The Best of 2023
My favorite discoveries from 2023.
Purchases
- Charmander Community Day, Pokemon
GO
- Hands down the best bang-for-my-buck purchase in 2023. It cost $1 to participate in this 3 hour (mobile game) event. My kids and I went to a park on a beautiful day. We all had a blast. No one fought. My wife got a break. Just a win all around.
- CEP compression socks
- I did not realize how bad the circulation in my legs was until I got compression socks. I can now be on my feet for hours without my legs getting tired. Game changer.
- Folding step stool
- In a small house with small children, this is amazing.
- Running hydration
vest
- Must-have for long runs and bike rides. So many pockets. It’s a joy to pack this thing.
- Prescription sunglasses
Articles
- How to Create Luck
- The Man Who Disabled Two Hydrogen Bombs Dropped in North Carolina
- How Do You Serve a Friend In Despair?
- How much of a billionaire’s wealth is uniquely their creation?
- How to Have A Conversation
- Summarize everything you read
- Fascinating theoretical connection between compression and AI
- Is Bach the Greatest Achiever of All Time?
- The Tyranny of the Marginal User
- Friendly reminder that (even now) no one knows what biological life is
Books
- Anti-productivity book I’ve recommended to many of my friends
- Little Drummer Girl (spy fiction)
- Book that convinced me to start making checklists for a lot of things I do
Movies
- Vengeance
- Equal parts hilarious, insightful, and heart-breaking. I re-watched this as soon as I finished it. Excellent writing by B.J. Novak (of The Office).
- Tinker Tailor Soldier
Spy
- Super understated and clever spy story. An amazing adaptation.
- A Few Good Men
TV
- Parks and Recs, Seasons 2-7, favorite moments:
- Andor, Season 1 (Disney+)
- The best Star Wars content created in the last 30 years. Note: it takes about 3 episodes of setup to get going.
- Sheng Wang: Sweet and
Juicy (Netflix)
- Unexpected, clean stand-up comedy that I really enjoyed. Also takes ~15 min to warm up.
- Tour de France:
Unchained (Netflix)
- If you are a highly driven person, you will probably really enjoy this. Episode 5, “Breakneck Speed”, was especially good.
- Formula 1: Drive to
Survive (Netflix)
- Ditto above. “Man on Fire” was a particularly moving episode.
Podcasts
- Rick Johnson on Fructose Metabolism
- Incredibly practical and eye-opening. I made several modifications to my diet because of this.
- EconTalk: Vinay Prasad on Cancer
Screening
- Nuanced and thoughtful discussion of cancer screening, when it makes sense and when it might not.
- Interview with Eric Ries (author of The Lean
Startup)
- The best start-up content I listened to all year.
- EconTalk: Tyler Cowen on AI
Risks
- Subtle, skeptical, clever. A (rare) well-grounded conversation about AI risks.
- America’s Hidden
Duopoly
- How the two-party political system in the US stifles competition and ensures everyone is dissatisfied. Also some interesting ways to fix it.
Music
- Shearwater - Animal Joy
- I listened to this so many times I think I actually changed the album’s popularity ranking on Amazon Music.
- Coheed: Vaxis II
- The best Coheed album in over a decade. Maybe ever. They did a ton of experimenting and tried a lot of new styles and sounds and it really paid off.
- Chris Potter Live
- My favorite living jazz base clarinet player.
- Silly Songs With Larry (kid’s CD)
- Genuinely hilarious music for little kids.
Health/Sleep/Running
- Non alcoholic beer is amazingly good. I don’t miss beer at all.
- CEP compression socks (mentioned above)
- UCAN can be made for pennies at home
- Doing intervals in non-super shoes improves performance
- Consuming caffeine, even in small amounts (100 mg or more), even early in the morning (6 am), reduces my deep sleep by 30-50%.
- Exercising shortly after eating leads to crashing because muscles draw glucose via an insulin-independent mechanism during exercise.
- Tylenol before bed on nights after hard workouts increases my deep sleep by up to 100%.