of a series that I know gets good… Anyway, rules similar to above are as follows:
– Must start the book from the beginning.
– Can be a book I’ve read before, as long as I follow the above rule.
– Does not include graphic novels (despite loving them)
Food
I’m fairly notorious to my family for not trying different foods. I’m also hoping to travel from next year, and I figure I may as well try out different foods before I go so that I get used to trying things I may not necessarily like. Rules are simple:
– Must not knowingly have tried the food before.
With this category, I’m gonna try and take a photograph of the food I try and upload it.
Films
I tend to get recommended a lot of things, films being a particularly large category for this. However I rarely go out and watch a film recommended to me unless someone else is about who wants to watch it. So for this one, I’m gonna try and watch films people suggest. Thanks to Netflix and Amazon, this might be easier than the other categories. Maybe. Rules:
– Must have been recommended the film by someone.
– Must not knowingly have watched the film before.
I already know the first film in this category…
The 365’s
1 – 365 news articles
2 – 365 new words
3 – 365 new pieces of information
4 – 365 Blog posts
News Articles
I’ve already started doing this, but probably prior to the start of last year, I rarely read/watched the news. And since reading the news pretty much daily, I now realise how much I missed out on. So I’m going to make the effort to read the news daily. Even on my days off (which I currently don’t do). There are no rules to this one, but I shall try to put a link in my blog for each day.
Words
This is one that I’ve seen lots of other people do, but never really thought about doing till now. I’m quite happy with my vocabulary, but I feel like expanding it could never hurt. So I shall update each day with a new word and the meaning. We shall see if it makes a difference after a year.
Information
This is one that people probably do randomly every day. But I’m going to go out of my way to learn a new piece of information, probably scientific, and see how it goes. This one feels more significant to me than the last one, because I tend to enjoy listening to podcasts about random things (Stuff that blows your mind is a particular favourite of mine) that teach you something you’d probably never learn unless you went out looking for it. However now I shall actually go out looking for stuff! Hurray!
Blog
This one should be easier than the rest, but I feel like after spending time on all the rest, it might actually be harder than I think. Here are some ground rules for myself:
– I’m not keeping to a particular time schedule, but I want all my projects finished by the 13/01/2015. So a year from this post (it’s after midnight in the UK, so I have till midnight on the 12th next year).
– With the 365 projects, if I miss a day, I need to catch up the next time I do it (so if I do it the next day, I need to do 2).
– Each day needs to have an update post in addition to any others I might make (for instance, after I finish every game/book/etc., I might make a separate post for it) and it must include where I am up to with each project.
– If I decide to add/drop any projects, I must make a separate post explaining why.
– Pictures are very welcome!
And on that note…
So as I am writing this page, I realise I’ve written quite a bit now. So here’s my last bit of information.
Recommendations/Comments are very welcome.
I’m quite new to the world of blogging, and I appreciate any help that comes my way. So thanks for reading, and I look forward to a very productive year!
52 Things to Do 