The perfect album

The perfect album

Everyone likely has their list of greatest albums. But what I’ve always been obsessed with is the perfect album. We’re all probably familiar with buying the new album from our favourite band and being thrilled. Except for that one song. Or two songs.

I define a perfect album as:

An album you can listen to from beginning to end, at a medium to high volume, and you never feel like skipping a song.

To make it clear, a perfect album doesn’t have to be among the greatest. It just has to be consistently high quality. And conversely, a great album frequently isn’t perfect.

So I’ve been in search of the perfect album but never did an extensive analysis of my own large music library. So I did! And I came up with 10 albums that qualify and here’s that list.

I wish I’d kept my list of almost perfect albums as there were many.… READ THE REST

Little Dinosaur

Little Dinosaur

I’ve had this idea for a long time to start a non-profit to promote bird keeping as a way to raise awareness about the plight of birds in the wild. Here is my business plan. I’m half hoping someone will just take it and run with it as it would be a huge undertaking.

The full document is below but I also have a PDF.

Little Dinosaur.pdfDownload

little dinosaur

Background

Populations of parrots have declined worldwide more than most species.

The 2018 State of the World’s Birds, released in April, finds that nearly 40 per cent of bird species throughout the world are in decline.

…as a whole, parrots face a higher rate of extinction than any other comparable parrot group. Indeed, 56% of all parrot species are in decline.

Parrot keeping has also been in decline for many decades. People still visit parrots at zoos and theme parks but these interactions are often at a distance.… READ THE REST

David Byrne playlist

David Byrne playlist 

Photo: David Byrne at Coachella, 2018

Short version

I created a playlist of David Byrne songs spanning his career and you can jump to the end if you’re not interested in my ramblings. I could talk endlessly about him.

Before 1983

At the beginning of 1983, I was listening to a steady diet of artists like this:

  • Hall and Oates
  • Human League
  • John Cougar
  • Chicago
  • Toto
  • Foreigner
  • The Cars
  • Men at Work
  • Journey
  • REO Speedwagon

Not that these bands are terrible or anything, but they have one thing in common: I haven’t intentionally listened to any of them since then. Except maybe for a walk down memory lane. Or in the case of some of them, a laugh.

During 1983

So, what happened in 1983? I started listening to this wonderful radio station in Chicago called WXRT. It was similar to KFOG in San Francisco where they were allowed some freedom to play what they wanted even unproven hits.… READ THE REST

Favoritism in men’s tennis

Favoritism in men’s tennis

For those that follow men’s tennis, you know it’s been dominated by 3 players for more than 15 years. Out of 60 grand slam tournaments that have been player, 85% of them have been won by these three players.

If tennis is not your sport, imagine that a single team or player won 85% of every major event for 15 years. It would get a little boring after awhile.

First off, it’s worth mentioning that these three players (Djokovic, Federer, Nadal) are exceptional players and all work very hard. Perhaps they are the best three tennis players of all time.

But tennis has a lot of interesting and subtle rules that assist top players in retaining their dominance. For each of these rules, there’s a good case to be made that it’s positive for fans and definitely positive for the bottom line of the sport of tennis. But taken together, they take some of the drama out of the sport.… READ THE REST

My favorite musical artists

My favorite musical artists

When someone asks me this, I can always rattle off a few I’ve always loved, but then everything else is this giant soup and I can’t really rank them. So, I like to take a scientific approach.

I looked at songs I’ve liked in Spotify and found the artists with the most likes and this is the list I came up with for my Top 10:

  • VAST
  • Ludovico Einaudi
  • Enya
  • David Byrne
  • Brett Dennen
  • R.E.M.
  • Sia
  • Iron & Wine
  • Beatles
  • Two Lone Swordsmen

It’s interesting how many of these were not really on the tip of my tongue but clearly I like them! I did the exact same exercise in 2013 and here’s what changed.

Changes since 2013

Added Ludovico Einaudi, Brett Dennen, and Sia, three artists completely new to me that I now adore.

Added Enya, who I’ve always liked, but as I listen to more music as background with people around, I’ve shifted towards more mellow music.… READ THE REST

Dialogue in TV shows and movies

Dialogue in TV shows and movies

So, I’ve analyzed a number of TV shows and movies and found 40 common lines of dialogue that I listed below. If we banned all of them, we could spend more time looking at the pretty pictures and listening to the soundtrack.

  1. Thanks.
  2. For what?
  3. I’m sorry.
  4. There’s nothing to be forgiven.
  5. It’s not your fault, stop blaming yourself.
  6. I didn’t tell you because I was afraid.
  7. I didn’t tell you because I wanted to protect you.
  8. I don’t need protecting.
  9. Can I talk to you for a minute?
  10. Last night was a mistake.
  11. I’ll walk you out.
  12. I’m fine. I’m just tired.
  13. I’m not angry at you. I’m angry at myself.
  14. You really didn’t have to do that.
  15. It was my pleasure.
  16. I’m sorry, I gotta take this call.
  17. He is in a better place.
  18. It’s not you, it’s me.
  19. I want to apologize.
  20. There’s really no need to apologize.
… READ THE REST
Exam for contractors

Exam for contractors

I’m working on an exam that contractors can take to become licensed. I’m open to suggestions.

To set this up, let’s say the exam is Monday at noon to 2pm. You fail the exam if:

  • You arrive before Tuesday
  • You call and let those running the exam that you will be late
  • You clean up any mess you may have made
  • You take less than 72 hours to complete the exam
  • You kill only one plant walking from your car to the exam
  • You have a vacuum, broom, or level in your car
  • You discard any of your trash into the correct bin when leaving
  • You write down any important things you are told
… READ THE REST
Why do stocks go up and down?

Why do stocks go up and down?

I was motivated to major in Economics because I wanted to understand human behavior and how the world works. Especially things that don’t make any sense. It’s hard to find a better example than the stock market. There are hundreds of publications and TV networks and commentators that try to make sense of something that really seems to makes no sense.

But it actually does make sense. It’s just a kind of sense that’s difficult to accept especially if you’ve invested your retirement into the market.

Let’s start with things that are often cited as reasons for stocks going up or down:

  • Company earnings
  • News stories
  • P/E ratio or other numerics
  • New product introduction
  • Layoffs

I could go on. But none of these directly causes a stock to go up or down. It’s easy to prove this by picking a company and looking at historical price moves based on one of the items above.… READ THE REST

The last time I saw Steve Jobs

The last time I saw Steve Jobs

I wrote this little anecdote shortly after Steve Jobs passed away. Despite it happening more than 7 years ago, it still is imprinted on my brain and does a great job of illustrating the person I felt he was.

I was leaving the main building on the Apple campus. Just ahead of me was Steve. This was not an uncommon sight despite being such a large company. He was often seen walking in the halls or in the courtyard in the center of all the buildings. He always seemed to have a spring in his step, like he was walking on his toes. And the glint in his eyes that you’ll see in photos. Sometimes he was seen eating lunch with Jony Ive, one of his closest friends.

On this day, though, the spring in his step was gone. I slowed down a little bit to match his pace. Although I passed by him often, I wanted to see how he was doing at close range.… READ THE REST