Looking Back, Looking Ahead...

The vast majority of my reading in 2013 was non-fiction, and I read some great books. What follows here is a short list of stuff that I enjoyed and experienced last year, in addition to a couple of resolutions that I want to observe in 2014.

The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, The Saturated Self, Orality and Literacy, Convergence Culture, Writing Space, and Alone Together were all excellent books. How Information Came of Age and The New Media Reader were also invaluable texts...

I enjoyed Katherine Tomlinson's Just Another Day in Paradise...

Andy Duncan and Ellen Klages really did something neat with "Wakulla Springs." Not just the best story I read in 2013, but one of the best stories I've ever read in my life...

Cap's on the Water never disappoints, and I had the best scored flounder there back in the spring. It was lightly fried in a rice flour batter and then topped with a peach and mango glaze. Dang, it was delicious...

I had my first eagle in Florida back in August. Stepped up on the first tee at Mill Cove and hit my drive 280. Punched a fairway medal onto the green to about twenty feet, pin high, then made the putt. It was with a Srixon golf ball my daughter gave me with an angry bird logo on it. I promptly lost that sucker in the pond two holes later...

I coached the Arlington YMCA Mustangs to a 4-4 record on the year. The team was a joy to work with, and the kids did a great job of taking coaching. I'm hoping the same group will get together again this spring...

Enjoyed the Players Championship again this year with Kris, even though I had to visit the ER a day before when I cut my foot open while kayaking. That was one nasty gash, but the skin knit up nicely and it hasn't given me any problems. Thank goodness I avoided the flesh-eating bacteria...

Argo was excellent--very engaging film. I also really liked The Conjuring. Just re-watched Prancer with my daughter on Christmas Eve. What an underrated Christmas movie. On the other end of the spectrum, I have no idea what Guillermo del Toro was thinking with Pacific Rim. I laughed the whole way through that film, and there wasn't a joke in that damned thing. I honestly think the actors were being serious with that crap. Thor: The Dark World was equally terrible, and I gave up on The Haunted Mesa. Talk about repetitive and, well, dull...

I had a nice time returning to the classroom at FSCJ, working with about 125 students. I will continue to tweak a few things in the materials I use and the approach to working on the writing process...

For 2014...

I resolve not to laugh at the kids up the street that always scrape their lowriders when they pull into their driveway...

I resolve to read more fiction and write more short stories...

More fish and wine in my diet...less steak and beer...

I resolve to keep a golf handicap, hit ten buckets of balls, and break eighty in back-to-back outings...

More sunscreen and longer runs...

More movies in the theater...