Happy New Year, Y’all.

Welcome to 2014 … I think … I mean, I’ve slept and lay around so much the last couple of weeks I could have missed a whole year in there.  I had been fighting a hitch in my chest for a few weeks, and it bugged me pretty bad in the humidity of Hawaii; but on the drive home from Christmas Dinner it peaked up into a full blown chest cold.  I considered even having it checked out as possible pneumonia (or as I called it as a kid, ammonia).  It’s pretty much cleared up, but when you are old, overweight, and spend nearly a week on a couch everything you do is way too difficult.

The new year is here, however, and that means the days are getting longer and people are now focused on what it takes to be ready for outdoor stuff.  We’ve had enough snow now that all the winter activities are a full on go, from skiing, to dog sledding, to skijoring (yes that’s a real word) which is the combination of the first two items.

New Years here was a little uneventful.  While big cities like New York will drop a ball to count down the new year, I think Anchorage just ‘drops the ball’ all together.  There is fireworks set off by the city at a family friendly 8PM, and there are a whole lot of people dressed up to go out (which …come on … why do you dress up for new years?).  After a late dinner following the fireworks, I just went home and woke the pup up so he can be awake for midnight.  When it came, the city filled up with the sounds of illegal fireworks going off, which of course freaked out the pup (serves him right for chewing on my blanket half the night).  I toasted with an 18-year-old scotch then found my bed.

Now we start into 2014, and like the rest of you I have a resolution, and it may sound like a cop-out but its something I want to do.  Simply its to put my “bucket list” into words.  I have an idea what my bucket list is, I know I knocked off a lot of items on my bucket list, but I don’t have it down anywhere — and you can’t work on something that doesn’t exist.

So, let’s get to it then … 2014 is here, so no use waiting around to get it going.