Over this weekend a friend of mine, and possibly yours, Nathan Wong, came down from Logan for a visit. Among various topics of discussion and activities Wong made the point of how he didn’t feel there was much to look forward with anticipation toward. I must say that I understand how Wong feels, but I do disagree.

Naturally, this is simply my view so anything I say would apply specifically to me and might not be anything everyone else gets excited about. With all that in mind, let me tell you about some things I am looking forward to with great interest. These will not be in any particular order except for the order that they pop into my mind after having completed the prior point.

1) Next week’s Battlestar Galactica. This statement could work for any week in which the next week has an episode of BSG airing. This is even more potent for what happened last Friday. I won’t spoil any plot for those unaware, but it has been a long time since I watched a TV show or movie where I felt uncontrollable urges to shout in amazement at what was happening on screen. This episode had several moments when such yelling occurred and I can only assume next week will be even better.

2) Summer vacation. While my summer will not be entirely free of responsibility, it will certainly be very enjoyable to have some of my current tasks reduced. I recognize that in a career such vacations are not given, but I’m not in a career  right now so I will take what I can. Being in school I can’t afford myself the time to do anything I want when I want without sacrificing a potentially higher grade and, more importantly, a comprehension of the course material. Extended time off will be greatly appreciated.

3) Getting out of school. As mentioned above, a career will reduce my available free time between semesters, since there will be no semester, but there’s an obvious perk to being out of school and in a career: money. Ah yes, money. It’d be a good thing to be racking in the money rather than racking up the student loans. Add into this the relative ease in locating a job, even in this declining economy, and compensation for a computer science degree and the money sounds even better. I don’t want to be really rich or anything, but a comfortable amount would be, well, comfortable.

4) Inevitable surprises. This option is quite broad and without any control. It still holds importance, though. Think of all the times in your life that something unexpected happened. Even if you might have known in some degree how it would turn out. Case in point: Iron Man. That movie had to have been the biggest surprise of last year. I enjoyed The Dark Knight much more, but I was expecting it to be awesome. I had no idea Iron Man would be anywhere near as great as it would be. It is easily one of my favorite comic book movies now, and a great movie at that. There are more surprises like this in store and even though I don’t know when they will come or what they will be, I look forward to them all the same.

5) One day finishing my book. I spend an overwhelming amount of my free time thinking about various things. Of that time an overwhelming amount is spent on one particular subject. That subject is the story I began many years ago. Every once in a while I pick it back up and work on it, but never in a consistent way to get it done. I try to justify the delay to myself by saying that I am working out the core details of the plot for the whole series in such a way that once I do begin working on it in a dedicated manner, I will be able to move through it rather seamlessly. Maybe that’s true, maybe it’s not. I’ll just have to start writing and figure it out. But I do anticipate the day that some of you reading this will be able to read my book(s), and hopefully you will enjoy being able to be a part of them as much as I have.

Again, that’s not the entire list, just a sample. It’s not in ascending or descending order. There’s a lot to look forward to.