Posts Tagged ‘resolutions’

2009 Goal Review/2010 Look Ahead:Hobby

Wednesday, December 30th, 2009

Time to do some housekeeping and get some things out of the way I’ve been meaning to do.

Let’s look at the hobby related items first, since they’re the shortest.  :)

1. Play 4 wargames.  I’m counting this one successful enough.  I believe earlier in the year, we completed a playing of A Victory Lost.  I also got in 2 playings of A Victory Denied in the fall.  Tabletop wise, that was probably pretty much it.  But, I’ve been playing countless Risk and Axis & Allies clones online lately, so the sheer bulk of those should count.  :)  I didn’t get anything done solo, but I’m still counting this one a success.  Let’s renew this for 2010.

2. BGG game collection updated.  Fail.  I’m finding my way to BoardGameGeek.com less and less.  It’s still a great site that I use for reference, but I’m hanging out there next to never.  Renew this just because I think it’s a nice way to keep track of things.  I see things I have in it that I don’t notice when I look at my shelves.

3. BGG play list up to date.  Fail.  I probably didn’t play enough to care.  It’s nice to have but this one will probably fall by the wayside.  I probably care more about what wargames I’ve played than everything.  I still need to write up my last AVD session.  If I can remember much, other than the outcome.

On this day…

  • 2005: Black Books — Black Books is a BBC series that I absolutely have fallen in love with. There’s a marathon of series [...]

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Posted in Gaming | 2 Comments »

2009 Goals: Hobby related

Saturday, January 31st, 2009

This is the final goal setting post for the year, other than hopefully checking a few off before the end of the year.  It’s fitting that I wait until the last day of January to finally get this thrown out here.  Nothing like letting one month already be gone before spelling these out.  However, a few of these should already have some progress made toward them.

Hobbies are a very subjective goal.  For instance, a lot of my professional goals could be considered just hobbyist programming.  This just the catch all category for all the other time wasting stuff I do.

 

  1. Play at least 4 wargames to completion.  At least 2 should be against a live opponent.  At least 1 should be something meaty played solo.  At least 2 should be games I’ve never played before. 
    I’ve already made some progress on this last weekend (more on that in a future post).  I’d say I should probably reevaluate my targets, but these are what I had planned on.  There’s nothing that says goals have to be realistic, it’s nice that this may be one that is skewed in my favor. 
  2.  Get my game collection caught up on BGG.
    I haven’t updated anything I’ve gotten since receiving Storm Over Stalingrad back in September.
  3.  Get my play history caught up on BGG.
    I haven’t updated it for December’s gaming weekend or for last weekend.  I’ve forgotten a few family gamings from last year, so those will be lost.
I’m kind of at a loss for others.  These are pretty much all boardgame related.  I guess besides gaming and programming type stuff, I don’t really have many “me-time” related hobbies any more.  Softball was left in Ohio, watching the Wings or tasting micro-brews can’t really be used for any goal related activities, so that’s pretty much it.

On this day…

  • 2005: Tired Monday — I’ve been very tired tonight. I should’ve gone to bed earlier but I can’t stand to go to bed [...]

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Posted in Gaming | 1 Comment »

2009 Goals: Professional

Sunday, January 11th, 2009

These are my goals of the professional variety.

  1. Continue to work hard and enjoy my job.
    This hasn’t been a problem so far, but I’m going to stay on top of things and make sure  
  2. Learn Groovy
    I learned about the Groovy programming language around a year ago during the fateful conversation that got my butt in gear.  It was on my list of technologies to learn but I never got that far.  Dynamic languages have been all the rage the past year and I’d like to learn what one can do to help me in my own projects.  Groovy is the obvious choice for me since I’m already using Java and it’s built on top of the Java Virtual Machine(JVM).
  3. Work on my own development projects
    This could be such things as finally bringing my old Overlord wargame idea to fruition or converting and extending Pit into a new development environment.  A lot of it might be plinking around with Groovy to learn it or such things as GWT (Google Web Toolkit).  Basically, just to get working on some different things to expose myself to new situations and new development libraries.  One of my paralyzing failings with the new technologies has always been not having something concrete to play with them in.  If I have some active projects, I’ll be able to see some possible uses for new things.
  4. Read at least two programming related books
    I’m in the early stages of Effective Java right now and really grokking things.  I really enjoy getting advice from smarter, more experienced people than myself.  This is a wonderful book for such things.  Coupled with #3 above, having some projects to use these newly learned methods will help to drill them home.  Perhaps another book to get would be Groovy related.  The thing with a lot of programming books, is they’re mostly used as a reference for situations you are encountering.  Reading them from front to back in order is nearly mind numbing.  So most likely succeeding at #3 will help this one succeed.
  5. By year’s end, program something that will make it worth getting a web host to make it available to on the web.
    I’ve not really been thrilled with my current web host for the last couple of years.  I find response slow as cat doo-doo, and the quality of their tech support makes dealing with most government guidelines a cake walk.  I was very close to pulling the trigger and moving FloydWing.com to a different hosting service where I could have my own application server running to host programs I would create.  But paying the extra amount to move to such a hosting service when I don’t currently have anything beyond this blog, the Pit forums, and Pit archive to put there would be a tremendous waste of money.  Another year of putting up with my current service may give me the incentive I need to make it worth it and get my money’s worth.
  6. Work on somebody else’s project
    I don’t think I’m ready to jump into some existing open source project, but one of my work associates has a couple projects that he’s in the early stages of, one that may end up open source.  He’s already mentioned having me help out, so I think I should pursue that.
  7. Start Pit back up.
    I heard from the faithful that they miss Pit.  I do too.  Even though we’re probably only three strong anymore, I still enjoy seeing how the seasons play out.  I’ve already put a little work into setting my environment back up and (most importantly) found the code and site archive.  I’ve got a a little more to do before I say we’re going to get moving for a definite, but look for a future blog post concerning this.
That’s plenty.  I’ve got one more goals post left.  And then I need to get busy on completing them!  :)

