101 Goals in 1001 Days

Posted by Neil Crosby on May 5, 2005 12:00 PM

The Mission

Complete 101 preset tasks within a period of 1001 days.

This list of tasks will begin being processed on the 4th June 2005, on the day that I leave university for the last time. The list will be completed by 1st March 2008. I’ll be keeping this page up to date from now until the end date, and I’ll periodically write blog entries when I manage to complete particularly important tasks.

The Criteria

Tasks must be specific (ie. no ambiguity in the wording) with a result that is either measurable or clearly defined. Tasks must also be realistic and stretching (ie. represent some amount of work on my part).

The Prgress So Far

42 tasks currently completed, with 2 half finished.

The List

Jump to my body, mind, finances, culture, entertainment, socialising, computers, websites, holidays, or other stuff.

1. Drink nothing but water for 2 weeks
2. Drink no carbonated drinks for 1 month
3. Drink no alcohol for 2 months [Completed 8th October 2005]
4. Reduce my wasitband to 40” [Completed 21st October 2005]
5. Reduce my waistband to 36”
6. Do 50 pushups straight
7. Buy a new bike
8. Shave every day for two weeks
9. Dye my hair some outlandish colour
10. Have a professional massage
11. Buy a nice office chair (I need it - my back’s killing me) [Completed August 2007]
12. Join a gym
13. Learn to drink diet coke without thinking that it is evil [Completed some time before 1st December 2005]
14. Go to the dentist
15. Purchase new glasses
16. Be asleep by 11pm for a week [Completed some time in April 2006 - Becca having to be up for 5:30am every day is great!]
17. Fast for 24 hours
18. Moisturise every morning and evening for a month (why have I stopped doing this?)
19. Buy a George Foreman Grill (Completed 25th December 2005 (Well, we were given one for Christmas. It counts.))
20. Read a photography book properly
21. Read 6 novels in 6 months [Completed 4th March 2006]
    1. Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell - Susanna Clarke
    2. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
    3. A Short History of Nearly Everything - Bill Bryson (I’m counting it because it was big and long, and I read it for fun)
    4. Diary - Chuck Palahniuk
    5. How to be Good - Nick Hornby
    6. Scarecrow - Matthew O’Reilly
    7. You Don’t Have to Be Evil to Work Here, But It Helps - Tom Holt
    8. Thud - Terry Pratchett
    9. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time - Mark Haddon
22. Subscribe to a magazine [Completed 2nd July 2006]
23. Join the library [Completed 20th January 2006]
24. Read a book in a park [Completed sometime May 2006]
25. Get 100 photos developed [50 developed 9th August 2005]
26. Take at least one photo a day of something that interests me for a month [Completed February 2007 - Since then, I’ve been taking at least one photo every single day for about 7 months!]
27. Read a newspaper every day for two weeks [Completed February 2006. Yes, The Metro does count as a newspaper!]
28. Watch a news bulletin every day for two weeks [Completed February 2006 - I watch the BBC News every morning before work]
29. Attend my graduation [Completed 15th July 2005]
30. Learn to speak French well enough that I can watch Nikita without subtitles
31. Get a job in the computing industry [Completed 25th October 2005]
32. Get a job where I’m actually creating something [Completed 25th October 2005]
33. Clear my overdraft
34. Start a retirement fund
35. Open a savings account [Completed 5th May 2006]
36. Keep to my budget for three months
37. Go one week without spending any money at all (not including direct debits for bills etc)
38. Take a packed lunch to work every day for 2 months (excluding any work meals) [Completed August 2007 - Becca makes my sandwiches every day now, so this is pretty easy :)]
39. Get something that I’ve done/created published in a national newspaper/magazine [Completed 19th December 2006 - Finds of the Year 2006 was in the Metro]
40. Paint a picture
41. Become a “Friend of” a museum or art gallery
42. Be an extra in a film
43. Ride The London Eye
44. Play poker (not online)
45. Go for a night out and dance
46. Attend a concert
47. Go to the theatre to see a play [Completed March 2007 - Becca and I went to see “The Woman in Black”]
48. See a musical at the theatre [Completed 16th September 2006 when we saw Avenue Q]
