I was forced to warn my good pal about this man. The following is an excerpt from that conversation:

First, if you’re an athlete who doesn’t want to be sober, go from being a small fish in a big pond to a colossal fish in a microscopic pond:

After watching his new import drink enough liquor to knock out a horse, Manotoc followed Bates into the street and saw the American pick up the back end of a car by its bumper and do a set of curls with it. He's wild, Manotoc thought, but he's strong.

A couple of weeks ago, I included a quote from All the Smoke, one my favorite new podcasts. The hosts are 2 former pro basketball players, but they talk about a lot more than sports. The only way I can describe is sitting in a room with the two guys at the barbershop who can size people up in 2 seconds and aren’t afraid to say what they think about that person.

Here’s a good intro article about the podcast.

I love this roast of Drake’s new house:

Second, telling a story while using the people’s rap names is a thing that should happen more often:

An interesting read about abolishing work (link):

Anybody who says these people are “free” is lying or stupid. You are what you do. If you do boring, stupid, monotonous work, chances are you’ll end up boring, stupid, and monotonous.

The 5 Craziest Soldiers of Fortune (link):

It’s been hard to focus enough to read anything, so I bring you some podcast episodes that you can listen to:

You bulljivin’ me?- Shannon Sharpe on All the Smoke

On books that put forth a grand theory of everything:

A good principle to remember is that if a book appears to be about everything, it’s probably not really about anything.

On being different:

Real contrarianism is painful. It's lonely. It hurts. It's when everyone thinks you're nuts.

On plastic toys:

The loss of fantasy is the price paid for precision.

On an enigmatic baseball player:

Kyle Brandt Perfectly Called Out Coronavirus 'Tough Guys'

This video is what convinced me to drop my tough guy act and take Covid-19 as seriously as was warranted.

This week, we look to The Bachelor. I know many of you hate the show. But that doesn’t mean that the people who write about it aren’t hilarious.

Even though the Dunning-Kruger Effect has been disproven, I think it still has some validity as a general yardstick.

the incompetent are often blessed with an inappropriate confidence, buoyed by something that feels to them like knowledge.

This quote by Andy Warhol has always resonated with me as a way to explain my youth:

When a situation develops gradually, no matter how weird that situation is, you get used to it.

First, from the ever wise Meditations by Marcus Aurelius. I've linked to the translation I think is the best.

When you face someone’s insults, hatred, whatever … look at his soul. Get inside him. Look at what sort of person he is. You’ll find you don’t need to strain to impress him.

A moral defense of Chidi's swoleness:

As character, however, does Chidi’s clearly obsessive working out make sense? In other words, is it ethical to be that jacked? We examine the moral implications of obsessive working out through the lens of the three dominant philosophies Chidi himself mentions in the episode as ways to be good.

I love essays that take pop culture and talk about it in a high-minded way.

A Better Way to Look at Most Every Political Issue:

Some Americans would feel less polarized and alienated from their fellow citizens if they recognized that some of the people fighting on “the other side” of a polarizing issue actually hold values and beliefs that are strikingly similar to their own.

First Principles: Elon Musk on the Power of Thinking for Yourself:

First principles thinking is the act of boiling a process down to the fundamental parts that you know are true and building up from there.

The Abolition of Work

The Curse of Having an Opinion About Everything

To say: “I don’t have an opinion on that.” (Even if deep down we do!) To focus on the things in front of us that matter, or more importantly, that are in our control. There is plenty there for us. Plenty to keep us busy, and not miserable.

The “Other Side” Is Not Dumb:

Sharing links that mock a caricature of the Other Side isn’t signaling that we’re somehow more informed. It signals that we’d rather be smug assholes than consider alternative views. It signals that we’d much rather show our friends that we’re like them, than try to understand those who are not.

"...steelmanning, the art of addressing the best form of the other person’s argument, even if it’s not the one they presented.

I love reading Naval Ravikant and listening to his podcast appearances. How to Get Rich (without getting lucky)

Specific knowledge is knowledge that you cannot be trained for. If society can train you, it can train someone else, and replace you. Specific knowledge is found by pursuing your genuine curiosity and passion rather than whatever is hot right now.

Conspiracy Theorists Aren’t Really Skeptics:

Conspiracy believers are the ultimate motivated skeptics. Their curse is that they apply this selective scrutiny not to the left or right, but to the mainstream. They tell themselves that they’re the ones who see the lies, and the rest of us are sheep. But believing that everybody’s lying is just another kind of gullibility.

I was alleged to have written this. Believe me, I'd claim it if I had.

Back in 2013, it just said "BOOB". It's now at "BOOBS":

There's a family of hooligans currently laying waste to New Zealand. It's delightful to read about.

From the movie, the Seventh Seal:

“My indifference has shut me out. I live in a world of ghosts, a prisoner of dreams. I want God to put out his hand, show his face, speak to me. I cry out to him in the dark but there is no one there.

My best friend got me this. It is one of my most treasured possessions.