Else what's a heaven for?

Yes, I'm a year late in writing the second part of this post, but on the other hand, I got really, really busy right after I wrote it, ya know? And of course, parenting has become much less theoretical since I wrote it and the startup life has become very much more theoretical. I still think they have a lot in common, that the keys to both putting in the work and getting up every time you're knocked down. Megan McArdle, Eric Ries, and others seem to agree.

Megan McArdle's The Up Side of Down is all about failing well, which includes getting comfortable with failure (by making lots of low-cost mistakes early in life) so that you will have the confidence to try, try again. It's a great companion to Tierney and Baumeister's Willpower, with a chapter each on various aspects of failure. It was recommended by Marginal Revolution, but the point where I started realized how much I could learn from the book was in the first chapter, where McArdle explains that very smart people often procrastinate like crazy because they are more terrified of failure than people who have failed more frequently, so in her own personal example, she procrastinated when she had articles to write on a strict deadline, because as long as it wasn't written, it couldn't be terrible.

The founder of the startup I worked at recommended The Lean Startup, but the smartest guy in the company pooh poohed it. I'm glad I read it, because this is the language of the community I was trying to join, but there's little to distinguish it from Six Sigma, which of course is a repackaging of the scientific method. I'm impressed by how Eric Ries has spawned an entire industry and I really miss having an economic historian with whom to mock this sort of book.

In contrast, Ben Horowitz's The Hard Thing about Hard Things is so very good, I commented that I wanted to read it every year. My husband pointed out that what I really want is to have a job where reading it every year is valuable. For those who don't recognize the name, Horowitz is the second name on Andreessen Horowitz, aka the venture firm where the Netscape founder now spends his days. Horowitz started as a product manager at Netscape, became a VP there, and later co-founded Loudcloud with Andreessen, becoming its president and CEO. There's a lot of insights about running a young company and being a CEO. I particularly liked his comments on being a wartime vs. peacetime CEO, pointing out that business school case studies often talk about being a CEO in peacetime, but don't distinguish or discuss what it's like to be a CEO in wartime, possibly because it's awful. Hard Thing is about the awful parts and how you get through them, with some insights into managing in general from someone who is really, really smart. It would also have fit well into my upcoming I swear! review of historic leadership books because so much of it is about the .com bust.

I had other modern business leadership books in my queue, but I'm still trying to see a way I'll have need of their knowledge ever again. I ought to be reading more books about children, but I'm not doing much of that either. *sighs*

Edit: It wasn't until I was checking the formatting of the finished post that I saw the deep irony of the post's end. *bangs head on desk*

I like Steven Pressfield’s Do The Work because he agrees with me: the best way to get something hard done is to deliberately ignore the fact that you don’t know how to do it. It’s become one of the books I flip through when I’m feeling discouraged about my intellectual endeavors.

Ethan Rasiel’s The McKinsey Way was helpful in that it had some of the lingo I’d need if I got another chance to interview there. I didn’t think the analysis techniques were all that novel, but some of the client management stuff was. For instance, figure out what you can deliver in the client’s time (money)-frame, underpromise that, and make sure there are a few softballs at the beginning to help get buy-in. Remember if you can convince the client it was their idea, you’ve done your job. Do team-building stuff with your client, but not your employees (they just want to go home).

Five Elements of Effective Thinking is more like, how to be a good community college student. There were two ideas that were interesting enough to note: (1) when looking at a hard problem, come up with a wrong solution and figure out why it is wrong and (2) when trying something new, figure out how an expert would do it.

I was so excited when Jon got Typography for Lawyers in his post-surgery care package and then we read it together. Some would consider it extremely dorky to sit on a couch reading about grammar together. Whatever. SOME PEOPLE are going overboard in paying attention to typesetting these days, but it made me realize I’m interested in typography as a user interface.

I got a cheap copy of Ken Rand’s The 10% Solution a few years ago when theferrett highly recommended it, but only started reading it when I realized I’m going to have to edit my work going forward (instead of just flinging it on the Internets for you lot). I’m afraid it’s one of those books where the first third is telling you why it’s awesome instead of… being awesome, which is a particular shame in a 63 page book. His 2 big things are (1) wear a (non-critical) writer hat when you’re writing, saving the critique for the editing process and (2) a list of words that are red flags for verbosity and lack of clarity. As a reporter, he strives for accuracy, clarity, and brevity – in that order – which I agree are good goals, but he doesn’t explain what to do when you’ve found an offending sentence/phrase/syllable. I added a whole bunch of books on editing on my queue; maybe I’ll get around to reading another.

