What is going on?

Three months ago, I graduated from college.

Three months ago, I moved across the country in search of Adventure and Manifest Destiny.

Three months ago, I didn't know I would be moving back in with my parents.

Home for me happens to be a little town north of Daytona Beach, Florida - but really, that's saying too much. Home happens to be (not Miami) Florida, a place from which I and most of my friends spent our entire adolescence cooking up plans to escape. Florida, for those unfamiliar with anything but the tourist literature, is a cultural vacuum of the worst kind. Between the tourists who demand Mickey Mouse merchandise and the tourists who demand to eat at the Olive Garden, there's not much of a market for the weird, the quirky, or the unique north of South Beach and south of North Georgia.

I need to go home out of economic necessity, but I need to want to go home for the sake of my mental health.

Ergo, I need to look forward to keeping myself occupied while passing the winter months at home.

Luckily, one month ago, I encountered by chance this blog, and the world of Mission 101: set 101 goals for yourself to complete in 1001 days. Sounds easy enough, right? One hundred and one little goals spread out over 2.75 years? Not if you don't do it right.

The trick to actually completing this mission (which I personally define both as making it to the end while still actively trying to accomplish things, and as ticking off all the goals, or as many as I feel is reasonable to feel accomplished by the 1001st day) is to balance long and short-term goals with one-time things (like climb the Statue of Liberty, or something) so that I neither get too bored or overwhelmed trying to manage a lot of "good habits" daily/weekly/monthly quota things, nor too bored or too overwhelmed waiting for and trying to pay for expensive travel opportunities or adventures or whatever.

So, in the next few posts, I will put up my master list, and then detailed breakdowns by goal categories which will more thoroughly explain each goal and provide an easy way, later on, to track my progress on each. In one week, on Friday, August 28, 2009, I will begin my Mission 101. Feel free to follow this blog, add it to your RSS feed, or just plain old bookmark it if you'd like to follow my journey. On the sidebar up at the top, you can sign up to receive email updates, if that's more your style. I plan on making at least weekly progress posts, as well as updates whenever something Big and Important happens for a particular goal. Thanks for reading, and I hope we enjoy the ride!