Another year, another set of goals, new memories and hopefully many good times.
As is the norm this time of year, I have created a short list of resolutions; some vaguely realistic goals and achievements for the year ahead. I’ve never really been one to take resolutions seriously, though this year I think I’ve made a list of potentially do-able things.

Putting it into practice is always much harder while having a few

• Go to sleep earlier
  
  I seriously try to try to get to sleep earlier, but I just don’t like going to sleep. I always have far too much on my mind to keep me occupied.

• Be more creative
  
  By this I mean that I want to expand my range of photography even more and possibly also improve of Photoshop techniques.

• Meet more people than last year
  
  This was really a great year for meeting lots of new people, and Twitter did help a lot with that – I hope that this year will have even more new encounters.

• Travel more around Ireland (besides Dublin and Cork)
  
  I have been to the South of Ireland more times this year than in any other year. Many times in Dublin and twice in Cork. This year I want to venture to some other parts of the country; Limerick, Kilkenny, Galway, Waterford etc. There is a small chance of a Road Trip so I’m keeping my fingers crossed.

• Understand the infrastructure of the Internet
  
  Cables under the sea! Name servers? IPs? General hosting woes. Yeah theres lots about the architecture of the web I would love to understand. It may take longer than a year.

• Save more money
  
  I’m terrible at doing this, but this year I hope to try very very hard.

• Become more confident at public speaking
  
  Ah yes, public speaking. So many people seem so damned good at it – the ones that are just have a certain amount of confidence in themselves, what they are saying and that the audience wants to hear it – that’s where I go wrong. This will be me year.

• Take more day trips around Northern Ireland
  
  I love taking train journeys around NI, usually somewhere by the sea (there are no trains in the West), usually somewhere slightly interesting to take lots of photos. I didn’t do it often in 2008 so big effort for 2009 – as well as a photo trip to the Giants Causeway still in planning.

• Email friends more often
  
  I just don’t write personal emails to friends often enough, I feel bad when I don’t. It’s often the feeling bad that puts of not doing it. Friends, you will feel the love this year.

Resolutions are one of those things that everyone asks about in the first week of January, right after saying they have just broken theirs by eating chocolate, having that takeaway, or having those drinks the very next weekend. It isn’t until two or three months later that they realise they still haven’t used the gym membership.

A year can be a long time, better planning of that time will be a major one really. The more variation of activities each day brings, the the shorter life won’t seem. No matter what it is, if each day is the same I want to make an effort to change that. Do more on the spur of the moment, hop on that bus/train when the opportunity arises.

2008 was seriously a good year for me, many people have been involved in piecing it all together, day by day, thanks to you all.

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