I watched the final ep of Deadwood with a beautiful rose champagne. The second to last one was so awesome, I expected great things and instead was disappointed. ( spoiler ) and then there was the random knifing of a minor character that seemed so pointless. Ah well, I'm sticking to House (and Heroes!) until after the exam, when I start Rome, as per ya'll's suggestions. And I'm glad that I'll get to watch Ian McShane again in Kings at least for a while.

Went for drinks afterwards with a sorority sister at Verlaine on the LES. Yummy drinks, sweet that she's trying to form a posse, too bad she's off to b-school in a few months :(

The Crossfit running seminar was fabulous. ( Read more... )

On my sister's recommendation, I went to a particular store in Soho and bought a new pair of knee high boots. They aren't exactly what I wanted, but I loved the way the top bit clung to my leg, instead of sticking out at weird angles. Unfortunately, that meant I walked past EMS, which was having its opening weekend sale. ( Arturo makes them not suck. And expensive. )

I hung out with the family Sat night. I still haven't figured out why I was so incredibly happy that night - I literally could not fall asleep bc I could feel the happy drugs coursing through my blood. I kept walking over to my sister and giving her kisses and both my aunt and father commented my skin looked fabulous. My sister blames the running all day - it was only 1.75mi! - but that seems unlikely to work hours later. Me, I think somehow my grandmother and aunt saving homemade lasagna and sitting with me while I ate made me happy. I dunno and I wish I did so I could do it again.

Sun, we went for brunch in the fanciest place in town. I was disappointed bc I ordered badly - the smoked salmon was boring, as was the lamb. I loved the mille fleu though. LBro told a horribly embarrassing story from our childhood, when I was a Trekkie, which turned out to be a good thing, bc we all decided to go to Star Trek afterward. AISOFB, that is the cleverest retcon job I have ever seen or could imagine. Wow. And I say that even though I spent the first third of the movie expecting Spock to make with the slicey-slice every time someone thwarted him :) I thought the love plot was great, that they worked in every tag line from the series, that they made it such a wonderfully typical story with all that is good and enjoyed by the fans. The only problem was that Bbro would punch me at important points during the movie (earlier they'd been mocking me for knowing any Klingon). My sister commented she's never seen me so happy. Embarrassing perhaps, but being happy feels so good. It's, like, addictive.

Other things that made me happy this weekend? Even with Lbro being his usual jerky self, I loved riding in the back of his convertible on a warm day. That said, is there any way not to arrive at your destination looking like a furball? Worth it though. And while I always get a little car sick when he drives us back to the city, it was interesting to listen to the boys chatting about the bond markets and the Fed. ( Everything has its price )

Speaking of health, when I commented to my mum that the knot on my shoulder now causes shoulder discomfort while running, she poked it and commented it feels like the bump I had removed from my head in hs. Anyhow, I've decided to just do what my incompetent GP said, instead of hunting down the shoulder specialist the PT god recommended.

On the plus side, at least I know it's all displaced anxiety, and the trick is to look it straight in the eye and face it down, rather than letting it interfere with everything else.

Edit: And then it got fargin' cancelled! Again! I would totally have watched more Heroes and had a drink last night if I'd known!!!!!! Razza fraggin!

Oh well, at least I'm rediscovering the joys of high thread count wool.

I'm not sure which is worse - (a) waking up to realize you've done the dumbest thing evuh or (b) waking up to realize you've done the dumbest thing evuh AND have a massive hangover. I mean, if I didn't have such a massive hangover, I'd wonder why I'd done foo, whereas with this hangover, I know. Bc I was drunk. And dumb.

Also, as a PSA - baking cookies while hungover is way harder than it looks. I'm so lucky I didn't cut myself more badly.

On the plus side, my bf tells me I can have hugs, no matter how dumb I am. Yes, I really am flying across the country at the last minute for a hug. The hamburgers have nothing to do with it.

Edit: then I remembered I started the night drinking champagne and it all became clearer...