Talkin' 'bout a res-o-lution

Well here it is, the very first outing of my very own, very online blog. The maiden voyage, so to speak.

I guess it's like any maiden voyage really: The Wright Brother's aviation attempts at Kittyhawk back in 1903. Yuri Gargarin's flight into space in 1961. Or even that dude from Tennessee who was the first person to fire a bottle rocket from his own arsehole in 2003.

My point is, there's bound to be some teething problems- the maiden voyage doesn't always go smoothly. For instance, that bloke from Tennesse is still scouring the launch site for his left testicle (serous miscalculation on the rocket back-burn I believe). So please- bear with me.

I was uncertain what to write about for this first post. But, after running through a shortlist of possible topics, from Why Cats Shouldn't Holiday in China, and How Thierry Henry Made Me Boycott Gillette Products, to more contentious issues such as Walkmans or Walkmen- The Plurality Conundrum and The Dairy Milk Bubbly: Just a Covert Wispa Bar?, I finally settled on writing about that futile tradition which nevertheless tends to make a reappearance on most folk's calendars around this time every year.

Namely, the dreaded New Year's Resolution.

We all make them, we all break them, and then the following year we make them all over again. Certain resolutions, in particular, are repeat offenders. Take the following, for example:

Must Eat Healthier Foods
I've long since suspected that there's more to a two course meal than a jumbo pack of instant noodles and a box of jaffa cakes. However I also remain wary of the fact that we all live in an incredibly body-conscious age, where calories are religiously counted, fatty foods are demonised, and every nutritionist and dietician worth his or her salt is busy clamouring for the latest TV deal. Hence we are bombarded with programmes such as I'm Great But You're Fat, The Problem with Moobs Today, and Enjoy That Cheeseburger Tubby- It May Be Your Last.

I'm not saying we shouldn't watch what we eat, but it's easy to take it to extremes, especially when the latest liposuction-makeover programme is followed by a health special on anorexia. Irony anyone?

Take Up Regular Exercise
It's simple: if God wanted us to exercise, he never would given us arses to sit on. A friend of mine once told me that a six-mile run at the end of the day was a 'treat' for him. In response, I merely asked him if his magazine subscription to Masochists Monthly was expiring anytime soon.

See, I'm the type of person who just doesn't really enjoy exercise- I simply do it (on occasion). Like everyone else, I will of course say 'oh I feel much better afterwards.' Well obviously I do, because it's fecking well over. If anything, the feeling of well-being achieved post-exercise only serves to counter the feeling of nausea and dread of impending pain experienced before the actual exercise takes place. It's a simple trade-off.

Don't get me wrong- I'd never let myself slip into the too-fat-for-conventional-clothes-and-now-need-to-wear-a-tarpaulin stage- but I just believe in a bit of balance. This is probably best illustrated by my response to a friend of mine, considerably more conscious about such exercise matters than I, who recently moaned about the ridiculous influx to the gym that occurs every January. I shrugged and pointed out that it simply mirrors the ridiculous influx to the pubs that occurs every December- we all have our cross to bear.

Travel More
The above resolution is something of a misnomer; let me clarify: seeing new places, experiencing new cultures- I love all that. But the actually travelling part of it? Sitting on a plane, staring at clouds for three hours? Lugging baggage on and off public transport to get to and from the airport? Pain in the arse.

In the average working lifetime, assuming a five-day working week, five weeks annual leave and forty years of servitude, a person will generally spend about eighteen thousand, eight hundred hours commuting to and from work. That's the equivalent of just over TWO WHOLE YEARS. I therefore ask you, why would you want to travel more? Roll on the invention of teleportation devices, I say.

Or maybe I've just taken the concept of travelling a tad too literally.

Buy a House
The word mortgage is a French word, and comes from the words 'mort' and 'gage', which when combined, literally mean "DEATH-PLEDGE". I don't know about you, but I'm in no rush to enter into such a contract.

Okay, okay- I may seem quite cynical thus far, but that's not to say I don't possess considerable hidden reserves of idealism. For instance, I happen to have made quite a few resolutions of my own this year:

Stop smoking
Given that the only things I've smoked regularly in my life were plastic cap-guns as a child (don't ask), I usually include this on my list to ensure that I easily fulfil at least one of my resolutions.

