New Year's Resolutions No More!

Well, January is nearly over so it's time to finally give up on those New Year's resolutions you made (“resolutions” here means "things everyone else is thinking you should change or do"). If you're like me, each year these "resolutions" get "written down" (meaning "told to a stranger in the checkout line but definitely NOT your mom or husband or someone who will actually make you do them"), and, by the time MLK Day rolls around (or at latest Valentine’s Day), they are happily forgotten.

We Bryans don't do resolutions for the very reason that "resolution" can be hard to say, especially with braces, and that it often has the automatic expectation unaccomplishment. We (meaning “I”), instead, want to Get! Er! Done! So we use the much more guiltifying concept of "goal." Goals are great because you can start them any time and you can revise them whenever you'd like... but no matter what, "goals" tend to hang over your head letting you know that you've got something to do but that you probably won't get done.

We dutifully made a handful of goals this year. Among them: Megh will eat 2 veggies a day, I am to blog once a week and walk 15 minutes every other day, and Kev’s to be nice and non-cynical. These examples display the obvious difference between resolutions and goals. Goals are mostly measurable and can be accomplished.

But after review, I think I have set my sights too low. And since it’s Time! For! Change! instead of blogging and walking, I’m going to attempt excel lance at something I should have started years ago. And I believe, if I try hard enough, it could become A Gift!

In case you’d like to join me, the goal for various aspect of daily life is listed below along with several easy-to-do action steps. Feel free to print the lists out and post in visible places thus not only maintaining a high level of inspiration but also allowing friends and family to be well aware of your intentions.
Overall Goal: This Year I’m Going to Irritate.
This year I’m going to irritate my friends and co-workers.
Potential easy-to-do (and measurable!) action steps:
• Find out when my friends’ favorite TV programs are on. Call them seven minutes after each show starts. Do this weekly.
• Expel bodily gasses in confined spaces. But only if other people are present. Blame it on my “condition” which is probably not “contagious.” A diet of beans will help accomplish this.
• Openly and loudly take credit for successes that have nothing to do with me or my abilities. Name-drop freely but only if it can’t be traced.
• Follow a few paces behind someone (pick a new person each week!) and ask, “Are you feeling alright?” while spraying everything they touch with Lysol.
• Finish as many sentences possible with the words “in accordance with the prophesy.”
• When I make presentations, I will occasionally bob my head. Like a parakeet. Must choose to do this straight faced or smiling like a loony.
• Deliberately hum songs that will take over other people’s brain. Pick a new one every week or month, depending on the reaction. Some possibilities are “Feliz Navidad” (but only January, February. and March), “Muskrat Love” (as sung by the Captain and Tenille), or anything sung by Barry Manilow. Research annoying songs from the 90’s to add to repertoire.
• Drum on every available surface.

This year I’m going to irritate those I love.
Potential easy-to-do (and measurable!) action steps:
• Learn to snore. (Research possible “how-to’s” on the Internet.)
• Leave late for appointments. Do so especially if I’m with family. And it’s something they really want to attend. Blame it on being a “slave to fashion.”
• Have the last word as often as possible. (Raise the stakes by making that last word “Idiot” or “Duh!”)
• Change channels five minutes before the end of every show. (May need to purchase my own “universal” sneaky remote to accomplish this.)
• Hide can opener. When visiting friends’ homes, hide theirs. If I can’t hide the can opener, hide something else of interest, like car keys.
• Adjust the tint on the TV so that all the people are green, and tell Kevin either 1) that I like it that way or 2) he would leave it like that if he really loved me.
• Push all of Megh’s flat Lego pieces together tightly. Blame it on the neighborhood kids.
• Drum on every available surface.

