Balance →

Published September 29, 2022  ·  All posts on Sep 29  ·  

Once we feel like we’re a little good at something, we cling to that. We cling to wanting others to think we know things and are good at things. We cling to the feeling of knowing what we’re doing.

~ Leo Babauta from, Destroy What You Know – Zen Habits Website

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Balancing continuing to work on what I know, and single mindedly focusing on something new, is the challenge I can never seem to resolve. Destroy all the things I know? …that doesn’t end well. Destroy some of the things I know? …sure, but which ones.

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Leisure by another name →

Published September 28, 2022  ·  All posts on Sep 28  ·  

The more man is alienated from his work, the more he must look elsewhere for sources of growth, mastery, and fulfillment; the more he is alienated from his work, the more critical it becomes for him to cultivate his life outside of it — his leisure.

~ Brett McKay from, Balancing Work and Leisure: Exploring the Pyramid of Leisure | The Art of Manliness

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This is both a brilliant survey of leisure over recent centuries and an insightful suggestion for how anyone might improve their life. Not everyone has time for leisure, but those who do are wise to be intentional about what they do with what time they have. Like many of McKay’s articles, this one goes into the evergreen bookshelves fill by centuries of authors and finds some old gems worth noting.

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In the end →

Published September 27, 2022  ·  All posts on Sep 27  ·  

Nine years ago I wrote a journal entry containing this quote:

At the end, when your legs are tired
and your arms are giving out,
GET ANGRY.
Get angry that you are tired.
THEN HIT IT HARDER.

~ unknown

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Although I still like that quote, I no longer find it inspiring. For me, the time and place for that mindset are behind me. I’m not quitting. Rather, when I get tired and my arms and legs give out, I now think: I misjudged the goal. I can access that other mindset if I choose to go on, but I’m also serenely happy to rest.

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Truth →

Published September 26, 2022  ·  All posts on Sep 26  ·  

Many statements which are accepted as truth because they have been passed down to us by tradition look like truth only because we have never tested them, never thought about them in a more precise way.

~ Leo Tolstoy

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Oh crap now I think I have insomnia →

Published September 26, 2022  ·  All posts on Sep 26

My dad used to suffer from insomnia, holding imaginary meetings in his head late into the night. I’m the same way.

~ “AllAmericanBreakfast” from, Mental nonsense: my anti-insomnia trick — LessWrong

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I read that short article and now I think I have insomnia. Sometimes, anyway. Clearly I’m a hypochondriac though. But in all seriousness, the author suggests something that—dare I say it?—I almost hope I have trouble getting to sleep tonight so I can try it.

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Remember who you are →

Published September 25, 2022  ·  All posts on Sep 25  ·  

Every time I left the house, my dad would always say, “Remember who you are.” Now that I am a father, this is a very profound thing to me. At the time I was like, “Dad, what the hell? You’re so weird. Like Im gonna forget who I am? What are you saying?” Now, I’m like, “Gosh, that guy was kind of smart.”

~ Kaskade

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The sands slip through →

Published September 25, 2022  ·  All posts on Sep 25  ·  

“Charles blew a little smoke and said, ‘Build a thousand and if we can’t sell them, we will use them in the store for something,’” Mr. Roach recalled in remarks to the Fort Worth Executive Round Table last month. “We were finally able to ship some machines in September and shipped 5,000 that year, all we could assemble,” Mr. Roach said. “Our competitors shipped none.”

~ Sam Roberts from, John Roach, Pioneer of the Personal Computer, Is Dead at 83 – The New York Times

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I had no idea who this person was until I saw this. A TRS-80 (the portable model, called a “4P”, so my computer’s name became “Forpy”) was literally the first in our home. We unpacked it Christmas morning and my father had declined to buy any games (which cost extra) for it. I didn’t even notice—I programmed the crap out of that thing. First in ASCII graphics, then added a graphics card so it could—gasp—draw progressively changing, black-and-white ellipses that looked like othello pieces flipping. I even manually coded the optimal tic-tac-toe algorithm so it could actually play. So, just knowing that one of the people who made that possible, is now gone… well, that’s a little sad.

You should go find the TV series Halt and Catch Fire.

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Endless dreams →

Published September 24, 2022  ·  All posts on Sep 24  ·  ,

While others may find beauty in endless dreams, warriors find it in reality, in awareness of limits, in making the most of what they have. […] Their awareness that their days are numbered—that they could die at any time—grounds them in reality. There are things they can never do, talents they will never have, lofty goals they will never reach; that hardly bothers them. Warriors focus on what they do have, the strengths that they do possess and that they must use creatively. Knowing when to slow down, to renew, to retrench, they outlast their opponents. They play for the long term.

~ Robert Greene

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This is how you eulogize someone →

Published September 24, 2022  ·  All posts on Sep 24

People who came here from my old blog, http://www.popehat.com, will remember my long-time co-blogger and friend Patrick. Patrick, another irascible trial lawyer, wrote at Popehat for more than a decade. He shared our Twitter account for years, and went on to co-author the wickedly satirical @dprknews account and his own Twitter account @PresidentDawg. He died yesterday.

~ Ken White from, A Farewell To A Friend – by Ken White – The Popehat Report

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Dang! That’s a eulogy. You should read the whole thing. And you should follow all of White’s links from therein. I’ve been following White and Patrick and “Popehat” from the beginning and it’s every bit as awesome as White suggests in retrospect.

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Interesting jobs →

Published September 23, 2022  ·  All posts on Sep 23  ·  

I distinctly remember [my dad] saying not to worry about what I was going to do because the job I was going to do hadn’t even been invented yet. […] The interesting jobs are the ones that you make up. That’s something I certainly hope to instill in my son: Don’t worry about what your job is going to be. […] Do things that you’re interested in, and if you do them really well, you’re going to find a way to temper them with some good business opportunity.

~ Chris Young

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