Learn a Foreign Language
This one is also a bit of an easy fix. I'm already relatively comfortable with French, mildly familiar with Italian, and on vaguely nodding terms with Mandarin Chinese. However, having last studied the language about five years ago, I have decided to renew my efforts on the French side of things. To this end, I have already met with one or two French-speakers for conversation practice this year, and it's going well so far. Quite reassuring really, as I had previously viewed the French as a people who did nothing more than make obscure, monochrome movies about sex, habitually smoke Gauloises, and walk around generally looking unimpressed with everything. Bof.

Be More Charitable
I have resolved to engage in more volunteer and charity work this year. I know people working in such roles are often criticised for gratifying their own egos and making themselves feel better, but I just find it forces you to put your own problems in perspective. After all, who can truly care about designer labels and salary bonuses when faced with a guy entering a homeless shelter to ask if he can borrow a suit just to attend the First Holy Communion of his daughter who he hasn't been allowed see in six months?

Such efforts are however not always well received by those at which they are aimed, and who can complain- no matter how harsh their personal situation, everyone retains some degree of pride. I am reminded of a story a friend of mine once told me. His policy is, upon seeing homeless people on the street, he will buy them food or a cup of tea or something, rather than giving them money. So one day, he's walking down Nassau Street in Dublin and sees this aul' fella lying in a doorway- the guy's probably in his sixties. Upon seeing this, my friend nips around the corner to Burger King, buys a hamburger and coke and brings it back to the old guy on the street. He crouches down and holds out the food.

'Here ya go,' says my friend. Upon registering his presence and the food before him, the old man shifts from a lying position and props himself up onto one elbow. He's shivering from the cold, his skin is jaundiced from alcoholism and his face gaunt from malnourishment. The aul' fella raises his free hand and points a quivering finger at the food. He begins to speak, but is overcome by a violent coughing fit.

'Whoa,' says my friend tenderly. 'Easy does it.'

'Is..' says the aul' fella, recommencing his sentence, but his next words are obliterated by the same hacking cough.

'It's okay,' says my friend, and places a comforting hand on the old man's shoulder. The old man's eyes are rheumy and blooshot, and his anorak is worn and smells faintly of urine.

'Is there..' starts the old man again, but his body is once more wracked by spluttering and coughing.

'Easy there,' says my friend gently. At this stage he is only seconds away from actually cradling the old man's weary head. The aul' fella wheezes, and almost bows his head in defeat, but then valiantly makes one final attempt to get his words out. After almost every syllable, he pauses a second to catch his breath.

'Is there...any (cough)....is there any (cough, cough)...is there any sauce...on that burger?'

My friend frowns. 'Umm...yes, I think so.'

'Nah,' grunts the old man, waving it away.

'No sauce.'

Classic. All I can say is, beggars and choosers, eh?

Learn a Musical Instrument
In 2010, I'm going to concentrate more on trying to learn the guitar and expand my repertoire beyond three buzzy-sounding chords and a handful of Oasis songs. The main beauty of a guitar is it's portability, versus the majority of other instruments. This is probably best exemplified by a great Far Side cartoon (always difficult to describe in words), which consists of two old-timer cowboys sitting around a campfire one night. One of them has an oversize grand piano convolutedly tucked into the back of his trousers (the piano takes up about half the cartoon panel), and the other old-timer says "Hey Zeke, why don't you pull out that ol' sucker and play us a tune?"

Another reason the guitar is great is that it is the type of instrument someone can thrust in your hand at a house party and ou can therefore react as follows: initially feign modesty about playing, eventually take the guitar with apparent reluctance, and then- seemingly with a minimum of effort- reel off the eclectic mix of ten crowd-pleasing songs you've spent the last twelve months relentlessly practicing. Nice.

In fact, it's easy to forget the crucial role a guitar plays in your standard house party. The standard sequence of events usually runs as follows:

· sometime around midnight, everyone begins to get so drunk on beer that drinking Jagermeister from the bottle actually seems like a good idea;
· everyone becomes more hammered, starts to get a bit restless, and finds that the guitar-playing and accompanying sing-song gives the party some sort of focus once more;
· whoever is playing the guitar then moves onto Irish songs which will invariably include The Fields of Athenry;
· some of the more boisterous attendees of the party will replace the common refrain of "baby let the free birds fly" with "I R A";
· the above action will then polarize all the people in the room;
· the most drunken person on the ah-the-IRA-weren't-too-bad-after-all side will get into a lengthy argument with the most drunken person on the how-dare-you-ever-praise-the-IRA side;
· the length of this argument will necessitate two comfy armchairs and the cracking open of a bottle of whiskey;
· sometime around 8am the next day, both of the arguing parties will decide the argument isn't worth wasting good whiskey over, will shake hands and become firm friends;
· one or both of the arguing parties will then collapse onto the floor in a heap and plunge into a semi-comatose, snore-filled state until about noon;
· at noon, both of the arguing parties will wake up and ask each other what happened after the bottle of Jagermeister was opened.

