Jonathan
TS Member
- Favourite Ride
- Helix <3
It's that time of year once again when we start thinking of New Year's Resolutions. For me, I never phrase it like that, as I'm hopeless at making resolutions. I just never keep them. I tend to think of them as goals instead, as they can be a bit longer-term that way. I've managed to come up with a list of ten goals I'd like to accomplish in 2026, with a bit of detail for each one.
1. Finish my OU course
I'm in my final year already, and things are going well, but this is a tougher year than the others. It's to be expected, of course, but I just want to get it done to a solid standard.
2. Buy a new car
I've had Franz, my beloved Ford Fiesta, since November 2017, and he's served me well. He's starting to show his age a bit more, though, and I'm thinking it's probably time to look for a replacement in 2026. Won't need anything flashy or overly expensive - just something along similar lines will do me fine.
3. Go abroad somewhere on my own
This has been something I've wanted to do for some time as just a long weekend thing. Even if it's only to somewhere like Dublin or Amsterdam, that would be fine. The whole logic is to get me more confident at doing things on my own, and I think somewhere familiar would be a sensible first step. Plus it would also mean having to confront some of my personal demons and go through Manchester Airport, which I haven't done since 2022 (we'll ignore when I landed there back in 2024, as that doesn't really count).
4. Buy a new desktop PC
I've had my current PC since March 2022, and it's showing its age a bit. I think the time's coming to replace it with something a bit bigger, and that also has the ability to upgrade components as and when required. This is something I can't do with my current PC, which is a bit frustrating!
5. Get my helix piercing downsized
I had my helix pierced in January 2025, and in spite of my best efforts, I just haven't been able to get it downsized at all. This has been really quite frustrating, especially given I know I've done everything right! All I can really do is just keep doing what I'm doing already.
6. Get another ear piercing done
In spite of the above, I still want another ear piercing in 2026. I'm leaning towards the conch, as I think that'll work nicely, but also be a bit different - largely because I don't really see that many guys with a conch piercing, so why not buck the trend slightly?
7. Do solo restaurant eating at least once (not fast food)
This shouldn't be massively hard. I'm not counting fast food or app-ordering places like Spoons - I was more thinking along the lines of somewhere like Pizza Express which is familiar to me. The logic is similar to point 3.
8. Maintain my current weight
I've done well on my weight loss in 2025, making sure to eat less and exercise more, particularly going out for a walk each day. It's got to the point where I was at about 62.5kg just before Christmas, which is at the lower end of the healthy range for my height. I'm happy with that, and while I did put on about 2.5kg over Christmas, I'm still OK with that being the case. While I still want to lose a bit more weight, I'd like to try and maintain somewhere around this region going forward. I think one potential factor that's made a difference as well is trying to cook from scratch as much as possible, and avoid relying on ready meals - not hugely easy when I live on my own! Easy solution there is to plan meals, only buy in what I need, and also do batch-cooking where possible. On that last point, I usually portion out a big pasta bake and freeze a number of portions so I have a few meals in the freezer, and it's also helpful if I have an evening meeting at church or something - I can just stick one of these in the freezer once it's defrosted, and I've got an easy (and healthy!) meal ready in just a few minutes. With the pasta bakes, they're also very easy to bulk out with extra vegetables, which is another added bonus. I also got a kitchen gadget for Christmas which will make doing the prep work even quicker!
9. Get some new creds
This one's pretty self-explanatory, really. Once I've finished with the OU, I'll have more time on my hands, so a bit more cred-grabbing will be possible. Need to hoover up some of the utter dross in the UK, so this would be an ideal opportunity to get some of these bits done.
10. Get another tattoo
Yes, I know - I don't think anybody's at all surprised by this. I think we all know I've been bitten by the tattoo bug.
I've had an idea of what I want the theme to be for my next tattoo, which will be my fourth, and I need to spend a bit of time thinking more about what I want it to look like. Once I pass the idea over to my artist and get booked in, I know she'll have fun with it and put her own design twist on it, which I'm very much looking forward to seeing when I eventually contact her at some point in 2026. As a bit of a hint, it's related to one of my favourite computer games that had a really big impact on me when I was a child.
