Thoughts on the Old Year and the New Year

Here are my favorite things from 2005:

movie that I saw for the first time: Good Night and Good Luck
book that I read: Kite Runner
CD that I bought: Thelonious Monk Quartet @ Carnegie Hall
website besides mine: The Carpetbagger Report
new place to eat: Casa Bianca
DVD: Simpsons Season 6
purchase: my digital camera
beer that I tried for the first time: Craftsman Declaration of Independence


Personal highlights of 2005:

getting drunk and watching Liverpool come back from 3-0 down to win Champions' League
another MLS Cup win for Galaxy
visiting Disneyland
finding a regular weekly soccer game
getting back on my principal's good list
getting my own classroom
adopting a meerkat
I think there is something else that I am forgetting that happened this year, but if it was that important I'm sure I would remember

Other people's lists of good things from 2005:

Time's 50 coolest websites
Notable Quotables
Funny Political Quotes
Stupid Political Quotes
Stupid things Bush said
Other Lists

What's up with 2006?

New Year's Resolutions? I don't make them because I won't keep them. However, I plan on improving my health. Regular gym schedule. More vegetables. I have a dentist appointment Tuesday, which is the first time in a while. Also, I need to be more organized. I bought a book about getting organized last year but I never read it. Maybe I should read it after I'm done with my Khrushchev biography.

Big events? Weddings Weddings Weddings. I'm getting married, my fiance's sister is getting married, my Uncle Jon got married yesterday, fiance's friend Erin is getting married, Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes. And then there's World Cup, which is an event that I recommend to all people to experience in some way.

My predictions? The U.S. will stay in Iraq with very limited troop withdrawals. Someone in the Bush Administration will get caught doing something bad and actually get punished for it. We'll find out the Democratic front-runners for 2008 and they will all be crap. U2 will break up (I've heard rumors about the other band members getting tired of Bono's involvement in international affairs). Democrats will make major gains in the '06 midterm election. The housing market bubble will pop and all of the people who could not really afford to buy their $500,000 track home in places like Fontana will face foreclosure. Gas prices will top $3/gallon again this summer.

My death pool choices for 2006? Dick Cheney, Micheal Jackson, Dick Clark, Gary Busey, Vern "Mini-me" Troyer, Sadaam Hussein, Tom Cruise (dark horse), MLB Hall of Famer Willie Mays.

I really wanted to write more in retrospect of 2005, but I was busy watching soccer a lot.

And by the way, the important event of 2005 that I intentionally forgot was my engagement. I'm not that much of an asshole.