1.) Reduce spending: cook at home more frequently and pack lunches, limit impulse purchases, use what I have. Conserve!

2.) Increase activity: bike to work more frequently, hit the gym, swing dance, hike and swim more.  Continue to lose weight (woop!).

3.) Create space for creativity: sew and dance!

And, last but not least, one I would like to challenge everyone to take on:
4.) Be a safer driver: No texting in the car! It’s not rocket science here, but it’s surprising to me how often my friends or I will glance away from the road for a silly text. It can wait. I hope you’ll take this one on with me, check this documentary AT&T made on texting and driving if you’re not convinced, I challenge you to watch it and not feel the same as I do.

(Sorry to be a downer, it’s a sad video but important!)

2011 will be AWESOME! Keep it that way – no texting while driving!

</mom>

Who is the biggest advertising loser of the Super Bowl? It appears to be GoDaddy, who started quite a stir on Twitter with their not only degrading but also blatantly stupid and absolutely uncreative ad campaign. People are fleeing the domain hosting company like rats off a sinking ship. This includes me. I had one single domain left there which I plan on transfering to 1&1 today. Not all publicity is good publicity, GoDaddy.

1. I will not #unnecessarily #hashtag nearly every #other word. Not even for #ironic effect.
2. I will not post vague and mysterious emo crud, nor vague and mysterious emo lyrics.
3. I will not post and mention someone just to namedrop. Really. I will search my heart first.
4. I will not attempt to make ten consecutive 140 character posts instead of one 1400 character blog post.
5. I will not post a link to every blog post I make, but rather sparingly link to the ones that are pertinent to a conversation at hand. Twitter is not my RSS feed.
6. I will use direct messages whenever appropriate, and make “quality over quantity” my mantra for posting publicly. No daily “Good morning/night, Twitterverse!” posts.
7. I will try to filter Twitter lingo from showing up in my Facebook status, so as to be kind to n00bs.
8. I will not take Quitter personally, everyone follows and unfollows people for different reasons.
9. I will make connections offline, and use microblogging as a tool for rather than a substitute for real life. I will use it as a tool to rally friends for impromptu face time. :-)
10. I will not overshare or post while consuming alcohol… which generally results in oversharing.
11. I will not be bullied into adding anyone on LinkedIn just because we randomly follow each other, I will retain my LinkedIn network as a list of people that I know that I would recommend professionally.
12. I will strictly limit my forays into the following topics: every cute thing my cat/dog/baby/significant other does, every slightly notable quote by every speaker at every conference I’m at, every food or drink item I’ve consumed all day, every address I’ve arrived at, and every change in the local weather… even if it is SNOPOCOLYPSE 2009 because Seattle got 2mm of snow.
13. I will remember that just because I’m bored at the airport, doesn’t mean that I should inflict that boredom upon everyone else.
14. I will never post a lone URL without some other text to describe why you should follow the link, unless the link is quite self-explanatory.
15. And for all that is good and holy in the world, I will stop rickrolling people already. Even if I am Wil fraking Wheaton. It’s 2009 already after all… we need to let it go.

In a nutshell: noise < signal.

Any suggestions for additions to this list?

MASTER THE BASICS, YOUNG PADAWAN

Set your phone up on Twitter before you leave for PAX, and If you’re using Twitter by phone (SMS, specifically) learn the SMS commands. To post a tweet, just text it to 40404. Using me as an example, to be my Twitter friend you’d “tweet” follow firewallender. To publicly mention me in a message or reply to me, you’d say, @firewallender Nice post! To send me a private message, you’d say d firewallender Party’s at the Hyatt at 11! If you’re using text messaging (SMS), this would all be to 40404. Keep in mind the limitations of your text messaging plan, because otherwise, this might hurt a bit.

TRACK LIKE A BOUNTY HUNTER

You don’t need to add everyone who posted in the PAX forum as a friend, just track the term “PAX” and add people you find interesting along the way.

Tracking via SMS

This may or may not work, Twitter likes to turn this feature off. Text track PAX to 40404 to get everyone’s tweets (messages) that mention PAX. Use untrack PAX to turn it back off, so you can eventually sleep again. You probably want to track your own username as well, so you’ll always get replies, i.e., @firewallender Boba Fett? Where?

Tracking via a laptop/from the BYOC LAN party

If you’re using a laptop at PAX, use a program like TweetDeck to track like crazy. You can track multiple terms (but of course, you’ll want to track “PAX”) and you get a separate column for your friends’ tweets, replies to you, and each term you’re tracking. It’s rad.

An example screenshot of my TweetDeck tracking Gnomedex and PAX:

Tracking via the Web (mobile or otherwise) or the iPhone

You can always hit up http://search.twitter.com/search?q=PAX from your mobile browser or your laptop to see what’s up.

If you’re one of the poor saps using an iPhone, I recommend installing an application called Twinkle (you can find it in the iTunes App Store for free). If you post using Twinkle, it knows your location, and allows you to see all other Twinkle posts within a mile (or further, you can set your desired radius). You can also use it to post pictures.

NAMEDROP, YO

Notice that tracking “PAX” only works if “PAX” is in the tweet, so if you want your tweet to get seen, mention “PAX”! You’ll sometimes see #PAX. You can toss the “#” in to turn any term into a “hashtag”. PAX hashtags (#PAX) will show up in anything tracking “PAX”, but additionally they show up at http://hashtags.org/tag/PAX/ IF and only IF your Twitter account already follows @hashtags. Mostly, Hashtags are just messy (sorry, Hashtag guys!). I wouldn’t worry about them if you can use the other methods mentioned to just track the word.

Alright, kids, that’s all I’ve got for now! If you have any questions, please leave a comment and include your Twitter username. Welcome to Twitter and please say hi if you see me at PAX! If you’re grateful for this post, please tweet about it to spread the word (and/or invite me to epic PAX parties).

(CW) out.