Tuesday 20 August 2013

Life List



Thanks facebook wisdom

Last year I made a love list to life. It was a great thing to think about, and I still think about it from time to time, those 100 things still give me great pleasure. Around the same time I came across a number of people making life lists- a list of things that they want to accomplish in their lives. Mighty Life List. Mighty Chookoolonks Life List. That seemed like an important thing to do. After all if you don't make an effort to do these things, they more than likely won't happen, this stuff doesn't tend to just happen by itself. Which would be a great shame. As John Lennon said "Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans".


So for my 500th post I thought it was time to think about my Life List a bit more. To put it out there. To remind me to do the things I really want to do.



Go to the Melbourne Cup


Visit all 6,11, 2019 edit: now it's 28(- 1) UNESCO cities of literature- Edinburgh, Melbourne most years since 1987, Iowa City, Dublin  2010, Reykjavik, Norwich, Kraków, Heidelberg, Dunedin, Granada, Prague, Baghdad, Barcelona, Ljubljana, Lviv, Montevideo, Nottingham, Óbidos, Tartu, Ulyanovsk, Bucheon, Durban, Lillehammer, Manchester, Milan, Québec City, Seattle 1985, Utrecht 2013.


(2019 Louise says: Wow, this list is really getting out of hand. 28 cities and Paris still isn't there! I've edited it to exclude Baghdad, as I can't see that I would ever travel there, everywhere else seems doable-ish in some future life)

Travel to Antarctica


Attend all Australian Writers festivals at least once- Adelaide (February), Bateman's Bay (June), Bathurst (May), Orange (July), Bendigo (August), Byron Bay (early August), Brisbane (September), Kiama (October), Melbourne (late August) three times,  Mudgee (August),  Newcastle (March), Perth (February), Sydney (May)


Attend an announcement of Literary Prizes- Age Book of the Year, CBCA Awards, Miles Franklin


Live in Paris for a year


Go to Darwin


Hear a nightingale sing


Visit what I think of as the ancestral home in Scotland


See a puffin (perhaps I'd better hurry up?)


Go on a pelagic trip


Cruise the South Pacific


Read Dickens, all of his major works at least- A Christmas Carol, A Tale of Two Cities, Barnaby Rudge, Bleak House (still the best book I've half read twice), David Copperfield, Dombey and Son, Great Expectations, Hard Times, Little Dorrit, Martin Chuzzlewit, Nicholas Nickelby, The Old Curiosity Shop, Oliver Twist, Our Mutual Friend, Pickwick Papers.


Cook my way through The Delia Collection Soup


Read all 1001- currently 320+


Drive across Australia


See Sydney NYE fireworks, not just on the tele


Climb the Sydney Harbour Bridge 2015 (see my day)


Swim up to the bar (Sofitel Siem Reap, Cambodia March 2018)



Sure, the pool was shut the first time...
But the bar was open the second time I swam up!

1000 fruits what a fabulous idea! Perhaps I'll start with 100?


See Cirque du Soleil's O in Las Vegas


Shave my head


Go on a snorkelling holiday with my son


Learn French, again (a perpetual challenge, but I am working on it)


Go back to Canada


This isn't a final list of course. There will be more over time, and hopefully most of these will be completed. Some are fairly easy, and some, well, they're more of a challenge.

12 comments:

Jeanie said...

I needed to see this list -- I'm retiring and they asked me to make a bucket list of 20-30 things. My mind was sort of a blank. Sort of. And not. And you have inspired me. Not the same things, but how wonderful the bucket can be! What a great list -- I hope they all come to fruition -- and much more!

Carol said...

I made up a bucket list a year or so ago and am slowly doing things and adding things to it.

skiourophile said...

"Live in Paris for a year". Sigh... oh yes, please!

bermudaonion said...

We really do need to spend more time living because life is short. Some of the items on your list, like shave my head, made me smile.

Hannah said...

I like the last one in particular. You should do this very soon. ;)

Deb Nance at Readerbuzz said...

Yes, I like this list, Louise. A year in Paris sounds lovely. And a puffin. Oh my. (But I'd cross off Darwin. My brother lived there for two years and he wasn't a fan.)

Deb Nance at Readerbuzz said...

And I'm really curious about the UNESCO Cities of Literature. I think I'll see if I can find out more about that.

Parisbreakfasts said...

What is swim up to the bar?
I think you could easily skip Iowa City though I've never been...
I wish I was good with lists.
I tend to lose them or forget.
Sometimes just being lazy is nice...like today..rainy and a bit chilly here in Paris.

Louise said...

Jeanie- glad to be of some help, I'd love to see your list too.

Carol making the list does help to clarify it all, and I hope to achieve things.

Vicki- Paris for a year and Antarctica I think are two of the big ones.

Kathy- I'm not sure why I want to shave my head, it's just always been something that I've wanted to do.

Ah Hannah, I wish I was. I have no idea when that delight will occur.

Deb- I don't think I can cross off Darwin. The Northern Territory is the only state/territory that I haven't visited. It'd be unAustralian of me to not want to go...

Carol- I want to go somewhere lush and tropical that has a pool with a bar in it and swim up to the bar. I've only seen it in pictures, and it always looks so amazing. Iowa City is an intriguing and perhaps surprising addition to the cities of literature for me, but there must be good reasons for it to be there? It is possibly the least tempting of the cities for me.

Mutterings from Maryville said...

You left off 'Visiting my friends Kevin and Steve in Larnook' ;-)

Louise said...

Ah that's because it's on the to do list, not the maybe one day I'll get to do that list! Everytime I see some of your pictures it reminds me how much I want to visit.

Deb Nance at Readerbuzz said...

Okay, yes, I've taken a look at this list before. Of course I'm not the same person. Now it's the idea of visiting Antarctica that intrigues me the most.