This year I’m going to irritate complete strangers.
Potential easy-to-do (and measurable!) action steps:
• Go to a movie alone. Sit near other people. Talk out loud (in an argumentative fashion) to myself. Tailor the argument around something in the movie. (Best done while watching dramas like “Gran Torino” or “Valkyrie.”)
• On the way out of the movie, (especially if there’s a line waiting to go in), discuss the ending in a loud voice. It’s best if you can strike up a conversation with a stranger and make it look like they went to the movies with you.
• (Keep in mind while traveling.) Pay toll fee with a credit card. Especially effective if done during rush hour.
• Deface bar codes of items in my shopping cart so they won’t scan. Use with either cashier or U-Scan-It line. Ask for help every 30 seconds or so.
• Leave turn signal on for 50 miles (if on a trip) or 15 minutes (if driving in town). Turn it off for a mile or so and then turn it back on for another 50 miles (or 15 minutes). Do this only if you have people behind you.
• Schedule once a month (at least) to find a pedestrian crossing during rush hour and repeatedly push the cross walk button. Never actually cross the road.
• Sit in front yard (or in car at lunch near a busy road) and point a hair dryer at passing cars to see if they slow down. Pick up dark wire-rimmed sunglasses to help with the effect.
• Honk and wave randomly. But only to people who can see you and try to figure out if they know you.
• Become a politician.
• Drum on every available surface.

This year I’m going to irritate people at restaurants.
Potential easy-to-do (and measurable!) action steps:
• Specify that your drive-through order is “to go.”
• Schedule time to visit nice restaurants twice a month. Decline to be seated, instead eat the complimentary mints by the cash register. Stay there through the dinner rush.
• Pay for my dinner once a month with pennies.
• When possible, ask waitress for an extra seat for my “imaginary friend.”
• Drum on every available surface.

This year I’m going to irritate people I email.
Potential easy-to-do (and measurable!) action steps:
• ONLY TYPE IN UPPERCASE.
• only type in lowercase.
• dont use any punctuation either
• Pass along everything that comes into my email box to at least 10 people on my list (It’s better if you can send it to everyone). Make sure the addresses to whom you are sending in the mass email can be seen and add the obligatory “curse if you do not forward to 10 people” tag at the end of the email.


This year I will construct an irritating lifestyle.
Potential easy-to-do (and measurable!) action steps:
• Remember a friend is only an enemy I haven’t upset yet. Watch for possible indicators that might suggest the tide is turning. Accentuate any behaviors that might increase those indicators.
• Practice smiling blandly at least 3 day a week. Build up to 6. It’s both an unsettling and irritating behavior—a double bonus.
• Remember that there is absolutely no point in talking about someone behind their back unless they get to hear about it, so be strategic in who you talk to and about whom. If in doubt, leave notes about the conversation lying about.
• Practice “Carpe Diem.” From the Latin “carpe”—to carp or whine, and “diem”—meaning daily, hence “carpe diem”—whine daily.
• Sniff incessantly. Do it especially while people are talking. Increase or decrease its frequency on whether agree or disagree with what they are saying. Start off by sniffing only when talking to strangers and then add friends and family as you become more adept.
• Wear a LOT of cologne. Buy it at the dollar store.
• Drum on every available surface.

I do apologize for such a long post. But if one person can be helped using these goals and action steps then, I think you’ll agree with me it’s well worth it.

It's a Whole New Me! at: marcyjoybryan@elkcreek.net

For Your Health, And Those Around You

I Present the...



As sent in by my friend Monti. (Click on it for an enlarged view.)

You can thank us later.

Can I Get You a Glass of Wine (or a Diet Coke) at: marcyjoybryan@gmail.com

Blogging...

Blogging isn’t easy…you have to use words. I mean you have to use words that are useful and creative and possibly inspirational. I am rarely any of these but to be all three at once takes the celestial alignment of near Biblical magnitude. And frankly, Biblical magnitudinalness is something that I often lack.

Please know: I’ve thought about putting something on this blog nearly every day. And some of my ideas—not to sound uncharacteristically boastful—were stunning and inspired. Sadly, they were all conceived whilst either driving, in the shower, or just as I fell asleep. Apparently, I’m at my most creative when I’m not near a keyboard, and when, I might add, it might be dangerous to be so. This realization doesn’t bode well for me as a writer (and thus you as a reader) since I am at this very moment sitting at my keyboard motionless, dry, and awake. Ah well…

Regardless of when and how I best form words for this blog, several legitimate things prevented me from blogging over the past several months. The excuse I shall offer today was that I was “writing” a cookbook. But not just any kind of cookbook with any kind of “writing”…it’s the worst, most difficult kind of cookbook! It was a FAMILY cookbook!

