Done

This is the list of things I’ve done, hence “the Done list.” Think of it as my life portfolio. Items in bold are especially interesting or important to me. I update the list as I do more or think of more to add to it. For now…

What have I done?

I…

  • Asked someone to marry me
  • Ate:
    • Mexican, Colombian, Cuban, Ecuadorian, Indian, Nepali, Thai, Italian, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Greek, Hebrew, Pakistani, Peruvian, Saudi, Ecuadorian, Egyptian, Ethiopian, German, Bosnian, Filipino, and Soul food
    • buffalo, venison, mutton, camel, alpaca, guinea pig, pheasant, sashimi, mussels, crabs, clams, littleneck clams, squid, lobster, frog, jellyfish, crickets, blood sausage, beef hearts, pork intestines, chicken anus, silk worm larva, and “live” octopus
    • cactus
    • chocolate covered, potato chips; bacon donuts; bacon chocolate; and refrigerated Swiss chocolate
    • just one Lays potato chip
    • an entire Korean meal in Korea with Korean (metal) chopsticks
    • an entire Indian meal in India with my hands, and the same with Saudi food in Saudi
    • a jar of peanut butter a day for a month
    • a whole apple pie in half an hour
    • a vegetarian diet for a month
    • a vegan diet for a month
  • Attended:
    • Thunder Over Louisville, Worldfest (in Louisville), and the Jeffersontown Gaslight Festival
    • a performance of The Nutcracker ballet
    • a concert at a jazz club, a concert at a blues club, a concert in a foreign country, a stadium concert, and the recording of a live album
    • a professional baseball game and a baseball game in a foreign country
    • a Super Bowl party and not watched any of the game
    • the first showing (at midnight) of a Star Wars movie
    • a sunrise church service on Easter Sunday
    • a Billy Graham crusade, a pastor’s conference, a worship conference, and a church summer camp
    • a wedding, a wedding in a foreign country, and funeral
    • a grand opening sale
  • Became:
    • a brother
    • a cousin
    • a step-father
    • a father
    • an uncle
  • Bought:
    • a couch
    • a house with a mortgage
  • Built:
    • a sandcastle on a beach
    • a snowman taller than me
    • a card house over four layers high
    • a tree house
    • a birdhouse
    • a Lego tower that touched the ceiling
    • a banquette corner seat
    • a website for a client and my own website
    • an email list with over 1,000 subscribers for my band, Hunchback Whale
  • Caught:
    • a fish
    • a foul ball at a baseball game
    • a lightning bug
  • Carved:
    • words into a tree
    • a face into a pumpkin
    • arrows for my homemade bow
  • Climbed:
    • a basilica tower
    • a snow-capped mountain, the tallest mountain in South Korea
    • a mountain in the dark
    • a sand dune in the middle east
    • a fig tree like a monkey
    • to the top of a tree
    • to the top of a fake rock wall
    • up a “down” escalator
  • Collected:
    • all 50 of the State quarters
    • over $500 in quarters
  • Couchsurfed
    • in Alaska
    • in Louisiana
    • in Japan
    • in South Korea
    • in Cambodia
  • Crawled through an underground drainage pipe
  • Created a whirlpool in a rectangular pool
  • Crossed:
    • the equator
    • the International Date Line
    • the prime meridian
    • an International border on foot, in a car, in a boat, and in an airplane
  • Drank:
    • zero carbonation for a year straight
    • camel milk
    • soju in Korea, sake in Japan, Chang beer in Thailand, Beerlao in Laos, Angkor beer in Cambodia, Kingfisher in Ethiopia, and a bunch of illegal home-brewed stuff in Saudi Arabia
  • Donated:
    • to charity: water
    • to Gospel For Asia
    • the Goodwill and the Salvation Army
  • Drew:
    • a charcoal picture of a rose
    • in the sand on a beach
    • on a wall with spray paint
  • Drove:
    • a car, a truck, and a van with 10 people in it
    • a stick shift for half an hour without stalling
    • donuts in the snow
    • 100 miles per hour with my head out the window
  • Earned over $50,000 in one year
  • Felt an earthquake
  • Finished:
  • Flew:
  • Gave:
    • myself a haircut
    • 100 of my T-shirts away
    • a short, “commencement” speech in Spanish
  • Graduated:
    • from high school when I was 16, having never “gone” to school (I was home schooled the whole time)
    • from a TESOL course in Thailand in three weeks
