I said I'd reveal New Year's resolutions, so I guess I'd better get something resolved before the new year arrives and it's time to enact them. I mostly know what I wish to achieve, and it's not really any different from what most people want to get out of themselves and their lives: physical fitness, good relations with friends and family, career success, life organization, and self-improvement. But wave those five around vaguely and nothing happens for me, though. I have to quantify my goals. New Year's resolutions are not like figure skating. So therefore:
In 2010:
1. I will follow a physical fitness program to maintain strength, flexibility, and endurance, plus I will run a six and a half minute mile and a 45 minute 10k.
2. I will contact someone I know in real life but don't work with or live with every day. That can be an e-mail, a postcard, a phone call or a visit and it has to be a hundred different people over the year.
3. Any day I don't fly IFR in real life, I will fly at least one approach on my flight simulator game, and I won't blog until that's done.
4. Whenever I get home on a break from work I will, in addition to the usual litany of perennial maintenance tasks, assign myself one new project to complete.
5. I will not let this list of responsibilities, nor other lesser pastimes, stand in the way of new adventures.
There, that's a pretty bold list, and I'll probably frequently let myself get away with fulfilling #2 by cc:ing an e-mailed lolcat to seven people on a Friday, and #3 by chugging down the same saved-at-g/s-intercept ILS while waiting for hotel internet to connect. I'm not even sure whether #5 constitutes a get-out-of-one-through-four-free card when I can find a good adventures. But it's probably better than resolving to watch all six seasons of Lost. I may expand on some of these in later blog posts.
Oh and to the person who was so negative about New Year's resolutions in a previous year "because if you want to do a thing you should do it, not wait until the end or beginning of the year," these are all things I already try to do. Only the accountability is added.
8 comments:
Happy New Year! And good luck with your resolutions.
All the best for the new year! Outsource your resolution options here.
I hope I get included in #2, and not in the cop out lolcat way.
Unless you're looking at IP addresses, you don't know who I am, so we'll see!
Happy New Year, Aviatrix! Whoops, I almost called you by your real name but without the L (see, that's a hint there)
Happy New Year, Aviatrix!
I've only found your blog fairly recently and I have enjoyed it so much- thank you. Good luck on the resolutions- anyone who can work out in -10 on purpose is, I'm sure, capable of fulfilling most of what your resolutions will demand of you!! All the best- LS-P
Happy New Year! [I read the next one first :-) ]
Good Luck on #1. I will be running a 10K tomorrow (Saturday) morning. Temperature is expected to be -12C with North winds at 13 knots.
If you ever really get into your flight simulator game, I hope you'll one day consider exploring the vast expanse of weirdness that is VATSIM. I'm sure I won't know if I ever see you on the network, but if you ever get interested, look for me around KCVG/KIND!
I used VATSIM for a while, but I had a few problems:
- the system isn't tolerant of old software, so I had to keep upgrading in order to participate,
- quite rightly, people who just pop up from a saved position 30 miles back aren't welcome
- I had a really hard time typing and flying at once
- very low controller density, so most of the time it was a lot of processing and set-up overhead for the same experience
- I had a lot of trouble with controllers asking for performance inappropriate to the type and unable to come up with another strategy when I said I was unable
There are some controllers who are real controllers and/or very knowledgeable, but they have to descend to the level they can expect of everyone. For example I had a controller message me in side chat asking why he has nothing all night, then three aircraft at once, right when he has to go to the bathroom. I messaged back something like "tell us there's an aircraft on the runway with a blown tire and give us all holds while you go take care of business". He thought it was hilarious that I thought my fellow sim pilots would know how to enter a hold.
The result was a poor ratio of time spent to useful practice, but I might try it again if I get into it.
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