A Beatle once said, “Life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans”.   That certainly proved true this month when cancer once again reared its ugly head in all of our lives by surprising my sister, Michelle, with yet another you’ve-got-to-be-kidding-me visit.   I guess that sonofabitch just forgot what it was like to get its ass kicked the first time around. Nevertheless, cancer will quickly learn that it chose the wrong host as it will soon choke on the poisons that my sister will bravely endure to defeat it once and for all.  In the mean time, Michelle has vowed that she will lean more on her family and friends this time around and, I for one, look forward to being leaned on. 

While my list seems trivial in comparison to fighting cancer, my sister was the first to point out its relevance.  She said that she looks forward to every post and that it is a source of hope and motivation for her to act on her own set of goals.  While our circumstances and challenges are night and day, we both realize that life is short and we must act to enjoy it.  I love my list, not because of the things that are on it will make me happy, but because I am already happy and that they just add to the experience.  A change of perspective is an amazing thing.  And I’m just getting started.  To quote Abe Lincoln, “It’s not the years in your life that count, it’s the life in your years.”

As for my list, January was a good start.  Despite knocking out just three goals (#1, #54, #71) on my list of one hundred, I made progress on a half dozen more.  I completed my first goal at the stroke of midnight on January 1st with a simple kiss.  The kiss was great, but the night was ho hum as most New Year’s Eves tend to be. They just never seem to live up to the hype.  With only a slight hangover to deal with, we were off and running.

It should come as no surprise that our first goal of the new year was to eat.  We discovered a new breakfast joint, The Coral Tree Cafe, thus completing the first step toward goal #24 (discover a new eatery once a month).  However, rather than settle back to our regular eating spots, we continued to venture out and try new places, including: Iwata Sushi in Sherman Oaks, Koi (#71) in West Hollywood, Chez Nois in Toluca Lake, Boneyard Bistro in Sherman Oaks, Cafe Vida in Pacific Palisades, Big Wangs in North Hollywood, and The Abbey in West Hollywood.  We also ate a bunch at our usual spots including, Artisan Cheese Shop, Katsuya, Laurel Tavern, Aroma Cafe and Casa Vega.  While we ate out more than we “should”, I did manage to cook dinner two nights in a row.  The first meal was jumbo shrimp on a bed of Angel Hair pasta with asparagus.  For my second trick, I christened the crock pot Georgeanne got us for Christmas with chicken and dumplings.  Even the kids liked that one.  Anyway, with all of that eating #25 (weigh 155 lbs) was paid no service. 

As for my progress in regards to the rest of the list….

(#23) We saw Gran Torino, Revolutionary Road and The Wrestler at the theater over the month and really enjoyed all three of them.  (#5) I made minimal progress on my current screenplay, but feel as though I am close to a breakthrough. I have also started to use the local library as my office. (#8) January was a better than expected month for us.  We were bracing for bad times that have yet to come.  Please don’t come. (#10) We hiked a couple of times, but yeah, nothing regular yet.  (#11) All of the necessary forms and payments are in concerning Devin’s college applications.  Now we just wait.  Hopefully we will know something this month. (#12) We still don’t know where Brittany is going to High School. (#15) Despite getting knocked into next Tuesday by an errantly thrown softball, I am still having trouble leveraging our bank account for health insurance. (#19) So far, so good. (#20) Wrote two posts on my Grandfather’s Office. (#22) After recently finishing the book, Outliers (excellent), I have begun reading The Big Sleep. (#54) We laid in bed all day and did nothing but play scrabble and watch TV.  The rain made it that much better. (#95) So far, so good. (#97) I only applied for Trivial Pursuit so far because it was a simple application.  The other game shows will require videos and auditions.