  • Got my wife pregnant
  • Grew:
    • hair over a foot long
    • dreadlocks
    • a mullet
    • a goatee
    • a mustache
  • Hand copied the entire New Testament
  • Handed out Hunchback Whale card at the Great Lawn
  • Held my breath for over three minutes (3:10)
  • Hired someone, fired someone, been hired by someone, been fired by someone
  • Hosted 18 children through Safe Harbor Families with OCA
  • Juggled three objects for over one minute
  • Jumped:
    • off a roof
    • off a diving board
    • off a bike ramp with a bike
    • over a fence
    • rope backward with my hands crossed
  • Learned:
    • some Koine Greek, Spanish, Korean, Thai, and Arabic
  • Led worship:
    • at life group
    • with William at Calvary Louisville
    • with Poppy, Ted, and William at Calvary Louisville
  • Listened to the entire Bible in a month
  • Microwaved an empty Doritos bag
  • Opened:
    • a foreign bank account
    • a money market account
    • a Roth IRA and a Traditional IRA
  • Played:
    • Ping-Pong, Volleyball, Croquet, Soccer, Tennis, Football, Baseball, Dodge Ball, Kickball, Tether Ball, Carpet-Ball, Bocce Ball, and Ultimate Frisbee
    • guitar in a church worship band
    • drums in a church worship band for eight years
    • drums on a demo CD
    • guitar on a forthcoming album for Hunchback Whale
    • Backgammon, Chess, Checkers, Chinese Checkers, Mancala, and Pente
    • Marbles
    • Yut Nori
    • Crokinole
    • Dominoes
    • Black Jack, Slap Jack, El Presidente/Scumbags and Warlords, Rummy, Spades, Hearts, Crazy Eight, Go Fish, Uno, Rook, Canasta, Cribbage, Casino, ERS, Trashcan, Nine-Hole Golf, Up and Down the River, a bunch of versions of Poker, and Cowboys and Indians
  • Preached a sermon
  • Read:
    • a novel in one day
    • an entire book at a bookstore
    • the Bible cover to cover in a month
  • Received as a gift:
    • A flight in an open-cockpit biplane
  • Received as a work bonus:
    • $6,000
    • Volvo XC 90
  • Recited:
    • the English alphabet backward in under five seconds
    • over 300 Bible verses at church (on separate occasions, not all at once)
    • all 50 of the United States in under 15 minutes
  • Recorded:
    • a demo project with Opus Jones
    • an album with Hunchback Whale
  • Released:
    • Two singles for free on the Hunchback Whale website, Spotify, YouTube, and just about everywhere else music is available
  • Rented:
    • A moped in India
    • A car in the United States and Saudi Arabia
    • Bowling shoes
  • Rode:
    • in the back seat of a police car
    • in a taxi
    • in a rickshaw/tuk-tuk
    • a subway
    • in a limousine
    • a Ferris wheel
    • a wooden roller coaster, a roller coaster seven times without getting off
    • a horse and a camel
    • Palm Springs Aerial Tramway, the largest rotating aerial tramway in the world
    • Maid Of The Mist, the Niagara Falls ferry
    • a bus from Seoul to Busan, from one corner of South Korea to the other
    • a ferry from Korea to Japan
    • a riverboat down one of Bangkok’s canals
    • overnight in a sleeper train
    • overnight in a sleeper bus, in a double-decker sleeper bus, and in a bus that shouldn’t have been meant for sleeping at all
  • Saw:
    • the Hope Diamond
    • the U. S. Capital building, the White House, the Washington Monument, and the Pentagon
    • a space shuttle launch at night
    • people bathing in the Ganges
    • the burning ghats (public cremation) by the Ganges
    • Niagara Falls from the back on the Canadian side
    • Niagara Falls from the New York side with Meagan
    • a glacier
    • alligators, bald eagles, camels, monkeys, and mongooses in the wild
    • extreme poverty in slums across India
    • Mt. Rushmore
  • Saved:
    • $30,000 in a bank account
    • $30,000 in a Roth IRA account
  • Scored:
    • a half-court basketball shot
    • a three-point basketball shot from behind my back
    • a hole-in-one in miniature golf
    • an A+ in a class without ever reading the “required” books
    • over 100% in a class
  • Shot:
    • a BB gun and an Airsoft gun,
    • a .45 pistol
    • a .30-30 and M1 Garand rifles
    • a homemade longbow, a recurve bow, and compound bow
    • a slingshot
    • a fire hose
  • Skied, snowboarded, skateboarded, roller bladed, and roller skated
  • Slept:
    • all night in a small closet
    • all night on a beach in a foreign country
    • all night in an airport
