writer, speaker, content creator

A List

In Self Improvement on August 17, 2013 at 10:31 am

Bucket lists tend to be big things (“see the Taj Mahal” “go diving in the Great Barrier Reef”) and tend to betray a desire for the list maker to want to achieve greatness, or be connected to greatness. This is not a bucket list. These are not great or lofty goals. These are small things to achieve, dumb little flourishes I’d like to add to my persona and portfolio of experience for no other reason than to be mildly more interesting to myself and others.

-Learn to juggle four balls, not just three.

-Completely memorize Yakko’s World (despite it being out of date) and perform it flawlessly.

-Actually read Finnegan’s Wake.

-Learn to crack an egg one-handed.

-Beat Super Mario Bros. 3 in one sitting without using a warp whistle.

-Get a perfect score at a pub trivia night.

-Run one of those goofy obstacle course runs like the Warrior Dash or Tough Mudder.

-Reliably be able to make risotto.

-Memorize the order of U.S. presidents. (I’m good on the twentieth century, and the early ones, but the late 1800s always messes me up.)

-Learn to say the alphabet backwards.

-Appear as an extra in a movie. (I’ve already done so with TV. It was interesting.)

-Successfully perform a handstand.

-Successfully perform a kip-up.

-Get an okay grasp of physics so I can talk about it without sounding like an idiot.

-Participate in some kind of fun run, perhaps while wearing an impractical outfit not suitable for jogging.

-Actually eat frog legs and then attempt to evaluate them as fairly as I can, taste-wise.

-Learn to juggle five balls, not just four.

-Achieve existential fulfillment.

  1. Even once you have a grasp of physics you sound like an idiot, but for totally different reasons. Acronyms and jargon FTW!

  2. I had forgotten how many times Yakko cheats in that song — Tibet, Asia, Transylvania, Abu Dhabi and (most dubiously of all, IMO) illustrating Borneo and Sumatra in different colors in order to gloss over the fact that they’re not countries. Also, no Singapore? But he sneaks in Palestine, so I’ll forgive him.

    The strange humors that once moved some WB comedy writer to spend what must have been a very long time writing that song are the same ones that, today, motivate people to make similarly awesome viral web videos, and this definitely would have been a big hit if it had come out in 2009 or whatever, though the creator probably would have been unpaid.

    Good list.

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