Being Resolute...

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So we're out of the noughties and into the tens, and I suppose I should decide on some New Year (or, more likely, recycled from the last several years) resolutions. Of course, one of the nice things about being a married man is that you generally don't have to spend a lot of time trying to think of suitable topics to be resolute about. You can usually rely on "the better half" to provide some useful direction in these matters. Suggestions such as losing weight, getting more exercise, giving up smoking, going to bed earlier, and generally increasing the possibility I might live to see old age.

But surely there are some more useful (and easier to keep) resolutions that I can come up with as we traverse into a new decade? Ones that there's at least a sporting chance I can keep until the middle of January? Having spent some inordinate amount of time pondering, I've come up with my own personal list. Feel free to borrow any that fit your lifestyle and situation.

  1. Accept that I'll never be able to look at a lambda expression and have even the broadest inkling of what it does without spending several hours taking it to pieces and reassembling it in a different order, often in a different language.

  2. Be nicer to the cats when they decide to sit right in the middle of my desk and pretend they are about to collapse from hunger just when - after several hours grappling with some complicated code - I'm about to figure out why it doesn't work.

  3. Learn the shortcut key sequences for Word 2007 so that it doesn't feel it has to continually remind me that I can "Keep typing the Office 2003 key sequence, or press ESCAPE to cancel".

  4. Upgrade my Windows 2008 servers to R2. Preferably without destroying my domain, or just giving up and buying new servers with it preinstalled.

  5. Accept that 86% is about as good as I'm ever going to get in FreeCell, and use the time I spend playing it to do something more useful. Such as getting better at Mahjong.

  6. Figure out how to switch PowerPoint templates in a way that means I don't have to go through all the slides individually reformatting them every time I change to a new template.

  7. Buy a replacement for the second monitor that displays everything in the top left corner of the screen in a bright yellow color.

  8. Understand Domain Driven Design without being hampered by the multitude of conflicting views and explanations.

  9. Discover some new words I can use in documentation to replace "leverage", "impact", and "functionality".

  10. Stop wasting inordinate amounts of time every year trying to think of New Year's Resolutions.