Aug 22Do I like consulting? I’m not sure.[a personal reflection] — I’ve been working as a consultant for a little more than 2 years now, after working a regular 9–5 job for decades. It’s a big change and people ask me how I like it. The answer is: I’m not sure. I left Oxfam in 2020 without a plan, just needing…Consulting7 min readConsulting7 min read
Aug 19On “The Book of Drugs”Years ago, I made the mistake of reading Carrie Brownstein’s memoir about growing up and being in Sleater-Kinney, and it mostly cured me of wanting to read autobiographies of artists and creators who I like. I recently read Danny Trejo’s memoir, co-written with a college buddy, Donal Logue, and it…Book Review3 min readBook Review3 min read
Aug 8On “Having and Being Had”I read the first half of this book being annoyed about it. The author, Eula Biss, takes on big and important economics questions, like “what is capitalism”, but often doesn’t answer them — at least to my satisfaction. As someone who reads and is interested in economics, it was just…4 min read4 min read
Jul 10On Being a New YorkerEven though I never lived there I think I was in high school when I asked my mom where she thought I would live when I was an adult and settled down. Would it be in Southern California where I grew up? Or Boston where I went to college (!)? Or somewhere else? She said, “I…Personal Reflection4 min readPersonal Reflection4 min read
Jun 26Diaries can be boring.David Byrne’s Bicycle Diaries. I’m not an easy person to buy gifts for. Ask my wife. I’m famously indifferent to gifts — in fact, I’m often annoyed by gifts. I’m not proud of it and I probably need some therapy to talk through why I feel this way. Needless to say, I don’t deserve gifts anymore since I’m so grumpy about it. Nonetheless, my sweet wife keeps trying. A few years ago, she about me David Byrne’s Bicycle Diaries. It’s a perfect gift, really. I’m big on bicycling and I like Talking Heads and David Byrne. And it’s a nice little book. You’d think it’s be happy. But no, I think I…4 min read4 min read
Jan 21Traffic is a cultureBicyclists: magical beings that can appear from nowhere to “almost get hit.” Years ago, I visited Thailand and learned something about culture. It was a chaotic mess of motorbikes and minibuses and cars, and I was standing by a road trying to figure out how to cross. The traffic was relentless and disorganized. There weren’t any stop signs or stop lights or…Traffic Culture5 min readTraffic Culture5 min read
Dec 16, 2022Elon Musk kicked me off TwitterFree-speech radicalism is, and always has been, bullsh*t. UPDATE: my exile from Twitter was short-lived. Reinstated. Sad, actually. Yesterday, I posted this: Today I got this:Elon Musk2 min readElon Musk2 min read
Nov 22, 2022Reflections on running for local officeFirst of all, it was fun. I don’t really recommend running for elected office if you’re not an extrovert. Because the job is basically meeting and chatting with a lot of people. Like, a lot. If you like meeting and chatting with people, then it’s great. …Election20228 min readElection20228 min read
Sep 26, 2022Crawling back to FacebookHi Friends, I’m back. I’m not proud of it, but I’m planning to come back to Facebook. You might not have noticed, but I quit in 2018. I had become increasing infuriated by the company’s behavior, irresponsibility, and gross exploitation of users (us). The violations of privacy, the data breaches, and the coziness with…4 min read4 min read
Aug 7, 2022I’m not really into Sci-fiCan’t remember why, but I decided I should try to read some sci-fi — or I guess they’re calling it “speculative fiction” now. In my youth I read some, and liked it. But haven’t read any in years. So, based on the fawning reviews, I thought I’d read The Three-Body…Three Body Problem5 min readThree Body Problem5 min read
