One new thing every day

I love a good new year’s resolution. Logically I’ve got no idea why, they just appeal. We put an arbitrary marker down for when a year starts, and we’ve divided that up into discrete quanta in a horrible fashion ever since. Yet every time we complete an orbit around the Sun, I feel mentally renewed, like this year is the one I’m going to crack some long-standing issues I have, form better habits and break some bad ones, and generally become a better human being. Look, I don’t know OK. Just pretend it makes sense, for us both.

On the list this year was, “publish a new piece of writing every single day in 2017”. It doesn’t have to be one of the long, ponderous, self-important pieces I’ve fallen into the habit of writing. It could be anything, from a cheat piece like this where I’m just explaining the ruse because I don’t have anything better to write about quickly (it’s 23.26 at night and I’m in a rush), to a link and a piece of commentary about something interesting or cool that I found on the web. I’ll even write some fiction from time to time.

So that’s the plan. Then, if I’ve categorised and tagged it all properly, near the end of the year or early in 2018 I can write about what I wrote about all year and see if anything interesting pops out as a trend, observation or anomaly.

Sorry I cheated today. I did have a small mental list I was trying to tease into something substantial, but then I decided to redo all the cabling behind my TV to add more power and network ports back there for all the stuff I have. While fighting cable organisation and running out of short Ethernet cables, I gave up on the mental process of fully forming those ideas, and then sat down to watch the newly recabled TV and play some Rocket League on the newly recabled PS4.