I can't speak German, I don't vacuum under the couch, and I have yet to design a workable jetpack, but that doesn't mean I'm going to stop making new year's resolutions.
Rather, like anyone should who has tried at something and failed, I'm going to set my sights lower. It's for this reason that the theme of this year's resolutions is achievability. Here are five commitments that even I should be able to keep.
1. Be more defensive about flossing
This item is motivated by guilt. I don't know what your dental hygienist does when he or she decides you haven't been flossing enough, but mine pulls out this big, frightening photo album of mouths that look like something Jabba the Hut might throw prisoners into and tells you you're going to look like that if you don't smarten up.
Last year, smarting from this lecture - and aware that my British heritage predisposes me to developing teeth that look like Druid ruins - I resolved to floss every day. But then I didn't. Instead I just did things that were more interesting, such as anything else. This year, recognizing that a complete turnaround is unrealistic, I'm going to continue to floss at random and, when I go back to the dentist, be more defensive about it.
"Why don't you floss my teeth more often?" 2. Do something nice for a cat
I was raised with a huge number of cats (three) - at any given time, anyway. Living as we did next to a busy road, we burned through them like they were going out of style, and so, while I liked them, I learned over time to separate myself from them emotionally.
As an adult, that distance has grown. Now, around my friends' cats, I tend to focus entirely on their negative qualities: their aloofness; their disrespect for couches; the fact that when they get near my face, I start to look like I'm at a very high-altitude funeral.
I've decided, however, that neither cats nor cat owners deserve to be treated so rudely, so this year I'm going to try to be nicer. I'm not going to go so far as to, say, pet them, but I'm going to try to make my interactions less derogatory.
Instead of saying, for instance, "Your cat smells like an abattoir after a power cut," or "Your cat looks like someone melted Grover," I'll say something neutral, such as: "That is a cat."
Baby steps. 3. Buy a pretentious magazine
Every year I tell myself I'm going to read more sophisticated books, not out of interest or for selfimprovement, but to make it clear to people I'm better than they are. My problem with so-called "intelligent" books, however, is that they don't contain any of the elements I tend to look for in a good read: no one slays or gets to the bottom of anything, the covers tend to be boring, and speech almost never appears in bubbles.
I could try investing in a serious work of literature, but I know from experience I'm not going to read it, so instead I'm going to settle for appearing to have read something intelligent. That means buying a copy of the New Yorker and leaving it somewhere where people can find it. With a little focus and determination, maybe I can even work my way through some of the cartoons.
4. Lie more about what I eat
I've made it clear before in this space that, in terms of overall composition and balance, my diet is similar to that of a Tyrannosaurus. I suppose, on reflection, that's an exaggeration; my diet isn't, technically speaking, made up entirely of slow dinosaurs - but it is heavy on fat and protein and extremely light on things that won't make me go extinct. Vegetables, for instance.
This isn't on purpose. Every day, I set out with the intention of plowing through greens like a weed eater, but then I get hungry, and I set a course for the nearest fast food chain and gorge myself like Earth has been hit by a meteor and I got the last Brontosaurus.
Afterwards, I confess what I did, and then my healthier and more socially conscious friends get haughty: "You ate that for lunch? You know that's made from underpaid workers and chicken feet, right?"
This year, I'm going to
break this pattern. Instead of eating terrible food, I'm going to eat terrible food and then lie about it. "Sure I eat non-potato vegetables." "No, I don't consider ravioli a salad." "Of course butter isn't a finger food." "What's special sauce?"
We'll see how it goes.
5. Invest in a narrower tie
As an instinctively conservative dresser, I tend to duck riskier fashion trends.
Hypercolour, faux-hawks, those leather Wonder Woman-style bracelets guys were wearing for a while, I steered clear of all of them in favour of straight-laced, timetested, standard-issue man wear. When I want to push the envelope, I wear a shirt that's a slightly daring shade of black or that has a controversially placed button.
But this year, in the interests of no longer appearing to have stepped out of a poster for mutual funds, I've decided to embrace an edgier look.
Many of you will have noticed that fashion has, in recent years, been increasingly influenced by the hipster esthetic, that particular combination of loose scoop-neck shirts, vests, scarves, tight pants and fake eyewear whose overall goal is to make the wearer look like a kind of homeless pirate-librarian.
Since the look is intolerably goofy on men taller than six feet - skinny jeans make me look like I stole my legs from a denim-coloured flamingo - I'm going to incorporate just one hipster-influenced item: a narrow tie.
It'll still be black, obviously, so it will be entirely invisible against my less recklessly coloured shirts, but it's a start.
Maybe, just maybe, this will be the year I get all these resolutions done.
But probably not.
