It takes a while to get back into the rhythm of normal life following the Christmas holiday, even for those of us who are not forcibly obligated to show up at an office. After all the preparations and running around and visitations and the like, what you really wanna do after it's all over is to rest up for a few days. It doesn't work that way, of course, but for those of you who like to get involved in social issues, the National Festival of Post-Christmas Just Letting Us Sleep In wouldn't be a bad thing at all to petition for.

But it's now two days later -- or will be, after this post goes up -- and it's high time you got started writing your New Years' Resolutions, so that you'll have a little extra time before the 31st to work in some loopholes. I have all of mine ready for action -- a benefit of not changing them from year to year. God forbid I actually fulfill one and have to spend precious time coming up with a replacement.

Habitual self-changes are a dicey proposition at best, because your coach has all the same flaws and weaknesses as you do. If some clean-living, beady-eyed Hun named Klaus was keeping an eye on you twenty-four hours a day, ready to punch you in the gut at your first misstep, then you'd be off the cigarettes and onto the treadmill in a flash. Most of us, living without the luxury of such professional help, will instead find ourselves, three hours into the new regimen, sitting in the Hardee's drive-through, enjoying a burger with our all-too-forgiving personal trainers.

What I'm gonna try, this year, is to tap the realm of primative psychology, by putting up wallpaper consisting of nothing but stern-looking people's faces staring out at me, wide-eyed. With luck, this will be just off-putting enough to curtail most self-destructive behavior. And even if that doesn't work, it's bound to help overcome shyness.