Since I’ve been blogging I’ve been taking part in the ancient tradition of setting goals at new year’s. What this tradition is infamous for is that those traditions are out the window come February, but I’m going set resolutions again, just to keep some reminders.

This year I’m going at it slightly differently than last year where all goals were rather absolute. Either you made them or you didn’t. Everything could be counted or checked off.

Of course, there are going to be similar ones too but in general I’m going to try to improve myself in general. Be more efficient, spend more time doing things I love than things I loathe. Be more focussed at what I’m doing, be it work, reading, writing or whatever.

In general, I’m going to try to waste less. Stop wasting time watching the 1000th rerun of Big Bang Theory. Stop wasting money on £ 12 bottles of beer simply because they are from BrewDog (not meaning I won’t buy any, but I’ll skip the Belgian Triple & English IPA mash-ups…). Stop wasting my health by eating that extra Nutella sandwich.

However, this is a whisky blog and it will remain that way. That means there has to be some crap in here about booze. So here go the more absolute ones:

1. Bring down my amount of open bottles from 92 to 65.
2. Host a Bottoms-up Tasting and the 4th Blog Birthday Bash.
3. Go to Hielander Whisky Festival and Maltstock. Maybe also to Whisky & Rum aan Zee.
4. Visit the Whiskybase Shop, and Van der Boog.
5. Visit Brouwerij De Molen.
6. Organize a trip to Speyside with some friends.
7. Brew some beer.
8. Do at least one Bottle-Share.
9. Stick to my budget.

Compared to last year, this is a fairly modest list. This is a conscious decision since 2013 didn’t match anything I had planned, apart from the holiday to Scotland. More or less all other items were not checked off by yesterday so I should slightly adjust the expectations I set for myself.

I usually feel that ambition is a motivator, but if I set the bar at an unreachable height, I stop caring about it. So that’s that. Happy 2014 and let’s try to make the most of it!