No matter how big or how small any goals you may have for 2026, let's hear what you'd like to accomplish.
1. Finish my OU course
I'm in my final year already, and things are going well, but this is a tougher year than the others. It's to be expected, of course, but I just want to get it done to a solid standard.
2. Buy a new car
I've had Franz, my beloved Ford Fiesta, since November 2017, and he's served me well. He's starting to show his age a bit more, though, and I'm thinking it's probably time to look for a replacement in 2026. Won't need anything flashy or overly expensive - just something along similar lines will do me fine.
3. Go abroad somewhere on my own
This has been something I've wanted to do for some time as just a long weekend thing. Even if it's only to somewhere like Dublin or Amsterdam, that would be fine. The whole logic is to get me more confident at doing things on my own, and I think somewhere familiar would be a sensible first step. Plus it would also mean having to confront some of my personal demons and go through Manchester Airport, which I haven't done since 2022 (we'll ignore when I landed there back in 2024, as that doesn't really count).
4. Buy a new desktop PC
I've had my current PC since March 2022, and it's showing its age a bit. I think the time's coming to replace it with something a bit bigger, and that also has the ability to upgrade components as and when required. This is something I can't do with my current PC, which is a bit frustrating!
5. Get my helix piercing downsized
I had my helix pierced in January 2025, and in spite of my best efforts, I just haven't been able to get it downsized at all. This has been really quite frustrating, especially given I know I've done everything right! All I can really do is just keep doing what I'm doing already.
6. Get another ear piercing done
In spite of the above, I still want another ear piercing in 2026. I'm leaning towards the conch, as I think that'll work nicely, but also be a bit different - largely because I don't really see that many guys with a conch piercing, so why not buck the trend slightly?
7. Do solo restaurant eating at least once (not fast food)
This shouldn't be massively hard. I'm not counting fast food or app-ordering places like Spoons - I was more thinking along the lines of somewhere like Pizza Express which is familiar to me. The logic is similar to point 3.
8. Maintain my current weight
I've done well on my weight loss in 2025, making sure to eat less and exercise more, particularly going out for a walk each day. It's got to the point where I was at about 62.5kg just before Christmas, which is at the lower end of the healthy range for my height. I'm happy with that, and while I did put on about 2.5kg over Christmas, I'm still OK with that being the case. While I still want to lose a bit more weight, I'd like to try and maintain somewhere around this region going forward. I think one potential factor that's made a difference as well is trying to cook from scratch as much as possible, and avoid relying on ready meals - not hugely easy when I live on my own! Easy solution there is to plan meals, only buy in what I need, and also do batch-cooking where possible. On that last point, I usually portion out a big pasta bake and freeze a number of portions so I have a few meals in the freezer, and it's also helpful if I have an evening meeting at church or something - I can just stick one of these in the freezer once it's defrosted, and I've got an easy (and healthy!) meal ready in just a few minutes. With the pasta bakes, they're also very easy to bulk out with extra vegetables, which is another added bonus. I also got a kitchen gadget for Christmas which will make doing the prep work even quicker!
9. Get some new creds
This one's pretty self-explanatory, really. Once I've finished with the OU, I'll have more time on my hands, so a bit more cred-grabbing will be possible. Need to hoover up some of the utter dross in the UK, so this would be an ideal opportunity to get some of these bits done.
10. Get another tattoo
Yes, I know - I don't think anybody's at all surprised by this. I think we all know I've been bitten by the tattoo bug.
I've had an idea of what I want the theme to be for my next tattoo, which will be my fourth, and I need to spend a bit of time thinking more about what I want it to look like. Once I pass the idea over to my artist and get booked in, I know she'll have fun with it and put her own design twist on it, which I'm very much looking forward to seeing when I eventually contact her at some point in 2026. As a bit of a hint, it's related to one of my favourite computer games that had a really big impact on me when I was a child.No matter how big or how small any goals you may have for 2026, let's hear what you'd like to accomplish.
