No Snow Edition
This is the first time I have written the Monday Read on Monday for at least a couple of years 🙂
We were supposed to go to Appi this weekend and stay a couple of nights. My wife had booked us a ski pack and a couple of nights at the big hotel there.
The night before we checked their website and the resort was closed. Less than 10cm of snow, no runs open. Eeek.
Fortunately my wife has high level people skills and managed to cancel the booking without paying the cancellation fee.
I thought we were supposed to get a lot of snow this year?
RJConf2022
I had so much fun at last month’s conference that we are going to do it again next year! Check out the details so far here. I also recommend signing up to the mailing list, as you’ll get information before it gets posted to the blog.
The Forum
The Forum is doing well (18,031 posts to date). Here are the latest active threads:
This week’s books
Picked up Neal Stephenson’s new novel, Termination Shock (also about climate change). Haven’t got very far into it yet, but very much looking forward to this one.
This week’s links
- I found this very insightful. I’m definitely a Starter: Starters and Finishers
- This site shows how prices have changed over time in Japan. Fascinating: neage.jp
- Seems Japanese stocks are cheap too: Why we like the Japanese stock market
- Interesting interview (mentions Where is my Flying Car): The Past, Present, and Future of Energy: a Conversation with Jason Crawford
- I really need #6: How to be successful
- I had no idea pachinko was so big: The Little Japanese Bastard That Beeps and Blinks
- Pretty technical explanation for geeks only: Lies, Damn Lies, and Investment Statistics
- Seems overly pessimistic to me, but worth thinking about: Ground Control to Major Tom–turbulence ahead
- Interesting stuff from the source: Is It Now the “3.3% Rule”?
- This was thought-provoking (shades of Wait But Why): The many worlds of enough
- Two great threads from reddit about tax-withholding accounts (特定口座): Guide to designated investment accounts, Reasons to declare investment income
What do you think? Anything good in there?
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Thanks as always for the weekly updates on your current reading. I’ve bookmarked a few interesting books after seeing them on the Monday Read. Any specific tips on how you fit so many books into your schedule? I wish I could read more but find it takes me about a month to finish just one book. I tend to prefer reading for 15-30 mins or so before bed depending on how sleepy I am, and guess my reading speed is pretty slow.
I’m nowhere near as consistent as I would like to be (tend to default to Twitter or the RJ forum instead of a book -something I need to work on).
Two things I find help: reading on Kindle, so I have books with me all the time on my phone or Kindle device, and putting my phone in the spare room to charge when I get home (I then read on the Kindle device and don’t touch my phone again until the next day).
(8) “Drive through some of the old Welsh mining valleys, and you still see some places where hope went to die 40 years ago.” Maybe, but house prices here in the Eastern Valleys of Blaenau Gwent went up at least 20% this year. Walking thru town these days I see a considerable number of Bentleys and Aston Martins. Totally out of place. English money buying up Welsh hill farms and planting trees to offset their carbon footprints. House price differentials were one reason we hesitated moving back to Kyushu. However, there are no 7-11’s in Wales, and we miss Ebi-mayo onigiri.