As for what is not on the list…

When she wasn’t playing Club Soccer, Brittany went on a trip of a lifetime to Washington D.C. to witness the presidential inauguration of Barak Obama.  Devin continues to ride out his senior year in High School and ready himself for his final baseball season.  Although I sustained a substantial shiner to my right eye in the process, we put together our best softball season to date.  In other sporting news, Marquette Basketball continues to exceed my expectations.  After going 8-0 in January Big East Play, the Warriors are playing for the record books.  The Clippers, on the other hand, continue to disappoint.  I suspect the remaining few games my Dad has tickets for will be our last.  It should also be mentioned that January produced more than twenty 80+ degree days.  With the rest of the country under snow and ice, how can you not smile with days like these?  And finally, we celebrated the birthday of my little sister, Rosie, and my niece and nephew, Kaden and Kennedy.  Without friends and family, this list is meaningless.

On to February.

As a screenwriter, I’m embarassed to say that I haven’t seen twenty percent of the movies on AFI’s top 100 movies of all time.  Those of which I have not seen are marked in bold.  Because Brando is one of my favorite actors, I’m going to start with a Streetcar Named Desire.

Update: Did it.

1. Citizen Kane (1941)
2. The Godfather (1972)
3. Casablanca (1942)
4. Raging Bull (1980)
5. Singin’ in the Rain (1952)
6. Gone with the Wind (1939)
7. Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
8. Schindler’s List (1993)
9. Vertigo (1958)
10. The Wizard of Oz (1939)
11. City Lights (1931)
12. The Searchers (1956)
13. Star Wars (1977)
14. Psycho (1960)
15. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)
16. Sunset Blvd. (1950)
17. The Graduate (1967)
18. The General (1927)
19. On the Waterfront (1954)
20. It’s a Wonderful Life (1946)
21. Chinatown (1974)
22. Some Like It Hot (1959)
23. The Grapes of Wrath (1940)
24. E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (1982)
25. To Kill A Mockingbird (1962)
26. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939)
27. High Noon (1952)
28. All About Eve (1950)
29. Double Indemnity (1944)
30. Apocalypse Now (1979)
31. The Maltese Falcon (1941)
32. The Godfather Part II (1974)
33. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (1975)
34. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)
35. Annie Hall (1977)
36. The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
37. The Best Years of Our Lives (1946)
38. The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948)
39. Dr. Strangelove (1964)
40. The Sound of Music (1965)
41. King Kong (1933)
42. Bonnie and Clyde (1967)
43. Midnight Cowboy (1969)
44. The Philadelphia Sotry (1940)
45. Shane (1953)
46. It Happened One Night (1934)
47. A Streetcar Named Desire (1951)
48. Rear Window (1954)
49. Intolerance (1916)
50. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)
51. West Side Story (1961)
52. Taxi Driver (1976)
53. The Deer Hunter (1978)
54. M*a*s*h (1970)
55. North By Northwest (1959)
56. Jaws (1977)
57. Rocky (1976)
58. The Gold Rush (1925)
59. Nashville (1975)
60. Duck Soup (1933)
61. Sullivan’s Travels (1958)
62. American Graffiti (1973)
63. Cabaret (1972)
64. Network (1976)
65. The African Queen (1951)
66. Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981)
67. Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966)
68. Unforgiven (1992)
69. Tootsie (1982)
70. A Clockwork Orange (1971)
71. Saving Private Ryan (1998)
72. The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
73. Butch Caddidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)
74. The Silence of the Lambs (1991)
75. In the Heat of the Night (1967)
76. Forrest Gump (1994)
77. All the President’s Men (1976)
78. Modern Times (1936)
79. The Wild Bunch (1969)
80. The Apartment (1960)
81. Spartacus (1960)
82. Sunrise (1927)
83. Titanic (1997)
84. Easy Rider (1969)
85. A Night at the Opera (1935)
86. Platoon (1986)
87. 12 Angry Men (1957)
88. Bringing Up Baby (1938)
89. The Sixth Sense (1999)
90. Swing Time (1936)
91. Sophie’s Choice (1982)
92. Goodfellas (1990)
93. The French Connection (1971)
94. Pulp Fiction (1994)
95. The Last Picture Show (1971)
96. Do the Right Thing (1989)
97. Blade Runner (1982)
98. Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942)
99. Toy Story (1991)
100. Ben-Hur (1959)