Allow me a brief explanation so that I might feel good about myself:

In late 1996 while researching our family history, an insane thought came to my sleep-deprived zombie brain. (Zombie status was primarily due to Meghan being 18 months old and a rebellious sleeper. See? I’m a victim!) And the insane thought that had entered was that I should write (or more accurately, edit) a family cookbook. This would, I reasoned, bring the family together in harmony and love forever uniting them under the most beloved banner of all: food.

Before I could stop myself, my Zombie self sent a letter to family members asking them to submit their favorite recipes. It took about a year of corresponding, gathering, typing, editing and laying pages out, for “Our Family Cookbook” to be “published.” It was a modest tome, full of quotes and some stories about various parts of the family; 125 pages, spiral-bound, it even had an index! It cost people $5, and my mom and mother-in-law were pleased. I was thrilled.

And Our Family Cookbook became one of my favorites, not because I made it (although that would be a just cause, if I was a proudful, unrighteous person). No, it was a favorite because I actually used it. Often.

Fast forward over the next 15 years and I would hear the occasional “When are you going to print another cookbook?” question, to which I would demurely laugh and quickly change the subject. But five years ago, the winds of fate changed; first my mother-in-law and then my mother, asked when I would put together another cookbook. My very own mother subtly (or was it?) placed me on the path of more insanity, and, most dastardly of all, made it seem like it was my idea.

Before I could stop myself (what is my excuse this time? Meghan was 12 years old!) I gathered email and snail mail addresses and sent out letters asking for another batch of recipes. This time it took two years to put the book together. My delay was mostly technological: Firstly, I had to find a program that would accommodate my layout and whatever the publisher might need. Second, I had to find the money to pay for said program. Third, I had to find a publisher for said printer-ready publication. And I had to pull out of an apparent slight depression in order to do it, as well. There’s no need to describe how everything fell together…certainly God’s humor and kindness helped me to obtain the needed elements in mid-October of this year and have the entire book completed by mid-December.

And it’s now available! And reasonable (at $11.99)! You can see it here:

This is even bigger and better than the last one! And already, it is a favorite because my mom, my sisters and I purposely submitted recipes that we didn’t want to lose or we wanted Meghan and her cousins to have.

And, I’m proud of this one too.

You’d think it would be time to bask in my laurels, catch up on my blogging, spend time in other pursuits.

And yet…

More insanity looms.

The first cookbook needs updating and reprinted…

And my mom has already started asking about it. I’m doomed.

Call Me Crazy (or perhaps Co-dependent)at: marcyjoybryan@gmail.com

Psssst!

I am feigning illness so I can blog tonight.

Shhhhh! Kevin is coming in to see how I am.

I must cough now.

If only there was another excuse that I could use monthly in order to receive pity and “me time” at: marcyjoybryan @gmail.com

It's A New Year, Where's the New Me?

The Nebraska Huskers are playing football on the television. I’ve had two bowls of Sauerkraut and Kielbasa. My other family members (including Anjel, one of my daughters from another mother) are downstairs “painting” Megh’s room. So far “painting” means cutting Megh’s bed down from bunk-height to princess-height (setting off the smoke alarm repeatedly with the sawdust); cutting several boards that will serve as a desk top and a bulletin board base; assembling 4 cubbyholders that will also participate in the making of a desk; ripping up part of the carpet because of a suspicious trim piece; and several other activities that require the use of neither brush nor paint.

Which is why I’m not down there. Call me crazy, but if “painting Megh’s room” is on my list for the day, then I want a brush (or roller) in my hand and wet colorant dripping on my shoes.

Instead, I’m watching Nebraska fight against Clemson while I surf the web in an attempt to avoid eating the cookies made last night (while watching the ball drop and insane mediawhores jump things attempting to die in front of millions of viewers) and working on my lesson plans for the Co-op I help with.

It's 3pm. So far I've not avoided the cookies but I've avoided everything else.

And in case you’re wavering on whether the New Year has, in fact, arrived, here's ABBA to make it disco-official:



And, if you think that I'm starting this year as a total waste of oxygen, here's some cool time lapse from NASA:


túrána hott kurdís by hasta la otra méxico! from Till Credner on Vimeo.

So there.

I think I hear a snickerdoodle calling at: marcyjoybryan@gmail.com