So is “fucknuts” one word, two words or hyphenated?

I am so fucking tired of people who talk about the government taking “their” money and how government should be run like a business. I hope this last shutdown has shown them some of the value of government so they can stop being such fucknuts.

Taxes are civilization.

They are you paying your debt to society for the framework it provides that creates the environment we all want.

Do you like drinking clean water?
Do you like driving on bridges that don’t collapse?
Do you like roads?
Do you like buying “olive oil” and it actually being olive oil?
Do you like ads that don’t make false claims?
Do you like cars that don’t randomly explode?
Do you like knowing if someone commits a crime they go to jail?

Civilization doesn’t magically happen. It takes money, skilled people to keep it running, and a society that RESPECTS the people who serve this country. The level of debate we are having in this country is so remedial it is sad.

Second, Government is not business, it CAN be very efficient but it many cases it should not be because it is providing a service to all of society in a way that private business would never do. Private business would watch your injured ass bleed to death if you don’t have money. That isn’t what we want as a society. Government is a platform, it is a platform that is meant to deliver results for its members. I wish we would stop having a debate over this and start respecting the people who work in OUR Government and the amazing work they do.

I used to be a huge AirBNB fan… I’ve lived out of AirBNB’s for multiple years when doing multi-year trips. I had one bad experience in 2012 and AirBNB’s service was amazing, they took care of everything and had my back. But the new AirBNB seems to have lost their way…

We had a really bad AirBNB experience a few months ago, one where we had to leave the apartment for fear of our safety from a really irate host. Plus about 20% of the AirBNB apartment pictures did not match what we got (plus broken AC units in a very hot place). The most frustrating thing was that the AirBNB support didn’t do anything about this. We eventually got it elevated to a senior rep and he told us our only possible solution was to leave a bad review of the host and hope the community did something about it. That is ridiculous. If AirBNB won’t police their listings to prevent fake pictures from making their way in, or to protect the people booking from abusive hosts what is the point. They even let the host leave us a review which doesn’t seem fair given the situation.

We will continue to use them as there are no other options but I am warning everyone I know about this and telling our story about the horrible service we received.

I also recommend you read this post about Jeffrey’s bad experience with AirBNB and a host who had video cameras in the house.

I tried a method I ripped out of this book and it worked! I wanted to get in touch with a very cool CEO (Shopify) so I created a 3 foot by 2-foot poster with a story pulled from internal culture about him. Here it is…

We exchanged a few emails so it seemed to help get some attention. Fun stuff :)

Wow, what an interesting time to be alive!

China might be in a recession, but we won’t know because of stats. Major slow down at least.

The EU might be in a recession, we will find out soon.

Trump has shut down the government over a symbolic border wall.

In a trade war with China, for good reasons, but I don’t really trust Trump and his staff of stupid to do this right.

Brexit with a hard exit fast approaches.

Plus…

Populism is growing around the world due to politicians ignoring the economics of inequality for the last 25 years.

Global warming is fast approaching some scary lines.

The USA is being crushed by student loans & an insanely broken health care costs.

Get a drink and sit back! This is going to be a fun one…

My theme of the year is Let’s go exploring!

You can view the full cartoon here…

Big 3 for the year?

1. Figure out Execution.com! We are trying to find our sea legs :).

2. Private goal.

3. Put together our family vision. Lindsey and I have been working on this for a while and want to get further. Basically a rough sketch of how we want to live, why, and a lot about how we want to parent.

I’ve got some smaller goals too… but mostly around habits, workouts, reading, etc. Anyway, onward to 2019! Nine is my lucky number so hopefully, that bodes well :)

I highly recommend this great article on “The New War on Comedy”. Here is a quick excerpt…

Comedy has had a well-understood purpose: to entertain, to push boundaries and to keep us honest. Historically, the court jester was the one person allowed to publicly mock the all-powerful king perched upon the golden throne. It is for this reason that when a storyteller wants to illustrate a ruler’s descent into madness, we see him begin to turn his ire towards the lowly jester…

I love comedians… IMO comedy is the ultimate speaking truth to power because it can play so much with boundaries and areas that we are afraid to talk about as a society. Plus I think the media is doing a shit job of it lately (FB isn’t helping).

