Bucket List

Years ago I wrote a blog post about the desire to have various life experiences. In honor of the New Year, I thought I’d take the time to update and improve it. The first thing I decided to change is the title of this post, to reflect what it really is — a bucket list.

A list of activities someone wants to do before he or she dies is often called a bucket list, because it is a list of things a person wants to do before they “kick the bucket” — Wikipedia

I’m not the same man I was then. So naturally some things I wanted then, no longer interest me. Likewise, other things have come to interest me since then. For example, when I wrote the initial post, the phrase bucket list never entered my mind. I just thought of it as an interesting list of things to do. For continuity sake, I’ll preserve the completed items from the orginial post. Completed items are grouped together (and moved up when completed) the top of the list for ease of use. As of 2019 Jan 01 Tue, I have completed 24 items. I’ll update the list periodically as I conquer these goals.

Attend a large music festival.
Go backpacking.
Go camping.
Go snorkeling.
Go snow-shoeing
Go to Disneyland.
Go whale watching.
Have a pillow fight.
Have dinner in your car at a car hop
Hit a home run.
Organize a major event.
Run a 1/2 Marathon.
Run a 5K
Sleep under the stars.
Stand in Times Square.
Start a business.
Start your own blog.
Take a sick day when you’re not ill.
Visit Hawaii.
Walk on a beach by moonlight.
Watch a sunrise or sunset.
Write a song.
Learn to swing dance
Sing karaoke.
Be in a movie.
Build a snow fort.
Build a stylish wardrobe.
Buy a stranger a meal at a restaurant.
Cook Christmas Dinner.
Fly in a helicopter.
Get 6-pack abs.
Give a technical presentation in Spanish at a conference in a Spanish country.
Go Parasailing
Go deep sea fishing.
Go hang gliding.
Go on a cruise.
Go rock climbing.
Go scuba diving
Go to a concert at Madison Square Garden.
Go to a drive-in theater.
Go to the top of the Eiffel Tower in Paris.
Have enough money to be truly satisfied.
Have your picture in the newspaper.
Have your portrait painted / drawn.
Kiss a Celebrity.
Kiss in the rain.
Learn ASL.
Learn CPR.
Learn Spanish.
Learn to draw.
Learn to drive stick shift (manual transmission) car.
Learn to ride a horse.
Learn to shoot a bow and arrow.
Learn to shoot a gun well.
Live in New York City for at least a year.
Live in a foreign country for 3 months.
Meet someone famous.
Play in a band.
Perform 100 consecutive pushups.
Read 36 books in a year.
Ride a train across the USA.
Ride a zip line.
Ride in a gondola in Venice.
Ride in a hot air balloon.
Ride on a speeding motorcycle.
Ride the STP (Seattle to Portland)
Road trip across the USA.
Save someone’s life.
See Michelangelo’s David.
See Niagara Falls in person.
See Old Faithful geyser erupt.
See the Changing of the Guards in London.
See the Grand Canyon in person.
See the Leaning Tower of Pisa in person.
See the Mona Lisa in France.
See the Northern Lights (Aurora Borealis).
See the Sistine Chapel in person.
Send a message in a bottle.
Serenade someone.
Sleep on a train.
Teach yourself an art from scratch.
Visit Barcelona, Spain.
Visit Bogota, Colombia.
Visit Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Visit Copenhagen, Denmark.
Visit Dublin, Ireland.
Visit Lima, Peru.
Visit London, UK.
Visit Madrid, Spain.
Visit Medellin, Colombia.
Visit Mexico City, Mexico.
Visit Santiago, Chile.
Visit Temples at Teotihuacan.
Visit Tokyo, Japan.
Visit the Great Wall of China.
Visit the Lincoln Memorial.
Walk to the top of the Statue of Liberty.
Watch a meteor shower.
Write and publish a book.
Write and release a music album.

Wrap Up

This is quite a diverse list of things to accomplish. These are all things that I want to accomplish. They may not have the same universal appeal as the original list, but that’s ok. I’d encourage you to create your own list. You don’t have to call it a bucket list. Feel free to use my list as a starting point. Don’t have a blog where you can post it? Perfect. That’ll give your first item to complete! If you do, let me know about it. I’d love to see what you come up with. Perhaps you’ll inspire me to further improve my list.