Song of the Day (Extended Version)

The BG and I have a routine on schoolday mornings. At 6:52, I come into her room and wake her up with the Song of the Day. She asks for “one more minute” and I use that time—after taking her order—to prepare her breakfast, which usually consists of cereal (Honey Nut Cheerios, Raisin Bran, Lucky Charms or Cookie Crisp) and either vegetarian bacon (VB) or vegetarian sausage (V Saw). When the microwave dings, the BG comes happily down the stairs, and while she eats her breakfast, we check the weather, watch “Dunkof the Night” on ESPN and, if there was a Wizards game the night before, discuss the usually predictable outcome.

I was so pleased with this morning’s SOTD that I thought I’d record it to give you a flavor of the procedure. I also found a version of the original on Soul Train, so those of you not familiar with the oeuvre of Mr. Kurtis Blow, might want to check that our first, in order to check the accuracy of rhyme and meter. 




Big D: The Wakes

 

Kurtis Blow The Breaks

Hateful words

I understand people's loathing of the words "awesome," "epic" and "literally." But moist? There is apparently an "I hate the word moist" group on Facebook with over 300 members. That may be a different statement altogether about a different topic, like what people do in their free time and whether that time is optimally used.

Sunday Papers

More intrigue in Egypt. Conservative Islamists endorse a liberal. And Friedman says Arab strongmen can no longer use resistance to Israel as a cover for their own problems.

The end of the wallet?

Christina Rohmer argues for spending now and backloaded cuts. I can see how this is unattractive to Germans. What is the case against in the US. Distrust of any government action?

Margaret Atwood, E.L. Doctorow and Martin Amis on life in America. I do not like where we're headed, despite the promises of innovation.

An introvert promotes her book and gives a TED talk, well aware of the concomitant irony.

Best facial hair of all time on a relief pitcher.

Burn baby, burn

Fascinating look at trash and the emerging technology of “waste to energy” (WTE), converting methane from landfills into electrical power, or even burning all garbage, a process from the days of old that has been scorned over the last thirty years. But the technology has not stood still. New processes remove the toxic stuff, and the residue after burning can be used in the construction industry, making the process remarkably efficient.

But right now there are easier ways to reduce the 5-7 pounds of trash produced every day by the average American, which is twice the OECD average:

The main difference is that in Europe and elsewhere manufacturers, rather than consumers, are held responsible for the cost of processing the packaging used to wrap their goods. Thus, a tube of toothpaste comes without a cardboard box; a TV set without all the polystyrene packing.

It has always bothered me that toothpaste comes in a box. I suppose it reduces shipping costs by allowing for easier packing. But if the environmental costs of disposal were borne by the manufacturer (or the consumer), I suspect we’d see a more efficient process.

I would also argue that as taxpayers refuse to support better processes, like WTE, and to resist change, this cost is not borne by the consumer as the author suggests, but by future generations.  

Song of the Day

It is too late Evie (oh, it's too late)
And it really is time to get up.
Morning is here, oh my dear, get in gear
'Cause your breakfast is already set up.

Steady Companion

There is an article in the Times from yesterday extolling the information to be found in each relentless weekly edition of the Economist. I have recently been enjoying the jump that having access to the new edition via the Ipad provides, but have now, after a couple of months, fallen back on the hedonic treadmill, struggling mightily each week to keep up.

Nevertheless, I do try to completely read each edition, and although I may skip the occasional Asia or Latin America piece, I’m pretty consistent. Here’s my preferred reading order:

·         This week

·         Leaders

·         Jobs

·         Obituary

·         Books

·         Science

·         US

·         Business

·         Finance

·         Middle East and Africa

·         Americas

·         Asia

·         China

·         Europe

·         Britain

If there’s a special report I like, such as this week’s on the coming changes to industry, I’ll read it after Finance. If it doesn’t grab me, I’ll save it for the end.

Anyway, I thought it might be interesting to write something similar to the Times piece. If I like it, or there is a positive response, I’ll try the same again next Wednesday.

Economist Highlights

Palace intrigue in the Egyptian presidential elections. 10 of 23 candidates barred on technical grounds.

Yemen is one messed up country.

The first leader to be judged by an International court sinceNuremberg.

Women do more housework; even when they make more money thantheir partner.

Obituary for bagel king Murray Lender

As Chinese wages go up, production is coming home.