Ah, the humble guitar. Frankly, it's difficult to imagine a house party without one.

Pass Drivers Test...or at least try to
The last driving instructor I had was an eight foot tall ex-policeman. He was fond of dispensing such bizarre pearls of wisdom as "for jayzis's sake Conor, don't be looking in that wing mirror, it's not worth a prostitute's kiss" and "Jesus wept! You haven't a chance in hell of passing this bleedin' test".

In a bizarre moment (reminiscient of that scene in Star Wars when Obi-Wan Kenobi encourages Luke Skywalker to 'use the Force' by making him try to dodge lasers whilst impairing his vision), the instructor made me take off my prescription glasses during one of the lessons: "For Christ's sake Conor, you look like Harry bleedin' Potter with them specs on- get rid of 'em." So I put them to one side, and despite driving around half-blind, managed not to kill anyone. Strong with me that day the Force was.

Unfortunately, and astonishingly given the quality of my instructor, I failed my test. Lack of observation on the left, they said. What a mouse-fart of a way to go. It would've been much more rock-n-roll if I had gone the wrong way down a one-way street, or maimed a pensioner or something. But hey, what's done is done, and despite inevitably never using it whilst still residing in London, 2010 will hopefully see me making further steps down the road to getting my drivers licence.

Above all else, it has become increasingly embarrassing that the only way I can give a lift home to any girls I meet in a nightclub is via piggyback.

Embrace My Creative Side
As we speak.

Stop Worrying About Hairline
Que sera sera. It has long been apparent to me that the genetic Grim Reaper has singled out my hair follicles for termination. My hairline hence continues to recede faster than the global economy. There's nothing I can really do, expect to let it happen gracefully. I will therefore not be utilising the time honoured comb-over method of my own dear Pa, nor the tried and tested grow-a-pony-tail method of the majority of Hollywood film producers.

The worst method of all though, is best illustrated by an ex boss of mine. I call it the extreme denial method. Although the majority of his hair had receded, there was still a small, stubborn patch of growth present at the very front of his scalp, completely disconnected from the rest of his hairline. It reminded me of those two Japanese soldiers on the Island of Lubang who were never told that World War Two had ended and continued fighting up to twenty nine years after the fact. I felt like grabbing that tuft of hair and shouting 'It's over, okay- you've lost! Male Pattern Baldness has won the battle!'

Most annoying though about the whole baldness thing, is that the hair which hitherto would have grown on my head, has now been somehow misdirected to other parts of my body, such as the ear, the nose, et cetera. I can't help but visualise two puzzled hair follicles sprouting on my shoulder blade, having the following conversation:

Hair #1: Hey, waitaminute- is this the forehead?
Hair #2: Whoa, I dunno. I expected it to be more crowded than this..maybe it's the ass?
Hair #1: Well that's just great. I specifically requested a placement somewhere on the cranium.
Hair #2: No, wait- I think...I think this is the back. Isn't that the shoulder just above us?
Hair #1: Godammit, I told you we should've taken a left at the neck.
Hair #2: Okay, well next time you read the bloody map!

And so on. I suppose there's nothing left for me to do, other than heed the words of a random stoner I recently met at a houseparty. The guy was cursed with the same affliction as myself, and through his Marijhuana haze, he said to me, 'Hey, you know what I say man: don't think of it as losing hair, simply think of it as.....

..gaining face.'

Wise words indeed.

And so ends my run-down of resolutions for 2010. Even if I don't fulfil the majority of them, it's good to have them in place- give myself some aspirational structure for the next 12 months, and all that. For as the old saying goes, Man plans, God laughs. Which I suppose means, that plans are made to be altered.

So stick a fork in me, I'm done. I've finally popped my blog cherry... and am off now to smoke a post-coital cigarette.

Soon,

CB

P.S. And in case you can't quite place it, the title of this post comes from... what's that? You don't care? Oh, okay then.