I know wine ratings by pompous twits such as Robert Parker are a bit absurd, but I thought it would be fun to sip a “perfect” wine nonetheless.  Unfortuantely it will not be as easy I thought.  I guess perfection is hard to come by.  Even if a restaurant were to miraculously carry a 100 point wine, there ain’t no way in Dixie they’re pouring it by the glass.  I did manage to track down a Sloan 2002 Cabernet from Napa Valley, but it was a tad expensive.  About $1400 more than I wanted to spend.  And from what I’ve learned, that’s about the average cost of a Wine Spectator, Wine Enthusiast or Wine Advocate 100 point wine.  But here’s the thing, it’s on my list and I won’t fail to accomplish a single goal.  So if you have any advice, be sure to shoot it my way.

Although I’m not exactly sure what “art” is, I knew that I wanted to include it on my list.  Not only am I a graduate of liberal arts, but I am also pursuing a profession in the “arts”.  With that said, I don’t particularly buy into the art and artist world. There are many people who view writing as an art.  However, I have never heard a good writer refer to himself or one of his peers as an artist.  Instead, these writers believe as I do in that writing is a craft.  No one is a born writer.  You have to first learn how to speak, then write, then writer better.  It’s a process.  The question is, is painting any different?  Or acting?  Or playing an instrument?  Isn’t everything learned and practiced?  Sure, one may take to writing or painting or composing more than another, but it takes real work and practice to “master” it.  No one shoots out of womb with a masterpiece.  Mozart was a talented SOB.  He was writing music at six and composing concertos at eleven.  Yes, he was talented, but mostly he was just committed.  In fact, those early concertos were mostly written by his father and were essentially rearrangements of more accomplished composers.   In fact, most experts agree that Mozart’s earliest masterwork (No. 9, K. 271) was not composed until he was twenty-one.  It is said that it took him ten thousand hours of practice/work to produce this masterpiece.   Ten thousand hours is a significant amount of time as it is the magic number that most experts believe it takes someone to master a particular “talent”.  So, while the 27 concertos are impressive, what I truly admire about Mozart is that he was able to log ten thousand hours of practice/work by the age of twenty-one.   I for one have yet to log those kind of hours and I’m thirty-five years old.  Then again, I’m no Mozart. After all, the one piece of art I was recently compelled to buy was a limited edition movie poster print of, The Shining.  What can I say, I love me some Jack.

First post of the year and I’m already faced with a major dilemma; to bullshit or not to bullshit.  I suppose that since this blog is mostly for myself, I should be as honest as possible. So with that said, I must admit that this New Year’s Eve was pretty much a downer.  But before I piss all over it, I should first point out the good news – I managed to knock out one of my one hundred goals; kiss Sonia at midnight on January 1st, 2009.  As for the rest of the night, it pretty much sucked.  We began the evening at one of our local watering holes, Senior Freds. Despite the owner’s investment of kazoos and party hats, the bar was never at more than half of its capacity.    Even worse, the half that showed up were about as interesting as a box of hair.  Nevertheless, Sonia and I rang in the new year with a glass of champagne and a kiss.  With the night still young, we decided to attend a house party in Sherman Oaks.  With over two hundred guests in attendance, great food, an open bar and loud music, it was a party certainly worthy of ringing in the new year.  Unfortunately, Sonia and I found the festivities impossible to enjoy due to the fact that our son, Devin was spending the night at his friend’s house despite being forbidden to do so.  Ah, the joys of parenthood…..  So, instead of beginning the new year with visions of joy and wonderment, we began with thoughts of torture.  Happy New Year!