Louis CK has gotten a lot of flack for a bit on the Parkland shooting survivors and trans people and that pisses me off because it was funny and it was taken out of context. The full bit is in the article above. I am *very* afraid of people that don’t have a sense of humor, generally, I think they are the same type of people who started the Spanish Inquisition or Holocaust. It used to be mostly converatives and evangelical Christians, it blows my mind that it is spreading to these super PC students. The media blows this shit out of proportion but I see it with my younger sister and it worries me when people can’t laugh at themselves or get a glimpse into the deeper irony or hilarity of a hard situation. Even if they are the ones in the joke.

I’ve wanted to quit Facebook for a long time…

I used to love Facebook as it was a great way to see what friends were up too, share things with friends, and feel connected. As FB added every person on earth it stopped being useful. I am just tired of a newsfeed that serves no purpose. None of my friends or family really post personal updates and I don’t want to waste my time with it. I am also not happy with the way it is being used by foreign and domestic tyrants/terrorists.

I have to have Facebook for work, and there are some groups you just can’t replicate outside of FB, but I don’t want to keep reading such useless drivel. So I am removing all my “friends” from it and breaking that functionality. That way it is just a place to jump on a group for work events or manage an ad campaign. I also have concerns over humanity’s ability to use tools like this for good.

Goodbye FB, I hope you don’t break humanity.

Update – What a great move, I feel no *desire* to visit FB after this move. I only use it for some work groups.

For 2018, I did a total of ~404 hours of tracked workouts. I worked out 267 days out of 365 days in some form. This was a good year for working out and I smashed my old record of 265 days.

It would have been even higher but in December I got a cold for ~4 days and then the cough lingered for 3 weeks (plus 15 days travel). I will admit it has also been hard to figure out how to do the workouts I want to do while working full time and make sure I have a ton of time with my family. I’ll figure it out :).

Fun stats:

I rode 1,524.7 miles this year on my bikes.

In July I did 660 miles on my Burgundy bike trip in France. That was over 16 days and boy was my butt sore from all the riding.

I set a new personal record for my longest bike ride at 73 miles.

I hiked/walked 342 miles in 2019. Way less than the 741 miles in 2017 but I replaced a lot of that with biking. Calico doesn’t do as many stroller rides too.

I ascended ~60,000 feet while biking and 35,000 feet while walking/hiking.

Last year I did 68 strength training/rehab sessions, this year I managed 152. My back feels awesome, and as long as I keep these up and keep learning I am hopeful I can start some lite trail running at some point…

What are my workout goals for 2019?
I want to keep my back happy and stay in good enough bike shape to do a ton of mountain biking this spring/summer.

1. Keep doing my strength training / rehab 3x a week to keep my back healthy and get stronger to prevent future injury.

2. Ride my bike 3x a week to stay in good enough shape to do the longer fun rides. I’ve got a specific plan but that is my minimum goal.

3. Do a small bike tour in Valencia along the El Cid route this spring.

4. Ride my mountain bike a ton this summer. I am excited to be home this summer, and hopefully, Lucas and I can go on a bunch of rides. Slightly dependent on work.

5. Do one solo adventure hike a month (1 to 4 hours). I miss these and wanted to add them back. Good for thinking.

Past years: 2014, 2015, 2016, and 2017 workout summary.

God, I love reading… it is the best :). Since 2010 I’ve taken part in a yearly challenge to read 100 books. For 2018 I read 170 books! This is a new record versus my all-time high of 157 in 2017. It helps when you are not working full time until late in the year and you have a nice long solo vacation :).

83% of the books I read were fun books, and 17% were serious. Toward the end of the year, I started reading a lot more people analytics and business books.

