The TharpSterLution is the moniker I’ve ascribed to an annual process I partake in during this time of year. I’m a little too lazy to go look it up, but I think this is the fourth time I’ve committed this literary atrocity. It gives me something to write about, while at the same time I’m provided with a goal to shoot for in the coming 12 months until it’s time to compose a new set.

Simply put, the TharpSterLution is a New Year’s Resolution scaled down to a set of obtainable goals. That’s right people. There’s no use in me going full boar committed to some lofty delusion of grandeur when I can settle for a certain level of mediocrity. I’m just too lazy.

As I do every year, I go back and review last year’s TharpSterLutions in order to drive home the fact in my mind that hindsight is 20/20. Even still, mine still has a minor astigmatism. My goals for 2013 and their eventual outcome are as follows:

1. Write more fiction – I did, but not enough. I’ve had a few story ideas kicking around in my head recently, however I haven’t been able to sit down and write them. See the comment above where I mentioned that I’m lazy. I just need to sit down and write them.
2. Work with the dogs in order to allow them to get along – The dogs still hate each other. We still have rules and procedures around the domain here which dictate that the two of them keep separated. There is still dog-aggression present in the pit bull, however she’s not acting on it as much as she used to. This will be a long term project.
3. Don’t piss yourself off – Failed. I’m rather angry about it as a result.
4. Regardless of what’s going on, deal with it – This was a callout to my procrastination. There have been several areas of my life in the last year where I was able to banish my innate desire to put things off. At the same time, the bathroom needs to be cleaned and the garage is still a mess, so I’m not 100% there yet.
5. Trust your gut instincts – Obi Wan had tremors in The Force and Spiderman has his senses. I have my gut instincts and boy did they rumble this last year. Even still, I didn’t act correctly on them or trust them enough.

Now I have the task to come up with a new set of TharpSterLutions for the year 2014. One thing I’ve noticed over the last few years that I’ve been doing this is that I’ve reduced the number of goals and generalized them enough so as to remove specificity. This year will be no different.

1. Callus up – I’ve put my guitar down in the last several years and haven’t really played it a lot. I was never really that good at playing it, but at the same time I wasn’t that bad either. In the last few years, Juniorette has hijacked it and began teaching herself how to play. This ultimately resulted in her asking for her own guitar which was scaled down to be more proportionate to her size. Well, she got one for Christmas this year. Imagine if you will a mad scientist capturing Cookie Monster and extracting his DNA through his blood or those googly eyes of his. Now imagine the same scientist splicing the aforementioned Muppet DNA with that of a Tardis colored Mini Cooper which belongs to the newly named assistant manager at a music store on the northwest side of town. He’s quite proud of his new promotion, his new car, and his flamboyant nature, so he’s also excited to tell you that when he picked that particular shade of blue for his new car, he was doing so out of his love for the Dr. Who television series on the BBC. The resulting shade of blue which would come out of such a pairing is pretty much that which is sported by Juniorette’s new guitar, and not very different from the shade of blue you see in the logo for this particular site.

None the less, the real goal here is for me to play more guitar this year. It’s not to create an image in your mind of Cookie Monster humping a Mini Cooper in order to produce a blue guitar. That’s a filthy image which shouldn’t even be conjured up within the human mind, and shame on you if you’ve done so.

2. Read more – With the arrival of my e-reader a few years ago, I’ve been able to recapture my love for reading. Up until then, there had been a few years where I had to give it up because of my vision. To put it as technically as possible, I have pretty goofy vision. It’s gotten worse as I’ve gotten older. That’s no longer an issue anymore. The e-reader allows me to adjust the font size on any book I’m reading to an appropriate number of about 36, which is a whole lot better to read than the ever so sadistic size of 8. Last night, I exploited some gift cards and purchased 6 or 7 books directly from my reader with the caveat that I can’t start reading them until I finish reading The Hobbit. If I had a nickel for every time I’ve ever picked that book up and put it down without finishing it, I wouldn’t be making periodic lottery investments.

3. Write more – Well duh. What’s the use of owning webspace to exercise my desire to write if I don’t write more? In 2012, I published a blog every day of that blasted year. I even did so on the days of that year when things weren’t going my way. I’ve dialed it back during 2013 to the point where I’ve gone close to a month without posting anything. That just ain’t right. Now that the self imposed break from daily writing has run its sufficient course, I’m going to pick the pace up a little bit. I have no frequency in mind yet. Stay subscribed to me on the social networking sites or through my RSS feed and you’ll know when I’ve posted more verbal brilliance.

4. Git R Done – This is a high level admonishment to myself to take care of some things in my life which need some attention. That’s all I have to say about that. Next year when I look back at this one, I’m not going to have the slightest idea at all of what in tarnation this means.

Well, there you go.

Again.

One has to wonder how long I’ll produce these things until I get to a point where I become bored with them.

Happy New Year Y’all.