Welcome to my new blog, “Kenwood’s Playlist: living vicariously through myself”.  It is in this little corner of the world wide web that I will chronicle my daily pursuit of happiness, a journey that I have only just recently begun.  After thirty four years of hitting my head against the proverbial wall, I have finally begun to understand what Forrest Gump realized from the get go, happiness is perception.  In other words, you can complain because roses have thorns, or you can rejoice because thorns have roses.  Although I haven’t perfected this approach to life just yet, a confluence of recent life events have made me realize that it is how I perceive each life situation that will dictate my happiness and level of success.  That said, a leopard can’t change it’s stripes.  I am not all of the sudden going to become a Tony Robbins clone.  I actually enjoy the darkness at times.  In fact, I think it’s what enables most of us to see the light.  I’m just going to try to be a little more aware and present on a daily basis.  And while I will do my best to make lemonade if life presents me lemons, I’m still bound to partake in a little road rage or sulking in my bed.  Carl Jung said “There are as many nights as days, and the one is just as long as the other in the year’s course. Even a happy life cannot be without a measure of darkness, and the word ‘happy’ would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness."  I certainly expect my life to be balanced in this regard, but hopefully this little experiment will help me see more roses and less thorns.  So rather than wait for life to come to me I intend to be a bit more proactive in the aspects of my life that I have relative control over, most importantly my time.  As you have probably noticed on the side bar of this blog, I’ve compiled a list of one hundred things I’d like to accomplish in 2009.  It’s like a Bucket List (things to do before you kick the bucket), but with more accountability.  Afterall, with a bucket list you can’t technically fail until you die.  So, rather than procrastinate, I choose to hold myself accountable and live my best life now, day by day, year by year.  Not unlike my "365 day project” on Flickr, this blog/diary will not only motivate me to act on my “to-do” list, but it will also force me to put the results of my day, good or bad, in perspective.  I might crash and burn, but I’m excited to excelerate the ride that Sonia and I vowed to take a little less than a year ago.

And it begins…
Welcome to my new blog, “Kenwood’s Playlist: living vicariously through myself”. It is in this little corner of the world wide web that I will chronicle my daily pursuit of happiness, a journey that I have only just recently begun. After thirty four years of hitting my head against the proverbial wall, I have finally begun to understand what Forrest Gump realized from the get go, happiness is perception. In other words, you can complain because roses have thorns, or you can rejoice because thorns have roses. Although I haven’t perfected this approach to life just yet, a confluence of recent life events have made me realize that it is how I perceive each life situation that will dictate my happiness and level of success. That said, a leopard can’t change it’s stripes. I am not all of the sudden going to become a Tony Robbins clone. I actually enjoy the darkness at times. In fact, I think it’s what enables most of us to see the light. I’m just going to try to be a little more aware and present on a daily basis. And while I will do my best to make lemonade if life presents me lemons, I’m still bound to partake in a little road rage or sulking in my bed. Carl Jung said “There are as many nights as days, and the one is just as long as the other in the year’s course. Even a happy life cannot be without a measure of darkness, and the word ‘happy’ would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness.” I certainly expect my life to be balanced in this regard, but hopefully this little experiment will help me see more roses and less thorns. So rather than wait for life to come to me I intend to be a bit more proactive in the aspects of my life that I have relative control over, most importantly my time. As you have probably noticed on the side bar of this blog, I’ve compiled a list of one hundred things I’d like to accomplish in 2009. It’s like a Bucket List (things to do before you kick the bucket), but with more accountability. Afterall, with a bucket list you can’t technically fail until you die. So, rather than procrastinate, I choose to hold myself accountable and live my best life now, day by day, year by year. Not unlike my “365 day project” on Flickr, this blog/diary will not only motivate me to act on my “to-do” list, but it will also force me to put the results of my day, good or bad, in perspective. I might crash and burn, but I’m excited to excelerate the ride that Sonia and I vowed to take a little less than a year ago.