I do a big book summary each year too, if you want to take a look at past years for some reading ideas check them out here: 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018. So what are my top books of the year?

If you only read 3 books this year I recommend the following:

1. The #1 book of the year is the 6 book series starting with Killer of Men. This is historical fiction based in Greece around 600 BCE and follows the fate of a 12-year-old boy named Arimnestos from Plateau. Arimnestos is an actual historical figure who led the Plataean contingent at the battle of Marathon during the Greco-Persian war and the author builds a backstory around him. I can not stress enough how AMAZING BALLS this book is. I cried a lot and part of the genius of the story is it is him as an old man telling his daughter the story of his life (and, during a key moment in western civilization). You watch him grow up from age 12 to ~40 and the author does such an amazing job with the emotional and intellectual changes as he gets older. It really resonated with my own growth and age. Miles Cameron is an amazing writer who can create a character you love so much you delay reading the last book so you do not have to say goodbye to them. Last year he clinched the top spot with his Red Knight series… and I didn’t start this one for a long time because it was so hard to say goodbye to the characters I love in that one.

2. The Farseer Trilogy and Fool’s series clinch the silver this year. This is another amazing writer and this fantasy world is unique. Similar to Killer of Men you start with a kid and grow the character up over a ton of books until he has kids. I love that pattern as it is like reading about yourself growing up and very introspective at times. My only frustration is how TERRIBLE the main character is at his job of being an assassin (as well as the people around him). It gets better and makes more sense long-term, but it is a tad frustrating at first. Lots of tears in this one too.

3. Robert Crais’ detective series about LA detective Elvis Cole. I read them all and love them, fantastic character and great cases that leave you guessing. They will make you laugh out loud. I read them all on my bike ride in France.

After top 3 of the year, my fav 3 Science ficition / Fantasy / Historical Fiction:

1. The Tyrant series by my favorite author Christian Cameron. This is about 300 years after the Killer of Men series and focused on a brother/sister king/queen near Turkey around the time of Cassander, Ptolemy, and Antigonus. He just does characters so well. The siege of Rhodes was particularly gripping given I have been there.

2. The Throne of Glass series. It got muddled a bit at the end, but that said these were super entertaining HUGE fantasy books that had everything. The last one came out this year and it made for a great ending.

3. Cold Iron. This is book one of a new fantasy series by Miles Cameron. This is heavy fantasy with heavy politics and technical sword fights. Very good and I am looking forward to more…. The author is dominating the awards this year and last year :).

After top 3 of the year, my fav 3 *Real* Books:

1. I read a ton of B2B and lean development model books this year and the best two are Lean B2B: Build Products Businesses Want and The Lean Product Playbook: How to Innovate with Minimum Viable Products and Rapid Customer Feedback. Both of these books have been supremely helpful as I learn how to do customer dev interviews and try to find a better model to launch a business.

2. Priceless: How I Went Undercover to Rescue the World’s Stolen Treasures. This is a fantastic book about the FBI’s lead art crime agent, a lot of great stories. I really enjoyed this one and super well written.

3. A lot of people have already read this, but Into Thin Air is a gripping read about a climbing disaster on Everest. Hard to read and you can feel the cold and death.

After top 3 of the year, my fav 3 Honorable Mentions:

I read a ton of sequels to books that have won awards in the past years, so I won’t mention those again.

1. Lucifer’s Hammer. This is a fantastic old-school sci-fi about a surprise comet strike on earth and the build-up and what happens after. It actually caused me a little anxiety that I am not prepared :), lol!

2. The Capitol Game – A good thriller about the corruption in the military industrial complex. Good read by an author who also has a series about a JAG lawyer that I read too.

3. Love ‘Em or Lose ‘Em: Getting Good People to Stay. A really really good read. A lot of stuff that makes you say duh and wish every business owner had to read. Take away the dumb rules and make your people happier :)!

I leave you Matilda enjoying a good book.