Welcome, 2025!

HELP! I CAN’T REMEMBER MY PASSWORDS

By Neil Offen
Columnist

My resolutions for the New Year:

• Refrain from ever addressing anyone as “bro.”
• When a waiter stops by to ask if everything’s ok, first finish chewing, then mention that the corned beef sandwich is a little dry.
• Figure out the difference between “partly sunny” and “partly cloudy.”
• Go to the gym more often. Twice would be good.
• Never use the word “dude” in a sentence.
• Floss.
• Explore how the temperature-humidity index is calculated.
• Never watch any episode of the real housewives of anywhere.
• Don’t turn on red when the sign says “Don’t turn on red.”
• Mention that I floss semi-regularly to the dental hygienist before she looks and knows I’m exaggerating.
• Eat more kohlrabi even if it tastes like kohlrabi.
• Find out what kohlrabi is.
• Try not to lose my phone more than once every few weeks.
• Identify all the components of an everything bagel.
• Do not pronounce Bluesky as Bloo-ski.
• Learn a foreign language, as long as there’s no subjunctive tense involved and most of the words look like they are in English.
• Ignore “Emily in Paris.”
• Don’t chew while trying to speak a foreign language, even if it looks like English.
• Go through an entire month without banging my knees, twisting my ankle or stubbing my most vulnerable toes.
• Make believe I know what people are talking about when they are talking about Snapchat.
• Get more sleep, although not while eating.
• Do not post my Wordle score on FaceBook. (Corollary: do not figure out how to play Wordle.)
• Don’t be envious of people who have taken long vacations to exotic Caribbean islands. Maybe, hopefully, the airlines lost their luggage.
• Figure out an easier way to translate centigrade into Fahrenheit.
• Remember where I left whatever that thing is I left.
• Practice mindful meditation to calm myself even when I realize I have not kept any of those other damn stupid ridiculous irritating resolutions.

Carrboro resident Neil Offen has been a humor columnist for four decades and on two continents. He is the author of “Building a Better Boomer,” available wherever books are sold.
This reporter can be reached at Info@TheLocalReporter.press