Still hard to believe in 3D printing, but it seems pretty real.

Major Repairs

Laundry is not something I generally do (let alone write about), but with Worldwide in Indonesia, it is something that I need to take care of. I don’t mind doing it; and in fact, I derive inordinate pleasure from reuniting orphan socks with their mates.

For some reason, we have two repositories for single white socks—one in the laundry room, and one in the master bedroom. So today, I decided to bring both into the living room while I sorted. I quickly matched one pair; and then another; and then another. It was like Vinnie Johnson in the 1989 playoffs. Usually, I am pleased with one or two successes, but today I was able to reunite an incredible nine pairs of socks.

I just had to share my joy with the world.

Good enough is Better

Pat calls me out on the idea of re-reading:

I would like to defend the idea of re-reading. I don't think it is in any way predicated on the assertion I have read everything worth reading. It only means I want to read this book again now more than I want to read something new. I read for enjoyment only. What I read is not a statement about anything more than that. I have re-read the Idiot more than any other book because few books give me half the enjoyment the first time through that the Idiot did on the 6th or 7th reading.

I was working up a scathing put-down, when the following sentence popped into my head: “Spinal Tap is the film I re-watch most often.”

Ahem. How can it be perfectly acceptable to watch the same film numerous times, but not read the same book?  Beyond the size of the temporal investment (depending on the title, of course), there’s really no difference.

The Paradox of Choice, which is the book I’m reading right now, deals at length with the concept of “satisficing (it’s been a word for more than fifty years), which is essentially settling for good enough, rather than “maximizing,” which is seeking the absolute best. It sounds like settling, but research suggests that it’s a better approach for optimizing happiness, and getting the most out of each day.

This got me thinking about restaurants. I always want to try new restaurants, rather than revisit places I’ve liked, which ends up being a high risk strategy. At a place you’ve been to before, you don’t have to order the exact same thing as last time, and there’s a good chance that a creative kitchen will surprise you again and again, in the same way that a book or a film might. Plus you have a better idea of what the overall experience will be like.

This is an easier strategy in the Triangle, where there are fewer choices, than NYC, but I appreciate the concept now, and as I said in an earlier post, who we are when we pick up a book is a key driver of what we find inside, so it is a new experience each time, “a deeper communion.”

It’s still hard for me when there’s so much new stuff out there, but I enjoyed the Salinger experiment, and I think it might be fun to revisit some of the books that I loved or hated in the 1980s, and to see how the older me responds.

Sunday Papers

5 books interview with economic historian Michael Lind. America achieved economic hegemony by copying European models. China is doing the same thing to us.

Whole Foods is only selling sustainable seafood, and New England fishermen are not happy.

Can buying Pringle save Kelloggs? In the Battle Creek lab; not the Wonka-like setting I had envisioned as a child denied Frosted Flakes and Sugar Smacks.

Review of the new Eisenhower biography. The book's author was my Pol 104 professor at U of T.

Search for the next big technology. The Economist suggests 3D printing. I am betting on ubiquitous artificial intelligence, like Siri and Watson. But predictions are hard, especially about the future.

Speaking of which, apparently today’s technology facilitates being “alone together” and has destroyed conversation.

Rethinking JD

After JD Salinger’s death, I had been meaning to re-read Catcher in the Rye. It had not made much of an impression on me when I read it in high school, but I loved Franny and Zooey when I read it as part of a religion in literature class in college, and I similarly devoured Nine Stories and Raise High the Roofbeam Carpenters on my own shortly thereafter. All those marvelous Glass siblings tossing off quotes from the Bhagavad Gita and drinking highballs in their Manhattan apartments while being quietly superior to their pedantic, workaday colleagues—those phonies who thought they understood Flaubert or who were worried about minor annoyances like jobs, money or relationships.

I picked F&Z off the bookshelf Thursday. We didn’t have Catcher in the Rye, but I was curious as to how I might find it twenty five years down the road. I don’t re-read anything (although I do go back to 4 Quartets—which was also assigned as part of the aforementioned class--now and again), and I’m always vaguely annoyed when people talk about re-reading books—as if they’ve already consumed everything of consequence, and have the time for deeper studies of the really good material. I can remember a quotation from, I think, Susan Sontag, on my copy of the Brothers Karamazov: “the novel I re-read most often.” I mean, come on: it’s like nine hundred pages, and of the many novels you re-read, Dostoyevsky is your comfort food? That sounds awfully like a humblebrag.

