A firm decision to do or not do something.

My resolutions for 2013 are straightforward:

1) Take better care of my teeth.
2) If I wear make-up during the day, I must wash it off before going to sleep.

And by "straightforward" I evidently mean "peepholes into my true life as a slob and possible redneck."

I forget how messy I was am. Throughout college, my roommate, Disturbingly Potent, was meticulous and very upstanding when it came to home making. Think pastel hued gingham with navy madras accents carrying a book on manners whilst wielding an acerbic wit and you have the jist of her persona. So of course she was tidier than a 1950s housewife.

In an effort to make up for the fact that I was am incapable of getting up when my alarm goes off and therefore ruined the majority of her mornings with my snooze hitting, I tried to keep my areas in check. No clothes on the floor. No dirty dishes.

At least, no dishes dirty enough to grow things.

As soon as I got to med school and had a room of my own again, the clutter came screaming back, albeit a little reigned in because Manhattan isn't a place too conducive of hoarding, at least not on the amateur level. I certainly rivaled the pros in terms of incapacitation due to mental illness, but even though I couldn't get out of bed in the morning, by God I could still aim and throw things in the trash.

Having said all that I don't think my hygiene has ever been out of check, save for the few years in elementary school when I was the smelly kid.

It had to have been around fifth grade after we moved 3 hours away from the only home I'd known and I implemented a bathing strike to make my displeasure known. Malodorously.

But I've found that when your time is crunched, like say, if you're enduring an on-the-job equivalent of water boarding and come home after an 80hr week unable to function in society, non-essential things go by the wayside. And now that you realize teeth brushing and face washing fall into the "non-essential" realm of life, you can see what dire straits we are dealing with here.

Residency: don't let it happen to you.