My bucket list is boring and trivial. If you don't believe me, try this: It's my dearest wish to travel across Eastern Europe looking for mineral water towns. *YAWN* And more of that ilk.
But you know what most people don't have? An anti-bucket list -- things they absolutely, positively don't want to do before they die. For my money, that's just as important as a real bucket list. You don't want to wander into a situation that you would absolutely deplore, just because you forgot to make an anti-bucket list.
Here's mine:
1. Disney World. Hard to believe, huh? I'm nuts about the old Disney movies, especially Peter Pan. But there's something about the expense, and the excess, and the lines, and the sun, and the canned fun that just makes Disney World a "must miss" for me.
2. Rolling Stones Concert. Gimme shelter from those guys! Their music is great, but they performed in Atlantic City last summer and charged $190 for a ticket. With parking and slots, that's almost three hundred bucks to see two geezers who were hideous when they were young. Cheerfully saving money on this endeavor.
3. Mega church Sunday service. No explanation needed on this one, and I'm sure I'm preaching to the choir.
4. Cottage cheese. Hate it. Always have, always will, not going to eat it anymore.
5. Tornado chasing. This is not for me. It's tempting fate. Those storms kill people. It's like inviting bad luck into your life.
6. Anything having to do with falling through the sky. Including, but not limited to, skydiving, hang gliding, cliff diving, zip lines, bungee jumping, and most of the more extreme amusement park rides.
7. Battle re-enactment. I know some of you like to do this. It's not for me. Not while people are running for their lives anywhere on the planet. I think it's bad form to play war.
8. Alabama. I don't even want to wander across the state line of Alabama by accident on a dark night. If you're reading this, and you live in Alabama, set me straight. If I get no impassioned defenses of that place, it stays firmly off the Anne chart.
9. Pony. I don't really want a pony. They eat a lot, they need a large plot of ground, they attract horse flies. No, I don't ever, ever want a pony. [sour grapes bucket list]
10. Get eaten by Megalodon. Every anti-bucket list should have something on it that is easy to accomplish ... or, in this case, not.
So there you have it! All the things I certainly don't want to do, eat, or see before I die. If you don't have an anti-bucket list, I highly recommend it. You'll feel more satisfied on your death bed if you just review what you never wanted to do and know that you didn't do it.
16 comments:
I feel the same way you do about Alabama. My sister lived in Birmingham for a couple of years because her husband got a job there. She liked Birmingham well enough, but blond and petite and grandmotherly as she is (as in, that should protect her somewhat), she was afraid to go more than 20 minutes out of town.
--Kim
It's not called "Letter from New Orleans Jail." And the bus boycott was not in Little Rock. No thanks, Alabama.
I worked at Disneyland in Anaheim in College, and grew up just minutes away from it in Orange County. I would go to sleep on Summer Nights, listening to the fireworks in the distance.
I miss that.
But WDW is too much. When we went on our Honeymoon, we went to the Animal Park and Epcot, avoiding the Magic Kingdom entirely.
On my anti-bucket list is things like skydiving. I mean, why?
Anne,
I'm with you on most of these, but, cottage cheese? Well, I guess that means there will be more for me!
Your mention of Disneyland takes me way back to a trip with my mother to LA, when I was a teen: we stayed at the Disneyland Hotel, but never stepped foot in Disneyland itself. LA had so many more interesting things to offer!
Like your commenter Anne Basso, I do remember the sound of the nightly fireworks there, plus the wonderful fragrance of orange trees!
Cliff
Um, hopefully these are a sort of wry joke .... but a pony? Oy, horses eat grass (a renewable resource), don't need alcohol or petrochemical products- especially those used to paint female faces (mmm?).
Do not need to be 'crushed' into landfill. Ride a pony to work. The planet will love you (grins).
(yer, i know, someone will tell me about 'excrement'. OK, when was the last time someone here used the exhaust from a motor vehicle to heat their house?)
Davoh, I actually really would like to have a pony. I would have one if I had a pasture. The "excrement" is the best fertilizer on the planet, completely organic. In a few weeks I'm going to a place where there are wild ponies. Get my "pony fix" there.
my good friend's the Waters Sisters live in Alabama...they rock...I think you know Vickie (wasted days and nights>
they are a great reason to go there..plus they've been canning like the apocalypse was going to be here by the weekend.
In Alabama, the apocalypse is only one hurricane away.
We went to Disneyland last summer, with some friends and their 6-year-old daughter. We all had a good time. but I have no desire to see Disneyworld -- I'm still boycotting Florida.
Everything on your anti-bucket list would be on mine too, except cottage cheese which I used to hate but now love (WTF?). Also, I have been zip-lining once and lived to tell the tale. Don't know that I'd do it again though.
I'd add one more item -- I would never, ever want to be forced to wear a burkha. Not much likelihood of that but still, you never know.
The top of my list is Alaska. I don't care how "beautiful" Alaska is. I DO NOT LIKE COLD. I DO NOT EVER WANT TO GO THERE. STOP TELLING ME HOW AWESOME YOUR ALASKA CRUISE WAS IN YOUR PARKA. I don't wanna, leave me alone about it and I won't drag you to go camping in the desert or to Hawaii, mmkay?
Debra -
"I'd add one more item -- I would never, ever want to be forced to wear a burkha. Not much likelihood of that but still, you never know."
OK, so you have never been 'forced', "manipulated", 'had the the sneaking suspicion' that if you would, um, 'show a smidge of cleavage' or more - as quite a lot of "young females" tend to do ....
every ravenous dog in the wild would sniff out the distinctive pheromones of a female "ON HEAT"?
Doesn't really matter whether there is a "burka" ... or more specifically ... in my case, the "eyes", that attract.
compre.
More can be said with the eyes, than any display of female flesh ..
It depends on when and where you visit in Alaska as to the tempurature, five months out of the year it is quite nice however. :)
And I'll camp anywhere I can pitch my tent.
My biggest anti is visiting zoo's. It's hard to get out of that one with a toddler.
I like the cold, but I don't have a burning desire (!!!) to see Alaska. If I'm going someplace in the extreme north, I would try Nova Scotia or Norway. As for wearing a burka, if I was forced to do it, I would use the anonymity to wreak havoc at every opportunity. "Who turned on that water main and flooded the street?" "I dunno, she was wearing a burka, like everyone else in this block."
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