Anyway, I finished the book yesterday, and 2012 me did not enjoy it nearly as much as 1987 me had. I found the world weariness of these twenty year old beautiful rich kids more naïve than profound, and the many literary allusions (“I just started writing quotations from Epictetus on the classroom chalkboard”) a little grandstanding and unnecessary. But the prose flowed nicely, as the comments to one of my many mediocre college essays once stated, reducing me in a handful of words to someone who didn’t get it, and making the condemnation of such mediocre academics in the novel all the more comforting, I suppose.

So the lesson, I guess, is that who you are at the time you read it plays a meaningful part in the enjoyment of every book. I heard or read once that each book is a picture of who you were when you read it. Inspired by this, as well as the quote below from Four Quartets, I wrote the only poem I’m still proud of today. I also named a mix tape “The Evening With the Photograph Album.” That strikes me as rather less profound now than it did at the time. But I forget what was on it.

(From East Coker)

There is a time for the evening under starlight,

A time for the evening under lamplight

(The evening with the photograph album).

Love is most nearly itself

When here and now cease to matter.

Old men ought to be explorers

Here and there does not matter

We must be still and still moving

Into another intensity

For a further union, a deeper communion

Through the dark cold and empty desolation,

The wave cry, the wind cry, the vast waters

Of the petrel and the porpoise. In my end is my beginning.

Here is what I wrote, about six or seven years ago, I think. I wanted to capture the idea that the books were equally good as souvenirs or kindling, but that they no longer had any of their original meaning; they had lost all aspects of bookishness. And only a very select few deserved to remain on my shelf.

Time turns books into photographs.

Histories rewritten, meanings changed.

They warm us, in the evening,

By the fire.

Note: These are the books in the photo: 4 Quartets; Le Petit Prince; Selected Poems of Robinson Jeffers; The Paradox of Tarheel Politics; Dynasties and Interludes; The Purposeful Primitive

How to Ask Questions

Farnam Street recommends that questions should be asked in order to improve the quality of the discussion that has already begun, and that if you can begin your sentence with who, what, where, why, when, you are on the right track, and need not spend extra time with prologue designed to showcase your own opinion or demonstrate your intelligence. “Who gave you that scar, Mr. Potter?” “Why are you wearing that letter, Ms. Prynne?” “When will our troops come home, Mr. Lincoln?”

More information means we see only what we want to see, and are less informed as a result. The opposite of what you know in your heart is also true. Fewer international articles in the news than before. Increasing confirmation bias.

Just finished An Economist Gets Lunch, by Tyler Cowen, one of my favourite bloggers. Here are my takeaways:

• The key to finding good food is to look where supplies are fresh, suppliers are creative, and consumers are informed.
• The two things you can do to eat in the most environmentally responsible way are to eat less meat and make fewer trips to the supermarket in your car.
•  I do not like the word “foodie.”

This means that cuisine suffers where tourists are plentiful, and my experience in Paris and Rome concur with this hypothesis. Worldwide and I had better food in the countryside, perhaps because we didn’t look too hard, or too far away from the attractions.

I enjoyed this book, but not as much as I had hoped. Professor Cowen seems more like a collector or a detective than an epicure: solving the puzzles and maximizing the number of experiences seem more important than gustatory pleasure. I’d like to hear him talk with Anthony Bourdain. I’m not sure they would enjoy each other’s company.

Lunch of a Lifetime

The BG has been grousing all month about being frog-marched to the symphony today. I finally got her turned around by proposing that we reward her acceptance of the field trip with a bespoke "dream lunch." Here is what she happily carried to the bus stop this morning.

Vegetable maki
All fruit smoothie (strawberry, blackberry, raspberry, blueberry, cranberry, orange, lemon, mango)
Cheese balls
Pomegranate seeds
Sugar cookie

A symphony of flavor, carefully orchestrated. Sorry.

Careful with that Vitriol

I especially enjoy the Monday edition of the Radio France news, because it contains the "expression de la semaine," where Yvan Amar, an avuncular reporter with a voice like Maurice Chevalier, explains the meaning and nuance of a word or phrase in French.

