One Last Try

OK, as I close out the final days of my 40s, I’m going to give the blog one last chance. And if I’m going to give the blog one more go, I might as well restart my favorite challenge 500 New Things! I started it this year but my last job really sucked the life out of me. The problem with working from home is that you can really get in a rut. Add in that i was dealing with East and West coast co-workers and I found myself working long hours; for the year, I’m probably averaging leaving my apartment 3 times a week. I can’t blame work entirely, my addiction to MLB The Show also ate up a lot of time. But I’ve kicked that habit and am ready to take back 2026!

One change to the New Things challenge is that I think I’m going to wipe my slate clean. Everything is new! Not only does this make it easier for me to get to 500 but I also think it will be fun to revisit old movies and, with so many restaurants/bars closing in LA, I will get to go back to some of my favorite haunts and help support them. So it’s more of a 500 Things challenge but that’s not as catchy as 500 New Things so I’ll keep the old name.

The 40s have been such a wasteland that I don’t think I’m going to do anything special for my birthday but I am going to try to go out for more dinners with people this year. That’s probably better than a party anywhere. I’m LA, you invite 50 people to party, 30 say they can make it, half of those people cancel the week or day of the party, and a few just don’t show up so you’re left with 10 people. And honestly, if 50 people did show up, you usually only really get a chance to spend quality time with 10 of them so it doesn’t really make a difference. In short, parties are for young folks.

My goal right now is to do some sort of diary-esque entry like this every morning and then I have a few other ideas for posts - compiling some of my favorite stories and retiring the stories that I’ve told too often over the last few decades. Maybe a weekly post about my favorite news stories of the year. We’ll eee how it goes. I’m keeping the bland, basic set-ip of the blog but hope to find some new tweaks as the year goes on.

I can’t imagine more than 10 people will read this but this go around is more about keeping me honest and challenging myself to show some follow through that I’ve lacked for, well, my entire life.