    • sitting up
    • in a car, bus, train, boat, and airplane
    • in a hut
    • in a tent
    • in a hostel, guest house, and hotel in a foreign country
    • in a coffee shop
  • Solved a 3×3 Rubik’s Cube
  • Spat into the Grand Canyon
  • Started a podcast with two friends called Cucumber Talks
  • Survived:
    • Y2K
  • Swam:
    • in Lake Erie
    • in the Pacific Ocean, the Atlantic Ocean, the Gulf of Thailand, the Persian Gulf, the Arabian Sea
    • underneath a boat
    • outside in a heated pool while it was snowing
    • in Walden Pond on Henry David Thoreau’s 200th birthday
  • Taught:
    • in the United States
    • in South Korea
    • in Thailand
    • in Saudi Arabia
  • Threw:
    • a hatchet into a tree and made it stick
    • a knife into the ground and made it stick
    • a homerun in a Little League baseball field
  • Toured:
    • Abraham Lincoln’s birthplace
    • Mt. Vernon, George Washington’s home
    • a Smithsonian Institute Museum; the National Museum of Korea; the Museum of Egyptian Antiquities; and the National Museum of Saudi Arabia
    • the Louisville Slugger Museum
    • the Louisville Water Company, which included seeing the world’s oldest ornamental water tower
    • Changdeokgung Palace and the Secret Gardens in Seoul, South Korea
    • the St. Louis Arch
    • the Kingdom Tower in Riyadh
    • a lava tube
    • Angkor Wat and other temples near Siem Reap, Cambodia
    • the temples in Ayutthaya, Thailand
    • the Taj Mahal
    • Machu Picchu
    • the Biltmore Estate
  • Tore down a fence
  • Traveled:
    • Southeast Asia for over a month straight
    • South America for over a month straight
    • India for four weeks straight
  • Typed:
    • over 60 wpm
    • the book of Proverbs in a month
  • Visited:
    • Mexico, Canada, South Korea, Japan, North Korea, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Qatar, India, Kuwait, Ethiopia, the United Arab Emirates, Colombia, and Ecuador, and Peru
    • 43 of the 50 United States: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, and Wisconsin (if you’re wondering, these the ones I haven’t visited yet: Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Minnesota, North Dakota, Oregon, and Wyoming)
    • Addis Ababa, Amarillo, Ashville, Atlanta, Bangkok, Bogota, Birmingham (Alabama), Buffalo, Busan, Cairo, Cincinnati, Charleston, Chicago, Clarksville, Cleveland, Cusco, Dammam, Dallas, Delhi, Denver, Destin, Detroit, Doha, Dubai, Erie, Gatlinberg, Indianapolis, Juneau, Kolkata, Kuwait City, Lexington (Kentucky), Lima, Little Rock, Los Angeles, Los Vegas, Louisville, Luxor, Manama, Medina, Myrtle Beach, Madison (Wisconsin), Mumbai, Nashville, New York City, Niagara Falls, Oklahoma City, Orlando, Providence, Pune, Quito, Riyadh, San Diego, Savannah, Seoul, Siem Reap, Sioux Falls, St. Louis, Varanasi, and Vientiane
    • five continents in one year
    • the Petrified Forest National Park, Joshua Tree National Park, Grand Canyon National Park
    • the Lincoln Memorial
    • Mother Teresa’s Motherhouse
    • the Smokey Mountains and the Rocky Mountains
    • Death Valley
  • Volunteered:
    • to pick up garbage around a bridge
    • to clean a church, mow a church’s lawn, and organize a church meeting
    • at a soup kitchen
  • Walked:
    • the wrong way on a moving sidewalk while other people were on it
    • the ridgepole of a roof
    • across the top of a frozen lake
    • from the east bank of the Nile to the Valley of the Kings
  • Wrote:
    • a poem
    • a song
    • a 50-page letter
    • a college paper that my professor used as a model for future classes
    • a recommendation for a college professor
    • a novel for NaNoWriMo, a challenge to write a 50,000-word draft in one month
    • a script for Script Frenzy, a challenge to write a 100-page draft in one month
    • a blog post every day for a year straight
    • an ebook
    • a novel in public on this blog over the course of two months
  • Won:
    • a pie eating contest
    • every game of Foosball I played for a month straight (dozens of games)
    • every game in a YMCA basketball season
    • a Sonitrol Go-Cart tournament
    • a humorous speech contest
    • over $1,000 cash at a company Christmas party
    • every hand of Slap Jack I played for over a decade (easily over a hundred hands)

do | marshland | doing

1 Comment

  1. Pingback: My Done List

Comments are closed.