Today's edition explains "au vitriol." I knew the word vitriol in English to mean caustic speech, but did not know until today that vitriol is the historic name for sulfuric acid, and that it was popular among certain French women in the 19th century--as it is today among men in certain countries for more misogynistic purposes--as a means of attacking a distaff rival for the affections of a loved one.

Tres curieux, non?

Song of the Day

Not surprisingly, the Song of the Day posts have been skewing a little 80s since I started this blog, so I decided this morning to play with the ubiquitous One Direction song that is unavoidable on pop radio these days. I can't bring myself to link to it (ask your daughter if you don't know what I'm talking about, or your granddaughter if you're among my many older followers) and I couldn't come up with anything to rival the lyrical complexity and grammatical daring of "The way that you flip your hair gets me overwhelmed," but nevertheless, I'm pleased, and it was awfully fun to sing this morning:

Everyone else in your family knows it.
Everyone else but you.
Girl you are still fast asleep in your cozy bed.
You are such an inveterate sleepy head.
I know it's hard to believe, and it sounds so cruel:
You don't know (oh oh)
You don't know it's time for school.
I'm afraid it's time for school.

FL. Fling

Flew down to Fort Lauderdale early Friday morning for a Saturday bat mitzvah party for one of the OG’s camp friends. Highlights of the trip included:

A nice car.

A walking tour of Miami’s Art Deco district (it must have been something when Gable and Lombard were hanging out , but now it reeks of Spring Break and Bourbon Street), including lunch on the patio at one of the tourist traps on Ocean Boulevard.

A pizza/hero dinner at the Florida location of Pittsburgh’s Primanti Brothers, with the fries inside the sandwich.

An Airboat trip on the Everglades at Sawgrass Recreation area (alligators and ospreys aplenty).

An excellent dinner at an Italian restaurant in the cute downtown area (Potato encrusted snapper with white bean and sausage ragout for me, spaghetti and meatballs for the OG).

Not as much sunshine as we’d hoped, but enjoyable nonetheless.

Strategic Thinking

In addition to referrals from friends and family, I rely on the New York Times and the Economist for book referrals. I also am a big fan of the Browser’s 5 Books interviews, and the Farnam Street blog, which seems to be devoted to reviewing the vast quantity of business books. Here’s how the anonymous author describes the blog:

The Farnam Street Blog is about the pursuit of worldly wisdom by mastering the best of what other people have already figured out.

In 2011, I spent over 1,000 hours bringing you articles on how our thoughts are influenced; the causes of human misjudgment; culture; history; mental-models; and other nutritious subjects for your brain.

I’m not sure what the business model is, although the author does seem to make money by referring readers to Amazon. But I have a hard time believing that is in any way commensurate with the amount of work involved. Nevertheless, it's great.

Today’s post about strategy, struck a chord. As someone who has been involved with projects whose strategies seemed to have ranged from “Be awesome” to “Do something” I could definitely identify with this point:

A leader’s most important responsibility is identifying the biggest challenges to forward progress and devising a coherent approach to overcoming them. In contexts ranging from corporate direction to national security, strategy matters. Yet we have become so accustomed to strategy as exhortation that we hardly blink an eye when a leader spouts slogans and announces high-sounding goals, calling the mixture a “strategy.”

Having been, over the past fifteen years, more of a project manager than a leader, I have often found myself in the position of having to help people see that a project lacks coherent strategy.  Frequently, though, especially in government, where the rewards of success do not directly go to the individual, leaders are unwilling to assume the risk that accompanies the adoption of a coherent plan for going forward. This point is well made in the Strategy Paradox:

The most profitable strategies are “extreme” strategies that commit companies to positions of either product differentiation or cost leadership. These extreme positions expose firms to a greater likelihood of bankruptcy by increasing the strategic risk they face. Consequently, the strategies likeliest to succeed are also likeliest to fail. That is the strategy paradox.

This point is lost in most business books, which largely chronicle the successes and ignore the failed companies, suggesting that all you have to do to succeed is copy XYZ corporation—as if the risk of failure is not equally present in each situation.

Moreover, I think organizations need to acknowledge the fact that a strategy supported by all is almost certainly a bad one, because it makes no choices. As Good Strategy Bad Strategy—the book whose review precipitated this post, and which I have ordered—states, a good strategy has three elements:

a diagnosis, a guiding policy, and coherent action. The guiding policy specifies the approach to dealing with the obstacles called out in the diagnosis. It is like a signpost, marking the direction forward but not defining the details of the trip. Coherent actions are feasible coordinated policies, resource commitments, and actions designed to carry out the guiding policy.

