TOC

• New year reminders

• My specific goals

• Entertainment

• Games

• TV

• Movies

• Books

• Others

Something I’ve gotten used to as the New Year rolls in: make a checklist of things to do and things I’m looking forward to for the new year. This is my personal list, but maybe you’ll enjoy going through it too. Check out the new-years-checklist tag for previous years.

New year reminders

These are general reminders that I think anyone would find useful. (I generally copy stuff over, but the list changes a bit every year.)

• Count your blessings for the past year and be grateful

• Change your passwords

• Throw away a few things you no longer need

• Audit your financials – where is your money going, how much do you owe, how much are you earning, where should you invest, etc

• Review your recurring luxury costs (Netflix, etc) and evaluate whether you still really need them

• Pick up your keyboard and shake out all the grime that’s gathered there over the past year

• Choose something from the past year that you’re going to stop watching or doing or move on from

• Eat your favorite food. Or ice cream. Ice cream is great!

• Replace 2025 calendars

• Digital housekeeping

• Delete all files downloaded 2023 or earlier

• Clean up the photos on your phone, tablet and computer

• Backup/archive all important content

• Check your backups

• Export your data from platforms like Google, FB, Instagram and Twitter

• Make sure to see a doctor every so often

• Follow up on the people who owe you money or things

• Forgive those who have wronged you

• Speak truth to power

• Seek beauty and wonder in this harsh world

• Be kind

• Reach out to your friends more often

• Relax, give yourself room to breathe and grow

• Buy a new toothbrush

• Believe that a better world can be possible

• Focus only on what matters

• Do not obey in advance

• Quit social media, run your own blog, write anything you want

My specific goals

This section is a thing I started in 2023. These are more specific yes/no measurable goals than the ones above.

Primary goal: Figure things out. This feels like the first year we’re going in, we don’t have any (known) big upcoming family problems to worry about, so I should take the opportunity to figure out what I want to be doing for the foreseeable future; after all I have done 5 hiatus years in a row, and that can’t go on indefinitely! I’m not sure if I want to look for full-time work again, or try to keep working part-time/freelance, or maybe start a small business or what. In theory I could have been using my free time the past few years to figure these things out, but an answer remains elusive; hopefully being free from other concerns makes it easier!

Secondary goals:

• Setup Linux dual boot on my desktop

• Learn a new programming language (maybe Rust?)

• Buy and ride a bike. (Carried over from last year)

• Start sketching again.

• Listen to more music and more of it should be new to me.

• Submit a crossword to the NYT. (Carried over from last year)

• Start using OpenStreetMap instead of Google Maps where possible. (Carried over from last year)

• General room cleaning. (Carried over from last year)

• Go through the boxes behind the bed, toss out what isn’t needed

• Go through the drawers

• Toss out at least 6 booster boxes worth of MTG draft chaff

• Figure out what to do with the SmartThings things

• MTG Inventory

• Archival work

• Continue/finish scanning old photographs

• Continue my secret scanning projects

• Bring the triviastorm triviabot back from the dead

Entertainment

Games

New releases I’m looking forward to: none!

Older releases I want to play:

| | | | | | | | | | | Tales of Xillia 2 | PS3 | RPG | carried over from 2022! | | The Witcher 3: GOTY | Steam | RPG | in-progress | | Wasteland 3 | Steam | RPG | carried over from 2023 | | Marvel’s Guardians of the Galaxy | Steam | RPG | purchased late 2024 | | Marvel’s Midnight Suns | Steam | RPG | purchased late 2024 | | Cyberpunk 2077 | Steam | RPG | |

TV

Some entries carried over from 2024.

| | | | | | | | | Jan08 | The Pitt S2 | HBOMax | | Jan15 | Seven Dials | Netflix | | Jan15 | Starfleet Academy | ??? | | Jan18 | A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms | HBOMax | | Jan27 | Wonder Man | Disney+ | | Feb25 | Scrubs | Disney+ | | Mar04 | Daredevil Born Again S2 | Disney+ | | Mar10 | One Piece S2 | Netflix | | Apr08 | The Boys S5 | PrimeVideo | | Apr10 | Malcolm in the Middle: Life is Still Unfair | Disney+ | | TBA | Ahsoka S2 | Disney+ | | TBA | X-Men 97 S2 | Disney+ | | TBA | Friendly Neighborhood Spider-man S2 | Disney+ | | TBA | Vision Quest | Disney+ | | TBA | Lanterns | HBOMax |

Shows I already started and hope to finish:

| | | | | | | | | 2025 | High Potential S2 | Disney+ | | 2025 | Fallout S2 | PrimeVideo |

Movies

I won’t be watching all of these in the cinema (ticket prices are high yo!) and will instead wait for a home/streaming release. This list feels a bit short; honestly there are a bunch of other trailers that seemed interesting, but this is what I have for now.

| | | | | | | | | — | Star Trek: Section 31 | Carried over | | — | Ballerina | Carried over | | — | Jurassic World Rebirth | Carried over | | Mar20 | Project Hail Mary | | | Apr03 | The Super Mario Galaxy Movie | | | May15 | Mortal Kombat II | | | May22 | The Mandalorian and Grogu | | | Jun26 | Supergirl | | | Jul17 | The Odyssey | | | Jul31 | Spider-man Brand New Day | | | Sep11 | Clayface | | | Oct16 | Street Fighter | | | Dec18 | Avengers Doomsday | | | Dec18 | Dune Part III | |

I am hoping to watch more movies this coming year though!

Books

Nothing specific I’m looking for in terms of new releases. I am hoping to read more Murderbot Diaries and Discworld though!

Others

I still feel mostly unambitious. As is usual, I mostly just want to see what happens next! Let us see what 2026 brings us!