82 Things I Wish To Do Before I Die

82 Things I Must Try or Will Accomplish
In My Life Before I Perish
From This Earth
(In No Particular Order)

PROFESSIONAL ASPIRATIONS
1) Write a book that will have people burst out laughing in one chapter and crying their eyes out in the next. It has to be a book that is not only good, not even great, but phenomenal.
2) Have that book make somebody’s Top Ten List, be it the New York Times, the Washington Post or Blackboard.
3) Have that book be the first one on Oprah’s “Book of the Month” club that isn’t a total bore or painful read and propels me to an instant world-wide phenom.
4) Invest my profits wisely and retire by age thirty.
5) Adapt my book into a screenplay and sell it to Hollywood. It never has to become a movie. It can even be a flop for all I care. I just want the profits from the original sell.
6) Have a book signing. At the event, be told by a fan how much I have influenced them and how my book has changed their life.
7) Be financially independent, having to rely on no one but myself, by age thirty.
8) Obtain my bachelor’s and master’s degrees not because I need them in order to get ahead, but simply to prove to myself that I can in fact do it. Toss the diplomas in a drawer and forget about them, but keep the letters behind my name.
9) Lacking the desire to purse a doctorate degree, persuade my alma mater to present an honorary doctorate to me.
10) From there on out, insist that I be addressed and only respond to “Dr. Davis”.

TRAVEL ASPIRATIONS
11) Have at least two stamps in my passport before it expires for the first time.
12) Travel overseas at least once before age thirty. Jeez. I’m putting a hell of a lot of pressure on thirty.
13) Sunbathe topless on a nude beach on the island of Mykonos in Greece. Do it without modesty, shame or embarrassment hanging over my head. If necessary, take along a fat friend.
14) Buy genuine, authentic, handmade Italian leather shoes from every major designer while in Milan. They can hurt my feet and pinch my toes for all I care, as long as they look good and I look good in them (and walk with a modicum or normalcy).
15) Stand in the Roman Coliseum even if it’s not allowed. Have my picture taken doing a gladiator-like stance in the center ring.
16) Be jailed for trespassing in said historical structure, but flirt with arresting officer and have all charges dismissed.
17) Have an affair with a beautiful Italian man. Make him fall in love with me.
18) Visit an ancient Roman bathhouse. And no, not the kind that were popular in New York during the 1980’s.
19) Stand on top of the Palatine Hill in Rome.
20) Do a handstand on Hadrian’s Wall.
21) Learn how to do a handstand.
22) Touch the Great Sphinx.
23) Enter the Great Pyramid of Egypt.
24) Visit the museums in Britain that have raped and pillaged thousands of years worth of ancient Roman and Egyptian artifacts.
25) Move to New York for at least one year. Live in a loft in the heart of the village with at least one eccentric roommate. (No eating disorders, drug addicts or Satanists allowed.)
26) Visit Alaska simply to see what all the fuss is about.
27) Have one very hazy but memorable trip to Amsterdam. Yeah…for that reason.
28) Attend Mardi Gras in New Orleans. Eat as much food as possible while down there. Remember to stop at that little restaurant just off of Bourbon Street with the fabulous calamari.
29) Go to Carnivale, but only after I have gained a few pounds and put some junk in my trunk.
30) Go back to Disneyworld. Have picture taken with long-time idol, Mickey Mouse.
31) Live in Los Angeles for at least one year and become immersed in the life of the “Beautiful People”.
32) Visit Phoenix, Arizona simply because I heard it’s beautiful and because I’ve never been.
33) Fly back to Hawaii in search of “Lei Boy” from the 2002 cruise. Kiss him and then forget about him once and for all.
34) Latch on to a “rock star” for one month before I’m old enough to know better and become a roadie.
35) Get a cool roadie nickname.
36) Have the “rock star” write a song about me and then quickly abandon the tour.