As the review articulates, and my personal experience supports, the vast majority of organizations have horrible strategies. In a way, that’s not bad; there’s nothing inherently wrong with a diagnosis that things are pretty much OK, and we’ll just keep on truckin’, but there seems to be a lot of time and money wasted in activities designed to create the illusion that the organization’s strategy is something different.

Sammy Davis Jr. Keepin' it real.

I just finished The One last night, a recent biography of James Brown. Not the nicest cat, he seems to have sacrificed relationships, money and health at the altar of success. But he knew how to get people dancing.

Interesting to read that during the Blaxploitation period, the Godfather endorsed Nixon, along with Sammy Davis Jr., which didn't sit too well with the brothers.

The book also mentioned an "astonishing cover" of Shaft by Sammy, which I had to go out and look for. No doubt the White House preferred this version.

Song of the Day

You were sleeping like a baby in your room upstairs,
When I came in.

And even though asleep, I think you knew deep inside,
That it was time for break to end.

Spring break 2012 has been so much fun.
I liked it too.

But now it's time for you to get your butt out of bed,
and get ready to go back to school.

Won't you wake up, Evie,
Won't you wake up, Oh (2x)

Life in Metaphorica

Johnson catches Rush Limbaugh in one of my favourite rhetorical miscues:

Now, look, folks, as I’ve told you countless times, I live in Literalville.    

If you tell me something, I take it literally. I believe that you mean it. I don’t dance around edges trying to figure out what you really meant. If you say it, I believe it. I live in Literalville ...

And, you know, when you live in Literalville, life is a lot simpler. It appears to be complex to people that don’t live in Literalville. But I live in Literalville, it’s very simple. You have to be able to accept things.

Why do I care about the facts?  I know, it’s a failing of mine.  It’s a failing of mine.  See, I live in Realville.  I’m the mayor of Realville, or Literalville. 

Apparently, there is no such place.

Living for the City--Fact of the Day

More than half of the world’s population lives in cities; that group occupies approximately 2.7% of the world’s land area. More at Marginal Revolution.

Sunday Papers

Apparently the OG doesn't have to take her Macbook out of the bag at the airport. More theatre from the TSA

Canada drops the penny. Well played.

New forms of governance and capitalism offer alternatives to the American way.

50 Amazing numbers about the economy; lots of seniors with college debt. Senior citizens.

The neuroscience of creativity; how Dylan was inspired. I think I'll read the book.

Tuning In

Our recent trip to the mountains in the western part of the state got me thinking about music. The OG maintained a stranglehold on the radio, deftly switching between presets and the ipod until a familiar tune was playing. It made me wonder how a new song could ever come into her life, since the unfamiliar was immediately  shunned, even if it was a song that might have been the newest Pitbull or Katy Perry. On the other hand, I like stuff that sounds like stuff I like--hence the Wefunk and RootsRock radio podcasts, as well as my love for the Artist Radio service on Pandora or Spotify. It creates the illusion of newness within the confines of the familiar.

In his excellent book The Power of Habit, Charles Duhigg delves into this, examining why Outkast's "Hey Ya," though envisaged as a major hit, did not find immediate favor among radio listeners. It was too different. It was only by sandwiching it in between familiar songs that DJs got people to listen:

"The areas that process music are designed to seek out patterns and look for familiarity... Our brains crave familiarity because [it] is how we manage to hear without becoming distracted by all the sound."

So if you want your kids to appreciate Jill Sobule, you might bookend her between Taylor Swift and Nicky Minaj on your next playlist.

I Want a New Drugstore

On at least two, and possibly three occasions in the recent past, we have gotten excited about a construction project in our neighbourhood, and been horribly disappointed when the resulting business turned out to be, not a restaurant or  some other business useful to us, but a drugstore, often within steps of another one. It just happened again, where a 24 hour Walgreens opened within 200 yards of a Rite Aid.

I know all about the rise of drugstores during Prohibition thanks to the excellent Last Call, but what could possibly be driving this trend today, when the supermarkets and Targets of the world already offer the same services, but with fresh produce and power tools to boot? And moreover, the non-core drugstore inventory seems to be a collection of random stuff (beach umbrellas next to Pringles) that wouldn't ever merit a trip, especially now that no-one brings their film there anymore (kids, ask your parents).

