Another year comes to an end.

And what a full year it was. Thinking back to how I started my 2010, it's hard to imagine that 2011 is only moments away. There are several bloggers out there who have already done a wonderful job of gathering up the best of 2010, so I'll keep away from that at the moment. Mostly because I'm working to finish up the public commitments I made for the 2010 Paleo Project Challenge, hosted by Dave Hone of Archosaur Musings and Andy Farke over at The Open Source Paleontologist. I'll admit, my goals were nothing compared to getting papers and manuscripts published, preparing specimens, and writing books. But we all have to start somewhere, right? I figured I should report on the status of the tasks I undertook.

Education: Take a course or practice test, and actually sign up for the GRE so I can start applying to graduate programs.

I am happy to report that I in fact took a practice GRE, got my hands on some Kaplan GRE prep books and CDs, and will be taking the GRE this summer.

Art: Submit one piece to each of the ART Evolved "Time Capsules" (9 pieces total).

For whatever reason, even though I had two and a half months to get these pieces done, and they were only ever going to be simple pencil and paper drawings, finding the time to actually work on any art was nearly impossible. They are, however, all finished (on paper) and I only need to scan, touch up, and submit the pieces to the ART Evolved Crew.

Blog: Overhaul the template and design of my blog, as well as create a new banner.

Take a look around. What do you think? It's still rather simple, but I think its better than the standard Blogger template. If you have any suggestions, I'd love to hear them. This is, after all, for the readers in the end.

And with that, I think I'll call it a year. Please, check out the end of 2010 posts at the following, always awesome science blogs (if I missed you, let me know and I'll gladly include a link), and Happy New Year 2011 everyone!

Dinosaur Tracking - The Top Dinosaur Discoveries of 2010 & Top Dinosaur Books of 2010

Love in the Time of Chasmosaurus - A Taxonomic Shot at the Buzzer: Titanoceratops ouranos

Dave Hone's Archosaur Musings - The Archosaur Musing 2010 Awards & Musings on 2010

The Loom - The Loom's Top Ten of 2010

Laelaps - My Favorite Science Books of 2010

Microecos - Top 10 Bacula of 2010

The Dissillusioned Taxonomist - So long 2010...

Stages of Succession - F&%@ 2010, Roll On 2010

Not Exactly Rocket Science - Four Million views, a personal look at the year, and many thanks

The Open Source Paleontologist - Last Day of the Paleo Project Challenge

Everything Dinosaur - Paleontology Predictions for 2011