Bucket List

I received an email from Outside magazine today and one of the articles this month was about their suggestions for a “Bucket List”. It is kind of odd that before the movie came out people just had things they would like to do before they die and now it’s a bucket list. I guess you can call it what you will, but in my mind (and Morgan Freedman’s) it is a very personal thing.

The magazine staff had what I would call normal or relatively normal tasks, but they had some very odd ones as well. One of them was to “travel the world on a teacher’s salary”. I am all for that, but I’m not sure how the teacher would take it. I suspect that it is somewhat illegal as well. How would you get their cards and pin numbers and if you did get the cards and pin numbers how you could prevent them from cancelling the cards? I guess you could threaten to kill a loved one or a pet, but that might bring the authorities into it. Going to prison is definitely NOT on my bucket list!

Oh, there was also “see a tornado”. If I see a tornado I hope that it is in the rear view mirror as I am speeding down the highway. The only Tornado I like to see is my grandson. Now, living in Calgary there is one that I could do, but have never really had the urge. “Lasso a steer”! I realize that there are people who do this for a living, but they are made of sterner stuff than I am. Besides, once you managed to lasso the steer, what would you do with it? I wonder if you get to take it to a butcher. Maybe I should put that on my list.

I laughed out loud when I read that someone at the magazine thinks that everyone should “step on the Antarctic”. The only reasons that penguins are there is that they have no better place to go. When the weather is nice there it is what we would consider to be the worst! There will have to be a lot of global warming before I go down there.

 How about “become a bush pilot”? Wouldn’t you need the pilot’s license first? Okay, that one would be pretty cool, but you need to start fairly early in life and then somehow develop nerves of steel.

There is one that just says “get tubed”. I don’t know what that is, but it sounds a little too much like going to prison. No thanks!

There were some pretty cool ones, like “learn to throw a hatchet”. I have always wanted to do that and if it hadn’t been for “the incident” I might have become pretty good. Someone suggested “learn an instrument” or “join a circus”, both of which would be pretty cool.

I hope that they succeed in accomplishing some or all of the things on their bucket lists, because it is a wonderful thing to attain your dreams. I have done more than a few things that I remember fondly and hope to do some more before I die, but you can bet that any activity that has a better than 25% chance of injury or death won’t make my list.

Hey, I guess that I am checking off one of the items on my list by writing this blog every day for at least a year. I am living the dream…

Check out the list for yourself at http://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/You-re-Gonna-Need-a-Bigger-Bucket.html