Turns out that the cutthroat competition is driven by a number of factors, including an aging population, a desire to compete with the supermarkets, and the search for the "coveted right-hand corner location." But as the end of retail approaches, it feels like a desperate, not very creative strategy. And despite the spiffy new drugstore at the corner of Estes and Franklin, I have no desire to venture inside. Maybe if they add live entertainment.

The Return of Manufacturing in America

Tyler Cowen, who brought us the Great Stagnation, offers three reasons that are likely to combine to make the United States an export powerhouse in the future:

.

First, artificial intelligence and computing power will revolutionize production in one sector after another, as it is doing now, both with things like Watson and Amazon's robots; basically, the more the world relies on smart machines, the more domestic wage rates become irrelevant.

Second, the  the recent discoveries of very large shale oil and natural gas deposits in the United States will decrease costs and lessen dependence on supplies from dodgy countries.

Finally, demand from rapidly developing countries will boost American exports.

Interesting throughout. One wonders if there will be enough domestic jobs in health care and education, along with feeding the dogs trained to keep the dog feeders away from the machines.

Pops and Potter

Just learned from the excellent Louis Armstrong biography, Pops, that marijuana smokers in the 1930s--a group that Satchmo belonged to then and throughout his life-- in addition to being known as "vipers" were also called "muggles." Wonder if JK Rowling knew that?

Book Reviews

My notes for the 2012 reading list aren't showing up in Worldwide's browser, so I've copied them below, for reasons of vanity, as well as for the benefit of my one follower and two commentors. It's been fun trying to write two sentence reviews.

Evelyn Waugh, Brideshead Revisited: The Sacred and Profane Memories of Captain Charles Ryder

Picked this up because Salman Rushdie said it was Christopher Hitchens' favourite book. Thoroughly enjoyable, but I found neither the Sebastian character, nor Charles' love for Julia credible. Perhaps all of the characters were just too rich and too British for me to fully understand.

Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games

The one book the OG's enjoyed in the last two years, it certainly held my interest, although I found a couple of plot twists implausible. I finished it quickly but won't be reading the sequel. That seems to say enough.

Ned Tillman, The Chesapeake Watershed: A Sense of Place and a Call to Action

Charming memoir by a friend of the family, centered on life in the Chesapeake Bay region, capably sprinkled with science, history and environmentalism. Enjoyed the geology lesson most, as it was the area with which I was least familiar.

Charles C. Mann,  1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus Created

Fascinating look at the development of what I now know is the Columbian Exchange. More enjoyable than 1491. I had no idea of the extent to which Chinese appetite for South American silver figured in the cycle, nor that malaria and other unwanted parasites were invariably part of the package.

Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov,  Pale Fire: A Novel

I didn't like Lolita when I read it,

Perhaps the fault was mine; I didn't get it.

I found Pale Fire on the bookshelf in the basement,

And skipped the Foreword, finding in amazement The words in verse--and comments--metafiction!

It's clever sure, but there is better fiction.

William Styron,  Lie Down in Darkness

Beautifully written, painful to read; especially after Darkness Visible. Even with the knowledge of events from the time shifting narrative, I was still hoping for some sort of redemption at the end, even though I didn't really like anybody.

Matthew Yglesias,  The Rent Is Too Damn High: What To Do About It, And Why It Matters More Than You Think

Not a lot new here if you read his blog (I do) but interesting throughout, and yet another case for the Kindle Single. Time to slip the bonds of zoning and central planning and give the people what they want.

Sam Sommers, Situations Matter: Understanding How Context Transforms Your World

The title says it all. The only thing I learned is that Seinfeld is about normative behavior, not nothing. Enjoyable throughout, but I encountered most of the substance in 2011.

Louis Sachar, Holes

Stole this from the BG's bookbag for a quick hit and possible conversation piece. A story that slowly draws you in and wins you over with characters reminiscent of Roald Dahl.

Kim Aubrey, Crave It: Writers and Artists Do Food

Is their beauty in food beyond the pleasure of taste and the warmth of shared experience? Sometimes, but this mostly tastes of sucrose.

Charles Duhigg, The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business

Anecdotal examples of the Kahnemann story with some good practical advice for self improvement. Not as good as I had hoped, but I am suddenly mindful of the Cue, Response, Reward cycle, and its implications in many areas.

Laura Hillenbrand, Unbroken: a World War II story of survival, resilience, and redemption

Having your Olympic hopes shattered when your plane gets shot down, you spend 6 weeks on a raft in the Pacific and 3 years as a Japanese POW run by a sadistic monster is rather unpleasant. Thank goodness Billy Graham came along to save the day. Great story but I couldn't wait for it to end.

Abhijit Banerjee, Esther Duflo, Poor Economics

Finally, some middle ground between Sachs and Easterly, backed by data, and with credible proposals for action. The herald of a quiet revolution?

Mark Kurlansky, The Last Fish Tale: The Fate of the Atlantic and Survival in Gloucester, America's Oldest Fishing Port and Most Original Town

Might have enjoyed this more if I hadn't read Cod first. A little too much hagiography and not enough economics for my taste. The early history and the mechanics of the fishing industry are fascinating.

Jared M. Diamond, Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies

Had been meaning to read this for years; finally picked it up at the intersection of a discussion of 1493 and a trip to New Guinea. Remarkable in sweep and succinctness; how different might our world be if Africa was wide, rather than long and the zebra had been willing to take a bridle?

Candice Millard, Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President

Who knew that James Garfield was such a remarkable figure? I don't know what was more shocking to learn about the late 19th century: the accessibility of public figures or the ignorance of the medical profession regarding germs and infection. Dodgy politics too. At least some things have changed.

Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's travels

Relatively enjoyable insight into the human condition. Apparently i missed the thinly disguised anti Whig satire

Michael Morpurgo, War Horse

I am getting old--skeptic of incredible coincidences and unimpressed by anthropomorphic animals. Not certain if it's me or this title. I suspect the latter, but fear the former.

Jonah Lehrer, How We Decide

More Gladwell than Kahneman. Not a lot of new material (the marshmallow study, loss aversion, the anchoring effect, the paradox of choice, etc,), but well written and sprinkled with stories from sports, which is always a selling point for this reader.

William Styron, Darkness Visible: A Memoir of Madness

Concise account of the author's descent into and recovery from suicidal depression. Painfully honest and beautifully written, it is a reminder of how complex our operating systems are and a caution against prescribing "cures" for psychological problems. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.

Katherine Porter, Broke: How Debt Bankrupts the Middle Class

Lots of people just like you and me declaring bankruptcy, often as a result of job loss, divorce or illness. And the process is expensive and confusing.

Philip Coggan, Paper Promises: Debt, Money, and the New World Order

Readable history of the role of money as a medium for exchange and a store of value; predicts China will be holding the bag in a hundred years, eliminating the comfort the US has enjoyed in having it debts denominated in a currency it can print at will. But we'll muddle through somehow.

Jacqueline Novogratz, The Blue Sweater: Bridging the Gap Between Rich and Poor in an Interconnected World

Interesting and honest take on projects in the developing world. I didn't believe her miraculous encounter with the eponymous garment in Rwanda, but she won me over eventually, as she seems to have done with many others.

Daniel H. Pink, Drive: The Surprising Truth about What Motivates Us

An airport purchase by LDW, I read this mostly in quest of yearly numbers. Again, echoes of Ariely and Gladwell, but still in it's own voice. Wish I had understood intrinsic motivation twenty years ago.

Norton Juster, Jules Feiffer, The Phantom Tollbooth

Someone pegged my Flavor Flav Halloween costume as the watchdog, and was incredulous when I confessed to not knowing the book. Enjoyable throughout, though this grump grew tired at times of the non-stop irreverence. And I expect its lesson teaching-powers are often overestimated by hopeful parents.

Peter H. Diamandis, Steven Kotler, Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think

Plenty of things to be optimistic about as we move exponentially toward progress in many areas. But predictions are difficult, especially about the future.

Matt Ridley, The rational optimist: how prosperity evolves

People have constantly been predicting the demise of civilization, despite incredible, even exponential improvements in world gdp, personal wealth, life expectancy, global harvests, reductions in pollution emissions, death from water borne diseases, and gains from trade. But this time it's different.

James Robinson, Daron Acemoglu, Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty

You only have to read chapter 15 to learn that inclusive economic and political institutions that allow competition are crucial to national prosperity, but the rest is full of historical examples of how rulers, governments and entrenched elites have interfered to benefit themselves. China beware.