49. Attend a Rocky Horror night in costume
50. Reduce my unwatched DVD pile to zero. (Dammit! I bought another 19 films on 25th March 2006)
51. Watch 7 films in 24 hours (previous best is 6) [Completed 1st May 2006]
    1. Caravan of Courage
    2. A New Hope
    3. The Empire Stikes Back
    4. The Phantom Menace
    5. Attack of the Clones
    6. Rvenge of the Sith
    7. Return of the Jedi
52. In one month watch the same number of films as there are days in that month
53. Buy one new CD album a week for two months.
54. Be part of the audience at a tv or radio recording (not an outside broadcast)
55. Pay for some digital music [Completed 6th September 2005]
56. See Rocky Horror Live
57. See a film at the Prince Charles Cinema
58. Purchase a large, flat television [Completed 7th December 2005. I know that the Bush 28” Widescreen TV I bought isn’t quite flat, but it’s good enough. I really like it.]
59. Watch five musical films which I have either not seen before or don’t remember the plot to
    1. The Producers [2005]
60. Throw a party [Completed 30th April 2006 with Becca’s party]
61. Attend someone else’s party [Completed 1st April 2006 at Marie’s party]
62. See a movie with a group of no less than five people that I know [Completed 2nd February - Movie and Pizza night at work]
63. Meet in real life three more people who I met online [Completed 28th January 2006 - I met Sus back in November, and Niall and ‘Lex on the 28th]
64. Go to a Convention wearing a costume
65. Perform karaoke [Completed 30th April 2006 - We bought SingStar Popworld for the PlayStation 2 and, well, sang]
66. Contact an old school friend [Completed June 2007 - FaceBook is a godsend!]
67. Watch a movie trilogy back to back in one day with friends [Completed 1st May 2006 - watched all six Star Wars films]
68. Go to a gay bar
69. Go 48 hours without touching a computer [Completed 1st October 2006 when we went to Aberystwyth for a couple of days]
70. Get TaoMixer.com to the state where people can use it
71. Release TheTenWordReview.com to the community [Completed 24th December 2006]
72. Purchase Tiger (no, not a tiger; Tiger!) [Completed 9th April 2006 - I bought a Mac Mini]
73. Have 50,000 unique visitors to workingwith.me.uk in a month. (At current rate of growth, that’s some time mid 2007. Lets do much better than that)
74. Get linked from Slashdot
75. Convert workingwith.me.uk to being database driven (the only reason that it isn’t already is that my previous hosts wanted me to spend more money to actually be allowed to use a database. It really is just a case of spending a little time to port things across and modify a little bit of code.) [Completed 12th February 2006 - The site got ported to use Moveable Type]
76. Write ten new articles for workingwith.me.uk
1. Standardista Table Sorting (26th February 2006)
77. Spend 10 hours a week developing new content for workingwith.me.uk for a month
78. Help Becca start her website.
79. Turn crosbyfamily.co.uk into a proper website
80. Earn $1001 in Adsense revenue
81. Visit five countries on a single holiday
82. Go on holiday to somewhere that I’ve never been before for a week
83. Visit Paris
84. Visit America
85. Fly a kite [Completed 2nd August 2005]
86. Climb a tree
87. Wear a bright pink item of clothing in public
88. Make an Adam & Joe style toy movie
89. Spend all day in bed when I’m not ill
90. Buy a paper shredder [Completed February 2007]
91. Complain about bad service (to the people who provided the bad service) [I complained in Sainsbury’s about some food which I’d bought, but had found out was mouldy when I got it home. I got my money back, plus a £10 voucher for my troubles. Completed 12th July 2006]
92. Write three letters of thanks/praise about a good service/product
93. Give blood
94. Purchase a suit [Completed 21st October 2005]
95. Spend £100 on a single item of clothing/footware (but not a suit)
96. Move into my own place that I’m not sharing with random people [Completed 27th November 2005 when I moved in with Becca]
97. Learn to drive
98. Eat a traditional picnic (with basket) under a tree
99. Have a candlelit dinner [Completed 29th September 2005]
100. Talk to someone famous [Completed at @media 2006 several times over]
101. Complete all the tasks on this list

comments (5) | write a comment | permalink | View blog reactions