The Best of 2023

My favorite discoveries from 2023.

Purchases

  1. 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.
  2. 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.
  3. Folding step stool
    • In a small house with small children, this is amazing.
  4. Running hydration vest
    • Must-have for long runs and bike rides. So many pockets. It’s a joy to pack this thing.
  5. Prescription sunglasses

Articles

  1. How to Create Luck
  2. The Man Who Disabled Two Hydrogen Bombs Dropped in North Carolina
  3. How Do You Serve a Friend In Despair?
  4. How much of a billionaire’s wealth is uniquely their creation?
  5. How to Have A Conversation
  6. Summarize everything you read
  7. Fascinating theoretical connection between compression and AI
  8. Is Bach the Greatest Achiever of All Time?
  9. The Tyranny of the Marginal User
  10. Friendly reminder that (even now) no one knows what biological life is

Books

  1. Anti-productivity book I’ve recommended to many of my friends
  2. Little Drummer Girl (spy fiction)
  3. Book that convinced me to start making checklists for a lot of things I do

Movies

  1. 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).
  2. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
    • Super understated and clever spy story. An amazing adaptation.
  3. A Few Good Men

TV

  1. Parks and Recs, Seasons 2-7, favorite moments:
  2. 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.
  3. Sheng Wang: Sweet and Juicy (Netflix)
    • Unexpected, clean stand-up comedy that I really enjoyed. Also takes ~15 min to warm up.
  4. 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.
  5. Formula 1: Drive to Survive (Netflix)
    • Ditto above. “Man on Fire” was a particularly moving episode.

Podcasts

  1. Rick Johnson on Fructose Metabolism
    • Incredibly practical and eye-opening. I made several modifications to my diet because of this.
  2. EconTalk: Vinay Prasad on Cancer Screening
    • Nuanced and thoughtful discussion of cancer screening, when it makes sense and when it might not.
  3. Interview with Eric Ries (author of The Lean Startup)
    • The best start-up content I listened to all year.
  4. EconTalk: Tyler Cowen on AI Risks
    • Subtle, skeptical, clever. A (rare) well-grounded conversation about AI risks.
  5. 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

  1. Shearwater - Animal Joy
    • I listened to this so many times I think I actually changed the album’s popularity ranking on Amazon Music.
  2. 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.
  3. Chris Potter Live
    • My favorite living jazz base clarinet player.
  4. Silly Songs With Larry (kid’s CD)
    • Genuinely hilarious music for little kids.

Health/Sleep/Running

  1. Non alcoholic beer is amazingly good. I don’t miss beer at all.
  2. CEP compression socks (mentioned above)
  3. UCAN can be made for pennies at home
  4. Doing intervals in non-super shoes improves performance
  5. Consuming caffeine, even in small amounts (100 mg or more), even early in the morning (6 am), reduces my deep sleep by 30-50%.
  6. Exercising shortly after eating leads to crashing because muscles draw glucose via an insulin-independent mechanism during exercise.
  7. Tylenol before bed on nights after hard workouts increases my deep sleep by up to 100%.