Here are my New Year’s resolutions:
Finally watch THE WIRE.
Get ALMOST PERFECT on Netflix or Hulu.
Go to the gym at least twice a week. (My gym is usually packed in January and by March it’s me and two other guys.)
Stay off the 405 freeway when it’s crowded (so only take it between 2-4 AM).
Visit my friend in Walla Walla.
Finish my novel.
Learn to do an accent in my improv class.
See a Broadway show I wish I had written.
Watch and listen to as much Vin Scully as I possibly can.
Finish reading the Elizabeth Taylor book. (She’s slept with so many guys already. No wonder one of her nicknames was ‘the British Open’.)
Learn what half the features on my car are.
Continue to support the WGA’s Foundation.
Catch up on DOWNTON ABBEY before the new season begins.
Champion strict gun control.
Get a humor piece in the NEW YORKER.
Get a cartoon in the NEW YORKER.
Keep Tetris playing down to three hours a day.
Answer more Friday Questions (which I'll be able to do if I keep the previous resolution).
Clean my desk (a perennial resolution but this year for sure!)
Keep an open mind when I watch Seth McFarlane host the Oscars (although that might be asking the impossible).
And finally, solve the Natalie Wood case.
Let's see how many I keep. What are your resolutions?
31 comments :
That first one should be your priority. In my opinion.
To be published in the comments section of Ken Levine's blog.
There, now I can rest.
Oh, and to get in the first 2013 plug for the very funny "The Me Generation By Me: Growing Up In The '60's"
Now Ken can rest.
Ken, how the hell long have you been playing Tetris?? Shouldn't you be moving on to Halo 4?
wg
The Wire is one of the best - right up there with The Shield & Breaking Bad.
Love your blog.
I definitely have to watch The Wire as well. I'm making it my resolution, as soon as I'm done with The Sopranos and Breaking Bad.
I' also definitely game for championing gun control. Hopefully, 2013 won't be marred by one of those episodes.
I'll add in my own personal resolution. Getting my script produced. And maybe travel to Chile afterward.
Vin Scully is a national treasure. One can never get enough of Mr. Scully's play by play and insight into the game
I saw Seth Macfarlane host an awards show. He wasn't bad but oh Lord he does like to sing. Like your drunk auntie on the karaoke machine at new year, he just keeps belting them out until he's the only one on the room who's having fun.
Better hurry if you are going to catch up on Downton Abbey, you only have 4 days. Well worth the effort.
1) Get a tattoo
2) Get my tattoo removed
3) Go running on the beach
4) Stop running on the beach
5) Eat a Tommy's burger once a month
So far as the gym is concerned, I take the first two weeks in January off from my workout routine. The place is always jammed in early January, but fortunately, most of those folks have little resolve and by the end of the month the vast majority of them are gone until the following January.
The best resolution I ever made was to stop making New Year's resolutions.
Although The Wire is on my list of shows to watch. As is The Sopranso, Breaking Bad, The Office (both US and British), The Shield, and Game of Thrones.
There are certain things, like the "Lord of the Rings" movies, "Game of Thrones" and the "Twilight" series, that I know I shall one day die never having watched. I resolve to be perfectly okay with that.
@Pat Reeder
Are you really lumping the Lord of the Rings movies and Twilight together? I don't think the Rings movies were masterpieces, by any means, but the last two, anyway, were extremely entertaining and even my mother liked them. I could only watch about 2 or 3 minutes of one of the Twilight movies before I couldn't stand any more. I didn't care about the hype. I just felt it was horrible filmmaking.
Same as every year: Write more, eat less.
I like all of yours except the "strict gun control." (Sound of can of worms opening.)
The Wire is the most exquisite thing I've ever seen on TV. I almost gave up after the first four episodes, but once you invest time with the long setup in each season, it rewards the viewer greatly. Season 5 itself was a huge payoff.
Mine is to start a Little Free Library as a means of lowering the clutter of books in my house. http://www.littlefreelibrary.org/
Elizabeth Taylor used to joke she'd married every man she ever slept with. Whatever the case, she didn't get pricked by enough guys to get nicknamed "Porcupine," as did Grace Kelly.
Are you serious about Almost Perfect? I hope so. It would be great to watch the whole series!
My resolution is to get the nerve to ask my other question about Cheers before the year is over. Right now I'd really like to know why the Charles brothers decided it was worth misattributing Christopher Marlowe's line "Come with me and be my love," to John Donne; was it just for the laugh, or to imply that Diane and Sumner were dilettantes?
JUST WHICH LIZ TAYLOR BOOK ARE YOU READING?
My New Year resolution is to get into good shape. But I've decided that shape will be a pear. So I won't be seeing you at the gym.
The New Year here in New York got off to a hilarious start, thanks to marathon episode airings of
"The Honeymooners" and "The Odd Couple" on two local channels. If you could go back in time to become a writer on just one of these classic series, which would you chose, and why?
@Tim W: I lump them together into the category of "things that take many hours to watch and that appeal primarily to a certain niche interest that I do not share, whether it's Tolkien or sparkly vampires." If I reached the end of my life and realized I'd spent 14 hours of it watching the director's cut of "The Hobbit" when I could have spent the same amount of time reading Robert Benchley, then I would use my last ounce of strength before I died to kick myself.
Nice post Ken. My New Year's resolution is to start using more beauty products, invest more in skincare than in makeup and eating more healthily. :)
Friday question:
I recently watched the hilarious one hour Cheers Woody and Kelly wedding episode and was wondering for special extra-long episodes, is the filming broken up across 2 weeks or is done on normal 1-week schedule?
This is wildly off topic, but does anyone know why the Rose Parade is carried nationwide on both NBC and ABC? I can't think of anything else that gets dueling networks.
It's a fine parade and who doesn't love seeing Pasadena, don't get me wrong, but the coverage seems to be a bit excessive.
You should probably add "Come to peace with the idea of the Houston Astros being in the American League" before you have to make your first road trip there for a Mariners' AL West division game. Should be some easy wins for the Ms, but couldn't they have just moved the Brewers back to the AL and corrected their error from the 1998 expansion?
@Pat Reeder
I've never even opened a Tolkein book and my mother is certainly not even close to the audience you suggest, but we both saw the films (separately) and enjoyed them very much. And the last one made over a billion worldwide. Hard to call that a "niche" film.
Take your spam elsewhere, anonymous.
The easiest way to master an accent is to play a Werner Herzog movie in the background while you're doing stuff around the house. In no time, you'll be answering the phone with a crisp, Teutonic, "Zere is no point in speakeng by phone, for we are each but motes in zee eye of the universe, flickering for a brief moment, and zen, no mohr."
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