PERSONAL ASPIRATIONS
37) Let someone really get to know me.
38) Fall truly, madly, deeply in love for the very first time simply to find out what all the hype is about.
39) Have my heart broken.
40) Parlay that pain into my art, having it be the central basis for my novel (which will ultimately be a comedy).
41) Write a scathing expose on the Davis family and have them all love me for immortalizing them in print.
42) Find the “love of my life”.
43) Impetuously run away to elope to an island (i.e. St. Croix, the Bahamas, Hawaii). Invite no more than ten people. Send out a DVD of the actual ceremony as an invitation to a huge reception. Get lots of gifts.
44) Have a child. Yes, acerbic, maternally-challenged me. Let the baby be healthy, beautiful and destined for greatness, just like its mother. Have the baby change my life in ways I can’t even imagine.
45) Meet someone who will open my eyes, challenge my mind and change my life for the better. (Guru’s motivational speakers and self-proclaimed “second-comings” need not apply).
46) Find something I can truly believe in and become passionate about.
47) Love me for me, not because of who I think I will become or because of what I think I can do for everyone else.
48) Stop worrying so much about the things I cannot change and be proactive about the things that I can.
49) Push myself to achieve all of my attainable goals.
50) To not set unreachable goals and then become depressed about them when they don’t come to fruition.
51) To stop being so stagnate and unmotivated. Translation: to get off of my ass, stop talking about doing stuff and actually get out there and do it.

RANDOM MISCELLANEOUS GOALS
52) Get a tattoo of my cool roadie nickname only after technology has developed a quick and painless removal procedure.
53) Become fluent in a romance language, preferably Italian.
54) Learn to ski, sky dive and SCUBA dive with a certain degree of expertise.
55) Try bungee jumping and parasailing, but only once. There’s no need to totally tempt fate.
56) Become proficient in the art of the following dances: belly dancing, tango and salsa. Attempt the lambada with a beautiful Spaniard.
57) Cut off all of my hair and wear it natural. Love it for one week, then cry every day until it grows out to its normal length.
58) Re-learn how to play the piano.
59) Learn how to play the acoustic guitar.
60) Open my mouth and have a beautiful song come out. Let it be a slow and seductive song that becomes a Top Ten hit.
61) Never record another album again and be content knowing that I was a One-Hit Wonder.
62) Model in a fashion show.
63) Have at least one photograph taken of me in which I can be proud of and boast, “My God, I’m gorgeous!”
64) Perform at “Deaf Poetry Slam” on HBO. Become a regular, popular favorite despite not writing lengthy odes to my “punani”.
65) Finally see Maxwell in concert in a quiet, intimate setting. Get invited backstage.
66) Attend an Italian opera and understand everything that is said.
67) Own an albino boa constrictor a minimum of ten feet long.
68) Live in London for at least one year with one sole purpose: to perfect my English accent.
69) Get arrested for protesting something I believe in (i.e. Women’s Right to Choose, Anti-War, et cetera).
70) Dance and jump around in one of those zero-gravity simulators that they have at NASA while singing Aerosmith’s “I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing” at the top of my lungs.
71) Take a helicopter tour in and around Mount Vesuvius. Have air-sickness bag handy so as not to repeat the volcano/helicopter near-disaster in Kauai.
72) Even if I don’t get a chance to compete (which we all know I should), attend at least one winter and one summer Olympic event.
73) If the Redskins ever advance to the Super Bowl again in my lifetime, make sure that I attend decked out in an outrageous outfit, face-paint—the works.
74) Successfully complete a back-flip and a full Chinese split.
75) Jump off a high dive.
76) Take a ride in a stretch Hummer, complete with a hot tub and loaded with hot men.
77) Something so outrageous that I can’t even put down on this list. *Super-Secret*
78) Solve a crime. Not necessarily the “crime of the century”, but a quasi-complicated whodunit would be nice.
79) Date a true romantic. Someone who understands the concept of roses, picnics in the park and carriage rides through the city. All that girly crap that we women say that we want, but reject it as soon as it we get it.
80) Die young.
81) Be cremated.
82) Be remembered long after I’m gone…