Cross It Off: The Summer To-Do List

How is it May already? I swear it was just January. At the beginning of the year, my friends and I came up with two mottos to live by (because we couldn’t pick just one). It’s pretty self explanatory, but basically we’ve been using these phrases to help push us to do things that we would have been hesitant to do otherwise, or things we’ve been putting off for forever.

I don’t know about you guys, but I like making to-do lists. I get great joy in crossing things off my to-do lists. Every summer, I make a list of TV shows that I’ve been meaning to watch but never have time to during the regular TV season. Last year, I managed to plow through 7 series (welp) in a matter of months. But this summer, in the spirit of our 2014 mottos, I’ve decided to expand my summer bucket list beyond the small screen. I put things on my list that I’ve been putting off the rest of the year, and hopefully this will be the summer I will get shit done. Here are some of the things on my to do list this summer.

Read More Books

In full disclosure, I’m not much of a reader. Legit my favorite books are popular young adult novels and biographies by celebrities. But whatever. Molly gave me John Green’s Looking for Alaska and I shit you not, it took me like a year to get through – not because it wasn’t good, but because I just struggle to find time to sit down and focus on a book instead of watching TV or something. In February, I bought BJ Novak’s book, One More Thing (and met him at a signing, NBD), and as of May 1st, I have only read 33 pages. Again, it’s not because I don’t like it – I do, it’s really funny – but because ugh sitting down to read. But guys, I’m gonna finish it this summer. And I’m going to re-read The Fault in Our Stars before the movie comes out. And I’m going to read Gone Girl before that movie comes out in October… uh do you see a pattern?

Get Through My Netflix Queue

I am one of those rare people who still have both the Instant AND DVD subscriptions with Netflix. While I use Instant frequently, I tend to sit on DVDs for a long time, which I’m sure a lot of people do too. I had Rock of Ages for like 6 months. In the end I forced myself to watch it and I didn’t even pay full attention to it. I have like over 200 movies in my queue, and I’ve been trying really hard to not hold on to one movie for too long. As you may have guessed, I’m more of a TV person, so there are a lot of films I still haven’t seen (legit JUST saw This is the End last week. Hated it. Best part was BSB. And Emma Watson), and I’m going to attempt to get through a lot of films in my queue – maybe get it down to like 75? That seems too lofty…

I Never Said I Wasn’t Going To Not Put TV Shows On This List

The past few weeks, some of my favorite shows have been wrapping up their seasons early (SCANDAL THO. AND PARKS!). It was April for goodness sake! I mean How I Met Your Mother wrapped in March! Shows are supposed to end in May! /endrant. Basically this means I can start my TV watching a little earlier than usual. So what am I watching this year?

Dance Academy

(per the suggestion of my friend Ana, who has been pushing me to watch it for like 5 months haha)

True Detective

(So proud of myself for avoiding all spoilers on this)

It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia

(This will be my Everest. I always felt left out with the Kitten Mittens joke. 10 seasons… we’ll see.)

Learn How To Make GIFs

Because, obviously. Relatedly: PHOTOSHOP IS EXPENSIVE WTF.

Explore LA

I’ve lived here for about five years now, and still have so much more to discover. I went hiking for the first time a couple weeks ago, which is like a thing that everyone in LA does. There are restaurants I went to go to, neighborhoods I’ve never seen before, and not gonna lie, the Backstreet Boys got their star on the Walk of Fame last year and I STILL haven’t been to it, even though I drive near it on my commute to work.