On this day…

  • 2010: CodeMash 2010 — Only one more day of work before I head to CodeMash.  I can’t wait.  It was painful not being able [...]
  • 2009: Mini review: Santa’s Butt Winter Porter — Santa’s Butt has a rear view of Santa looking over a list and holding a mug of brew while sitting [...]
  • 2007: Spam, VASSAL, Exercise — Sorry, no The Mighty Endeavor after action report yet. Hopefully this weekend I can put some time into that [...]
  • 2005: Wellies — Tonight was a very entertaining evening for me. For once I wasn’t the target of my children’s laughter.
    My wife [...]

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Posted in Programming, Tech Stuff, Work | No Comments »

2009 Goals: Personal

Tuesday, January 6th, 2009

I don’t normally bother with the resolution crap (since I’m not really one to keep such things anyways), but it tis the time of year where it’s all the rage.  These aren’t so much resolutions as they are just goals I’d love to achieve in the coming 11+ months.

These are my goals of the personal variety.

  1. Continue to introduce the girlywogs to new experiences
    This one will be an easy one to keep since the wifal unit already has us following this mantra.  We’ll continue to take advantage of the zoo, art museum, sport teams, and events as much as we can without overdoing it.
  2.  Actually take a family vacation this year
    This will depend on how fast I waste my vacation before the summer, the economy, and any unplanned as well as planned expenses.  We’ve not ever really had a full blown vacation.  I’d love to go somewhere relaxing and interesting for like 4-5 nights.  We’ll see.
  3. Lose some weight
    I think ideally, losing like 30 pounds would put me where I should be.  This is the most likely goal to fall by the wayside.  I’ve never been one for exercise and I really don’t know how I’d fit it in.  The only times I’ve lost weight was when I stopped drinking Mountain Dew (20 lbs) and playing lunchtime bball at the University.  I’m gonna have to get back into a disciplined eating and snacking routine for this one to have any chance.
  4. Get the basement cleaned
    Not only would this enable us to have more lounging space and have a nice place for the gaming systems, it would also make it easier for me to have some wargames set up.  Not to mention the good feeling having an organized basement can give you.
  5. More quality family time at home
    This will involve finding ways to better keep up with all the home maintenance and upkeep in a more efficient manner as well as the weekly errands.  Yes we spend a lot of time together today, but more wouldn’t hurt.
  6. Read at least 4 books (at least one of which is non-fiction)
    This shouldn’t be a problem as I’ve actually been more actively reading the past year or two.  We’re even going to the public library now.  I’ve got two non-fictions waiting for me now.  Though I think a biography might be in order.
  7. Listen to more music
    I used to have a voracious appetite for music and would buy far too many CDs.  Podcasts have slowly displaced the time I used to use for music listening and now I listen to very little.
  8. Write more
    I’ve always wanted to write that great American novel.  While I don’t see that happening, I still enjoy when I write something here and the words flow out easily.  I’d love to take part in Nanowrimo someday but don’t see that soon.  Ideally I’d satisfy this one by writing a short story or two, but I’ve got no ideas.  So, I’ll try to not go longer than a week without a blog post.  I just passed the four year anniversary of this blog on January 1st and those of you who’ve followed me for part of that know that I’m either hot or cold.  Very seldom in between.  So I’ll try to keep those empty lapses shorter.

On this day…

  • 2007: Christmas Party Gaming — In my continuing effort to get caught up on my game playing posts, let’s head back to Christmas on my [...]
  • 2005: Frustration — I’m ready to scream. After sitting and writing a post, I find out there must be some sort of [...]

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Posted in Deep Ramblings, Entertainment, Family, music | 2 Comments »