New Year's Resolutions

1. Be More Productive

    Put your smartphone away. Just kidding how can you do anything without your Google Calendar? Oh wait, you have five Facebook notifications. Just gotta check those really quick, right? I mean what if your high school crush finally poked you back? This could be important.

2. Organize Your Things

    Start with your fridge. For every five Gala apples, throw in a bottle of San Pellegrino and a wheel of Brie de Meaux. Now every time you walk that well-traveled route from futon to mini-fridge you can pretend you actually have some distinction above your fellow Ben & Jerry's Bingers and Easy Mac Addicts. Now, for that pile of paperwork on your desk...

3. Boost Your Confidence

    Remove and sell away all the mirrors from your living space, but be careful not to break any, because that's just bad luck. Replace each mirror with a skinny mirror (i.e. not exactly a funhouse mirror). Now you can fool yourself into thinking you're actually attractive. 

4. Start a Business or Get a Stable Job

    You think your Lemonade Stand business proposition is actually some kind of original, life-fulfilling career choice? You're right. It's better than wasting away behind the ever encroaching walls of some office cubicle with a dorky picture of your family on your cork board and a desk fan that doesn't blow well enough. (pun intended)

5. Be More Friendly and Approachable

    Forget about joining a weekly yoga class or actually giving a flying fig about caring for other people. Just get a pack of those Crest Whitening Strips and practice smiling like a constipated sales agent every morning. You'll realize it's all just indigestion anyway and being a nice person will start coming naturally to you just like getting in debt did.

6. Learn How to Cook

    Flip on FoodNetwork and spend a couple hours with Iron Chef. Go to your nearest department store and purchase every RachelRay kitchen appliance that looks appealing. Come home and realize your fridge is empty except for some moldy Brie and an unopened Absolut on the side door. Go return all your dumb kitchen gadgets and crash on your futon with  frustration. Speed dial your friend Hong Li from Panda Heaven. Tell him you want "the usual."

7. Quit Smoking

    Text Nicotine tonight and tell her to call because you need to talk. Explain to her how things just don't seem to be working out anymore like they used to, but don't let her know that you're dumping her for that OG Kush. She'll find out anyway when she stalks your profile pictures for the next three months.

8. Shift from Alcohol to Healthy Drinks

    Okay so, chasing 151 with Miller Lights and Heineken every weekend isn't helping you out so much with the whole "let's be salubrious" idea. Some people prescribe coconut water as the best pre-pre-gaming tonic to avoid the morning-after-hangover. Others swear by cactus juice. Why not skip the whole hangover episode altogether by fighting fire with fire: just get drunk all over again. But that's only dumb-college-kid-speaks type advice. Instead, just avoid drinks with high congener content and say "Salute."

9. Be a Vegetarian for 30 Days

    Have you been a carnivore come omnivore your whole life? Can't imagine how vegetarians get their protein? Well, congratulations. You are officially a misinformed, brainwashed by the FDA, average American consumer. But don't worry. I don't blame you. The truth is you don't need "The Other White Meat," nor do you need to follow the "Got Milk" campaign. Go vegan, or as Oprah advocates, be "vegan-ish." The average American doesn't need to bulk up on such an obsessive high-protein diet, and most dairy products actually decrease your body's calcium levels. Don't believe me? Just check out Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease.        

10. Share Knowledge With Others

    If you're tweeting about your soggy breakfast cereal, you're missing the point. And sharing your latest cat video discoveries is not an enlightening activity for yourself or others. Watch TED, and no I don't mean the Seth MacFarlane comedy film. Get on that NPR trip. Subscribe to debka.com and consider what advice you wish someone gave you ten years ago. Then share that advice with someone and have a meaningful life discussion (whatever that means), because honestly, Siri's been getting tired of listening to you.    

a satire of "Why Do People Fail in Their New Year's Resolutions" from www.2012resolutions.org