To start 2023, I decided to move everything back to where it began. I registered nicholastoone.com well over a decade ago, so that’s where everything is going to be. The Low Budget Lifer domain will not be renewed and will fall by they wayside sometime in late April. No more clever URL’s. No more content creating on whatever the big platform of the day is. No more playing with SEO or whatnot. Just me in my little corner of the Internet.
I was going to post a big, blathering piece about 2022 but I couldn’t find the right tone. Everything I wrote sounded overly bitchy, or overly elitist, or overly preachy. In the end, I’ve settled on a short list of what could be called resolutions.
Exercise
I need to move more. Working from home and having a car has made me very, very lazy and I can feel it. I turned 50 last year and my body is creaking in ways I’m not used to and I don’t like it. I know a big part of it is I spend too much time sitting on my ass and not getting up and moving.
Up until my mid thirties, I used to bike everywhere. Hell, I was even a bike courier at one point in my life; my bike was my main form of transportation.
I plan to start moving again. I’m going to get myself a bike and start using it for all the errands that I currently drive for – like going to the store that’s literally less than 5 Km away. We also have a treadmill and a stationary recumbent in the basement that I’m going to make use of a few times a week. It doesn’t have to be anything ridiculous, I just need to move more and sit on my ass less.
Food and Drink
I don’t eat like complete shit, but I eat more carbs and sugar than I should and I plan to rectify that. While I’ve already cut my coffee down to around two cups a day, I want to get this down to one. I’m also cutting booze out for the most part in 2023 for both financial and health reasons.
Stay off my fucking phone
God I hate my phone. I could rant for days about why I hate my phone. It’s not an Apple vs Android thing, it’s a phone thing in general. I hate that it takes up so much of my spare time. I hate that both the phones and the “services” we use are engineered to keep us using our phones.
The main thing keeping me with a smartphone is work; Teams, Outlook, etc. I’ve looked at what I use my phone for other than work and have discovered that I could get by with a cheap ass device. I don’t need all the bullshit that’s advertised (these companies are adding cameras the way Gillette adds more blades to razors). None of us do, really, but we buy them anyway.
Anyway, I’m stopping my rant there and saying I’m going to find ways to stay off my phone unless it’s work related.
Speaking of “services”
I have both an Instagram and Facebook account. I also spend an inordinate amount of time watching shit on YouTube and I really need to cut that out.
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- Instagram: I’ve deleted the app off my phone and will stick to checking it on my computer browser only. If I don’t miss it, then delete my account.
- Facebook: I had created this account in early 2022 for a very specific reason and I had planned to delete it altogether in the fall, but I wound up being put in touch with some extended family thanks in, part to FB so I’m keeping it around for the foreseeable future and only for Messenger.
- YouTube: I just need to try and stay off it. I mostly use YT for music tutorials and some history stuff but this can lead to a video spiral thanks to the recommended list that gets served up.
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Spare Time
With the idea of cutting way back on my phone and social media usage comes spending my spare time hanging out with my family, reading, creating, doing things that are not just scrolling through an endless feed of memes and other useless bullshit.
I have an awesome family that I love more than anything. So why do I insist on spending so much of my downtime with my phone? I could be going for morning walks with my wife, or spending time with my kids that does not include sending each other memes.
Everything Else
I spent the last couple of weeks of 2022 really thinking about where I am in life and it really clarified the point that things are awesome; my relationship with my wife is as strong as it ever was and we’re right where we want to be. We don’t covet needless, expensive trinkets or bigger houses or whatever else we’re supposed to have bought into to signal that we’re “making it”. There is no prize at the end of this game. It doesn’t matter if you pay $5 or $55 for a hamburger, it’s still just a fucking hamburger.
We also have financial goals for 2023 while I’m not inclined to go into the details, I will say it includes not spending money on stupid shit. This goes hand in hand with the original idea behind The Low Budget Lifer which was to make the most of what you have and not break the bank on stuff you don’t need.
Family and health (physical and mental) is more important than anything Apple wants to sell you or Facebook wants to serve up to you. Being creative means much more than uploading a 30 second hot take to a video platform that may not even be around in 5 years.
Then again, maybe I’m just old now. Or maybe not.
Whether or not I’m old, or just idealistic, or some combination of the two, 2023 is going to be about family, heath, finances, and good, old fashioned creativity.
Well shit. I said this wasn’t going to be a big, blathering, elitist, bitchy piece yet here we are. Oh well.
I hope your 2023 is excellent and everything you hope will will be, and by the way:
