2012 Reading List

01 - Reamde by Neal Stephenson (f)*
02 - Economics For Real People by Gene Callahan (free PDF)
03 - Man's Search For Meaning by Viktor Frankl
04 - Quicksilver by Neal Stephenson (f)*
05 - The Hitman's Guide to Housecleaning by Hallgrimur Helgason (fe)
06 - Applied Cryptography by Bruce Schneier (e)
07 - The Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy by Douglas Adams (fe)
08 - < redacted >
09 - Rocks Into Gold by Clarke Ching (e)
10 - Reaction by Seth Baker (fe)
11 - Wool - Omnibus 1-5 by Hugh Howey (fe)
12 - Wool 6 - First Shift by Hugh Howey (fe)
13 - The Plagiarist by Hugh Howey (fe)
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14 - Molly Fyde - Book 1 by Hugh Howey (fe)
15 - Molly Fyde - Book 2 by Hugh Howey (fe)
16 - Molly Fyde - Book 3 by Hugh Howey (fe)
17 - Little Brother by Cory Doctorow (fe) CC
18 - Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell (fe)
19 - The 48 Laws Of Power by Robert Greene (e)
20 - Some Remarks by Neal Stephenson
21 - Molly Fyde - Book 4 by Hugh Howey (fe)
22 - The Confusion by Neal Stephenson (fa)*
23 - The System Of The World by Neal Stephenson (fa)*
24 - Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson (fr)*
25 - Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes (f)
26 - < redacted > (r)
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27 - Zen & The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance by by Robert Pirsig (e)
28 - Pattern Recognition by William Gibson (f)
29 - Crypto by Steven Levy (e)
30 - Hackers by Steven Levy (e)
31 - Pirate Cinema by Cory Doctorow (fe) CC
32 - For the Win by Cory Doctorow (fe) CC
33 - Eastern Standard Tribe by Cory Doctorow (fe) CC
34 - Makers by Cory Doctorow (fe) CC
35 - Someone Comes To Town by Cory Doctorow (fe) CC
36 - Down and Out In The Magic Kingdom by Cory Doctorow (fe) CC
37 - Overclocked by Cory Doctorow (fe) CC
38 - A Place So Foreign by Cory Doctorow (fe) CC
39 - With A Little Help by Cory Doctorow (fe) CC
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40 - The Rapture of the Nerds by Cory Doctorow (fe) CC
41 - Girlfriend In A Coma by Douglas Coupland (fr)
42 - Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk (fr)
43 - Wool 7 - Second Shift by Hugh Howey (fe)
44 - Little Brother by Cory Doctorow (fre) CC
45 - The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson (fe)
46 - The Girl Who Played With Fire by Stieg Larsson (fe)
47 - The Girl Who Kicked The Hornets' Nest by Stieg Larsson (fe)
48 - Flip by Peter Sheahan
49 - Fail!
50 - Fail!
51 - Fail!
52 - Fail!

Notes:

• Increased "Fail!" rate probably due to the 5 epically long Neal Stephenson books.
• All book links to Amazon.co.uk (non-affiliate), free and Creative Commons links provided where applicable.

Key:
(f) = Fiction
(r) = Re-read
(a) = Audio
(e) = Electronic
CC = Creative Commons (Download link)
 *   = >800 pages

2011 Reading List

01 - Why's (Poignant) Guide To Ruby by _why the luck stiff (Free PDF Download)

02 - My Boring-Ass Life by Kevin Smith

03 - Learn To Program (e) by Chris Pine

04 - Dexter Is Delicious (f) by Jeff Lindsay

05 - Program Or Be Programmed (e) by Douglas Rushkoff

06 - The Agile Samurai (e) by Jonathan Rasmusson

07 - The Personal MBA by Josh Kaufman

08 - The Art Of Agile Development (e) by James Shore et al

09 - Beginning Ruby (e) by Peter Cooper

10 - Everyday Scripting w/ Ruby (e) by Brian Marick

11 - The Pragmatic Programmer by Andrew Hunt and David Thomas

12 - The Afrika Reich (f) by Guy Saville

13 - Bait And Switch by Barbara Ehenreich

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14 - Poke The Box (e) by Seth Godin

15 - Getting Real (r) by 37 Signals

16 - The Definitive Guide To SQLite (e) Grant Allen et al

17 - Starship Troopers (f) by Robert Heinlein

18 - The Passionate Programmer (e) by Chad Fowler

19 - Adventures of Johnny Bunko (r) by Daniel Pink

20 - Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud

21 - jPod (f r)  by Douglas Coupland

22 - Do The Work (e) by Steven Pressfield

23 - Ender's Game (f) by Orson Scott Card

24 - Everyone Loves You When You're Dead by Neil Strauss

25 - Fahrenheit 451 (f) by Ray Bradbury

26 - The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx et al

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27 - Nineteen Eighty-Four (f r) by George Orwell

28 - The Old Man & The Sea (f) by Ernest Hemingway

29 - Be Fast Or Be Gone by Andreas Scherer

30 - Slaughterhouse 5 (f) by Kurt Vonnegut

31 - The Fountainhead (f) by Ayn Rand

32 - Turing Evolved (f e) by David Kitson

33 - The Hunger Games (f e) by Suzanne Collins

34 - Catching Fire (f e) by Suzanne Collins

35 - Mockingjay (f e) by Suzanne Collins

36 - Read This Before Our Next Meeting (e) by Al Puttampalli

37 - Atlas Shrugged (f) by Ayn Rand

38 - Economics In One Lesson (e) by Henry Hazlitt

39 - The Black Swan (r e) by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

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40 - Damned (f) by Chuck Palahniuk

41 - Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson

42 - Cryptonomicon (f) by Neal Stephenson

43 - Boomerang by Michael Lewis

44 - What Has the Government Done To Our Money? (Free PDF) by Murray Newton Rothbard 

45 - Mindfire (e) by Scott Berkun

46 - Thinking; Fast And Slow by Daniel Kahneman

47 - Snow Crash (f) by Neal Stephenson

48 - The Mindset by Carol Dweck

49 - Anathem (f) by Neal Stephenson

50 - The Diamond Age (f) by Neal Stephenson

51 - Fail!

52 - Fail!

Key:

(f) = Fiction

(r) = Re-read

(a) = Audio

(e) = Electronic

Summary - 2011 Arbitrary Dividing Point In Time Resolutions

1. Mind - Learn Ruby On Rails Every Day – Failed after 86 days
Started off pretty well on this one, i put in just over 500 hours in 3 months but ultimately learning Ruby On Rails turned into learning; Ruby, Rails, Git, Linux, SQL, Agile and what felt like an ever expanding list of computer science theory. Also the project that spurred this goal fell through – the customer had zero interest in it – which just goes to show Agile is for every project, even non-commercial ones.

2. Body - Don't Drink Calories – Failed after 178 days
I probably could have kept this one up longer but around 6 months in i really missed beer and it didn't seem to be making much of a difference to anything else.

3. Spirit - Write 750 Words Every Day - Failed after 281 days
This one really should have gone the distance – even when i was in Glasgow for 6 weeks and had to go to coffee shops for internet access i kept it going – one day in October i just forgot and that was it, streak gone, game over. Also while it was initially positive, eventually the enforced daily introspection just ended up a circle of the same ideas which was really not positive.

I haven't thought about any resolutions for 2012 yet, so the dividing point in time will be even more arbitrary if i do decide on some.

The Power Of Positive Thinking (aka The Placebo Effect)

Now before you go thinking that i'm going to be all negative on the subject, i'll start by saying that i think the placebo effect is highly underrated. If someone was to tell you that in a reasonable number of cases a sugar pill could be as effective in treating illnesses as an expensive medication you'd be pretty impressed. You might even ask why we don't try to treat everything with sugar pills instead of spending lots of money on pharmaceuticals. Alas the placebo per se doesn't do anything and the effect relies on the patient believing the sugar pill will improve their condition, therein lies the link to positive thinking.

I suspect that most of the cynicism about 'positive thinking' is based on the screeds of pseudo-scientific books which propose a variety of far-fetched mechanisms for how it works from auras, to spirits or even quantum mechanics. Some of these mechanisms are occasionally covered in a thin veneer of real science (yes, there is a zero point field) but invariably the mechanism cannot be scientifically proven (there is no hard evidence to indicate that people can manipulate the zero point field with their thoughts). On the other hand there are a number of scientifically proven theories which can shed some light on the benefits of thinking positively.

Psychological - This one is obvious, if you frame everything in a positive light you will be happier; threats become opportunities, something going wrong becomes a chance to do something different. It doesn't take a genius to see that if you choose to perceive things in a positive way you will feel more positively about things, it's simple tautology (circular logic). Furthermore there are a number of cognitive biases which are likely to amplify the feeling that if you think good thoughts, good things happen. The most relevant in this case is Confirmation Bias; "the tendency to search for or interpret information in a way that confirms one's preconceptions.". In other words if you believe something, you are more likely to accept evidence that agrees with your belief and ignore evidence which does not agree with your belief. So if you think positively and believe it makes your life better, you will be more inclined to notice and remember positive things that happen and dismiss any negative things that happen. Now if you want to make optimal decisions or become a being of pure reason and logic, tautology and cognitive bias are to be avoided. On the other hand if you want to be happy, thinking positively is bound to help.

Physiological - Thinking comes from the brain, the brain controls a lot of the processes in the rest of the body, so there could be a link between positive thinking and physical wellbeing. Please don't ask me to dig up the research, but there is ample evidence linking mental state with physiological effects. One example is that if you are stressed (a mental state), your brain triggers your adrenal gland to release cortisol (a physiological response). Now in some ways cortisol is great; in the short term it helps you metabolise protein, carbohydrates and fat, which is pretty useful if you are stressed because you are being chased by a tiger. On the other hand in the long term it suppresses your imune system and slows bone growth, both of which are less than ideal. I don't propose that we fully understand how mental state effects physiology. However given that your brain regulates a large number of hormones and systems, from an evolutionary standpoint there is a good chance that being happy and relaxed is better for you than being depressed and stressed.

Interpersonal - So the above covers why thinking positively can be beneficial to your mental state and physical wellbeing, but if it doesn't translate beyond you as an individual then it is borderline delusion. Fortunately there is scientific evidence which supports emotions - and hence positive thinking - being contagious between people. Let's try an experiment; the next time you are outside, smile at a random person. Nine times out of ten they will smile back, unless of course they are in a really shitty mood. While that of itself is quite impressive, what is even more impressive is that by the mere action of smiling that person will feel slightly happier. This reciprocation is caused by mirror neurons in the brain, you don't just mirror movements but emotions as well. There is no need to invoke spirits or psychics or quantum mechanics, it is simply neurobiology. Humans are social creatures and have been long before the advent of language, it makes sense that our ancestors would have had an evolutionary advantage if they could understand and influence other individuals. So if you think positively and are therefore happier, that happiness/positivity is likely to rub off on people you meet, which will result in better outcomes from those interactions.

The three paragraphs above are my best attempt at remembering and summarising the science at 3am after a few beers. The examples are limited, the explanations imperfect and they are distinctly lacking in citations. If you would like more detailed information on anything above, or suggested reading, please leave a comment.

Conclusion - Do i think that peoples positive vibes somehow propagate out through the zero point energy field and change the universe? Or that you can manifest a new Lexus by thinking positive? Hell no. On the other hand i do think that there is good scientific evidence for why people with a positive outlook on life are happier, healthier and have better relationships.


Some related Wikipedia links:
The Placebo Effect
Physiological Effects Of Cortisol
Tautology
List of Cognitive Biases
Mirror Neurons

2011 Arbitrary Dividing Point In Time Resolutions

I decided to change a couple of things this year compared to 2010. Firstly I have restricted myself to 3 resolutions, the 7 last year were probably a bit much and diluted my focus. Also as i mentioned in my 2010 Summary, i think focusing on daily habits that will enable future goals will be more successful than listing longer term abstract goals that might change or disappear.

The main reason for posting these online is so that i am accountable and i will be trying to tweet daily updates on the success or failure of the above with an #ADPITR hashtag. If you notice that i fail to tweet or fail any of the above resolutions please kick my ass!


Here are my Arbitrary Dividing Point in Time Resolutions for 2011:

1. Mind - Learn Ruby On Rails Every Day
About half way through last year i started learning the Ruby On Rails framework. While i have completed a couple of books and Rails For Zombies i don't think i have retained much of what i learned as i haven't been using it regularly. I have stopped learning for weeks (occasionally months) at a time and during those breaks i'm sure i forgot a lot. So by making sure i learn/use RoR daily, i should hopefully learn and retain more. I considered putting a time requirement on this resolution, but while it would be nice to do 2-4 hours of programming every day, i suspect just by thinking/reading about it every day, i should achieve the desired effect.

The flip side of this is that i need to plan what i am going to learn better. Last year i ended up on some pretty epic tangents; learning about version control (Git), setting up servers (Fedora) and lots of other somewhat related things (RVM, Vagrant, Amazon Web Services etc). While these tangents were interesting and potentially useful in the future, they aren't strictly relevant now. To start with i need to learn more about Ruby (Why's [Poignant] Guide To Ruby, Programming Ruby etc), refresh what i know about Rails (re-read Head First Rails and Agile Web Development With Rails) and deploy an actual application.

2. Body - Don't Drink Calories
One of the first pieces of advice in The 4-Hour Body is not to drink calories and it tends to be the foundation of a lot of other diets too. While it might seem a relatively easy resolution, it is bound to cut out a lot of calories from my diet (Red Bull, Fruit Juice, Beer and Wine) and i can always add other restrictions to it throughout the year if it gets too easy. On the upside it means that i will still be able to drink nice black coffee along with plenty of water and herbal tea. On the downside it means that i will have to give up alcohol as even spirits contain calories.

Interestingly this was the last resolution i decided on and only came about due to the next resolution.

3. Spirit - Write 750 Words Every Day
I think this will be my favourite resolution, it kind of combines last years Moleskine and blog writing with an awesome website (750Words) and Morning Pages. "Morning what?" you might ask, the best summary is from the 750Words About page:

Morning pages are three pages of writing done every day, typically encouraged to be in "long hand", typically done in the morning, that can be about anything and everything that comes into your head. It's about getting it all out of your head, and is not supposed to be edited or censored in any way. The idea is that if you can get in the habit of writing three pages a day, that it will help clear your mind and get the ideas flowing for the rest of the day.

Seeing as my handwriting sucks and i normally only manage around 50 words per page in my Moleskine, i'm glad that 750Words is there to save me time and money.

So far i have done two days (did a practice run yesterday) and it has been useful. I had decided on resolutions 1 and 3 over a week ago and i though i should have a third. In my morning pages today not only did i spot the potential for a Mind, Body & Spirit link but they also helped me narrow down and chose resolution 2. So far both sessions have taken just under 30 minutes each and it seems like a worthwhile investment in time.

The main reason for this resolution is coming across 750Words.com, however it is so awesome it deserves a post all of it's own!

Summary - 2010 Arbitrary Dividing Point In Time Resolutions

Well it is that time of year again, i figured i would review the successes and failures from this years Arbitrary Dividing Point In Time Resolutions before i publish new ones for 2011 tomorrow.

1. Develop a business that makes £2000/month after tax - Failed ... Miserably. 
Don't think i've earned £2000 from the business all year, never mind per month.

2. Develop a business that is location independent - Technically succeeded ... but really failed.
Technically i have a business and technically it is location independent. However as noted above it doesn't make any money, so while the work could be done anywhere, i couldn't afford to live anywhere else.

3. Visit at least 4 new countries - Failed ... mostly.
Only managed to visit one new country (The Netherlands) this year, which i suppose is better than none, but not looking good for 30 by 30.

4. Read 1 book per week - Success
Ideally i would have preferred to be more regular in my reading - starting and finishing a book each week - but i suppose averaging a book a week will do.

5. Write 1 Moleskine page per day - Success
Over the course of the year i missed a few days for various reasons, but the overall number of pages was right.

6. Watch a maximum of 1 TV episode per day - Failed ... Miserably.
I'm not sure this resolution lasted a day, instead i have ended up watching more TV than ever. In fact even when there was nothing on i have been getting whole series to watch (e.g. The Wire, The Sopranos, Deadwood etc) which resulted in watching up to 12 episodes in a day.

7. Write a blog post once a week - Technically succeeded ... but really failed.
According to the rules of the Blog Duel each week missed had to be caught up on, i missed 18 weeks in a row and then caught up on them all this month, so i technically succeeded. On the other hand the real purpose of the Blog Duel was to write regularly - and in my case improve my writing - in that regard i failed miserably.


Unfortunately the failures don't really fall into neat patterns of recommendations for resolutions: I failed on a frequent feedback resolution (daily TV) and a publicly accountable one (weekly blog posts). I also succeeded on a frequent feedback resolution (daily Moleskine page) and a publicly accountable one (weekly book). Maybe the mistake was not combining frequent feedback and public accountability?

I suspect the first 3 were doomed to failure almost from the start: Resolution 1 was predicated on a certain plan i had for starting a business, when i gave up on that plan the resolution didn't seem important or feasible. Resolution 2 was based on the plan from Resolution 1 and Resolution 3 required the success of Resolutions 1 and 2. It was a bit of a cascade failure really, once the first domino failed to fall, nothing else happened.

I think next year i will focus on relatively simple daily habits that can be publicly accountable and will assist me in implementing wider goals as the year progresses.


Tomorrow i shall unveil my Arbitrary Dividing Point In Time Resolutions for 2011 ...

2010 Reading List

1 - The Collaborative Habit by Twyla Tharp

2 - 59 Seconds by Richard Wiseman

3 - The War Of Art by Steven Pressfield

4 - The (mis)behaviour Of Markets by Benoit Mandlebrot

5 - Drive by Daniel Pink

6 - Velocity by Dee Jacob et al

7 - The Art Of The Start by Guy Kawasaki

8 - Brave New World (f) by Aldous Huxley

9 - Linchpin by Seth Godin

10 - Rework by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hanson

11 - The Management Myth by Matthew Stewart

12 - The 4-Hour Work Week (r) by Tim Ferriss

13 - Maverick (r) by Ricardo Semler

Q1 Bonus - The Dice Man (f) by Luke Rhinehart

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14 - Confessions Of A Public Speaker by Scott Berkun

15 - The Man In The High Castle (f) by Philip K Dick

16 - Presentation Zen by Garr Reynolds

17 - Neverwhere (f) by Neil Gaiman

18 - The End Of Faith by Sam Harris

19 - The Knowing-Doing Gap by Pfeffer and Sutton

20 - The Design Of Business by Roger Martin

21 - Speak Human by Eric Karjaluoto

22 - Childhood's End (f) by Arthur C Clarke

23 - Outliers (r) by Malcolm Gladwell

24 - What The Dog Saw (r) by Malcolm Gladwell

25 - Blink (r) (a) by Malcolm Gladwell

26 - The Elements Of Style by William Strunk

Q2 Bonus - American Gods (f) #1b1t by Neil Gaiman

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27 - What Should I Do With My Life? by Po Bronson

28 - The Upside Of Irrationality by Dan Ariely

29 - Foundation (f) by Isaac Asimov

30 - Let My People Go Surfing by Yvon Chouinard

31 - The Big Short by Michael Lewis

32 - Foundation And Empire (f) by Isaac Asimov

33 - Leading Change by John Kotter

34 - Second Foundation (f) by Isaac Asimov

35 - Into The Wild by John Krakauer

36 - Delivering Happieness (a) by Tony Hsieh

37 - The Complete Stories Of Sherlock Holmes (f) by Arthur Conan Doyle

38 - Roomanitarian by Henry Rollins

39 - Win Without Pitching Manifesto (e) by Blair Enns

Q3 Bonus - Tell-All (f) by Chuck Palahniuk

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40 - The Bootstrappers Bible (e) by Seth Godin

41 - Neuromancer (f) by William Gibson

42 - The Paleo Diet by Loren Cordain

43 - Then We Came To The End (f) by Joshua Ferris

44 - Fascinate by Sally Hogshead

45 - Player One (f) by Douglas Coupland

46 - Notes On The Synthesis Of Form by Christopher Alexander

47 - Head First Rails (e) by David Griffiths

48 - Agile Web Development With Rails (e) by Sam Ruby et al

49 - Pragmatic Version Control With Git (e) by Travis Swicegood

50 - Unbearable Lightness of Being (f) by Milan Kundera

51 - The Art Of Non-Conformity by Chris Guillebeau

52 - The Metamorphosis (f) by Franz Kafka

Q4 Bonus - The 4-Hour Body by Tim Ferriss

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Key:

(f) = Fiction

(r) = Re-read

(a) = Audio

(e) = Electronic

My Hikikomori Year

Well it is exactly a year to the day since i left my last job and i can tell you one thing; i really don't miss it.

Unfortunately in the time since, i have come to realise that the same issues i had with the job are endemic to most money-making endeavours. This realisation has caused me to become what the Japanese would refer to as Hikikomori; a hermit who does not go outside. While i probably don't meet the technical criteria - due to ocasional visits to the supermarket (when internet shopping isn't fast enough) and a trip to Barcelona - i like to think i conform to the spirit of the term.

Sidenote: The post title is a slightly obscure reference to the My Hotel Year story from Douglas Coupland's Life After God.

Top 10 Books I Read in 2010

1. Rework by Jason Fried and David H Hansson


2. Speak Human by Eric Karjaluoto


3. The Knowing-Doing Gap by Pfeffer and Sutton


4. Player One by Douglas Coupland [Fiction]


5. Foundation by Issac Asimov [Fiction]


6. American Gods by Neil Gaiman [Fiction]


7. The Big Short by Michael Lewis


8. The Upside of Irrationality by Dan Ariely


9. The War Of Art by Steven Pressfield


10. The Man In The High Castle by Phillip K Dick [Fiction]

New Additions To Best and Worst Airports

Last year i put a couple of posts together on the best and worst airports i have been to. While i didn't do much traveling this year, there are two clear additions to my lists:

Best - Barcelona [BCN]
Terminal 1 in Barcelona is what Terminal 2 in Charles De Gaulle should be; BCN has the same open light feeling as CDG, but with a host of decent shops, restaurants and executive lounges. Security and check-in was nice and efficient, plenty of seating near the gates and theoretically there was free wifi though i couldn't find it.

Worst - Schiphol [AMS]
Ok it's not as bad as the Top 5 Worst, but i would still avoid transiting through it again if possible. The first issue is that it is a single terminal, normally this is a good thing, but when it is one of the largest, busiest airports in the world, that means a lot of walking. Maybe it's just because i had a sore foot, but it seemed like i had to walk from one end of the airport to the other for my connecting flight. I also found it quite difficult to navigate, not sure if it was the layout or the signage, but it seemed like a lot of concentration was required. The only upside was that all of the staff - even security - were very friendly.