ALooks Almanac

Category: Book Reviews

  • Snow Crash, Fiction Book

    Last night I started reading “Snow Crash”, a fictional novel written in 1992 about a pizza delivery boy and the metaverse..? apparently its REALLY good. Tim Ferriss and Chris Sacca are just a couple proponents.

    I read 2 chapters and so far heres my review – I like the writing style – short hand sentences. like this: about an angry guy just trying to deliver his fucking pizzas before 30 min are up. tangential rant about state of the world – consumerism, hierarchy, high tech, greed, more. Pizza place on fire. Don’t care – need to deliver on time. You fucking idiots who started the fire, give the pizza IDC I need to GO! Rushing through traffic using high tech car, don’t need to look at road.

    And so on and so on.

    At one point I found myself asking myself if I like this book but then I had a hard time putting it down, with bloodshot eyes begging for closure and my needed clockwork rest, I know I’ll need to continue where I left off.

    The fun/ intimidating part about this – it’s my first ever fiction read since Twilight in high school. I’m 30 now. Haha!

    -AL

  • Essential Take Aways From Greg Mckeowns’ “Essentialism”

    • Priority is a singular word. “Priorities” is a word we use to trick ourselves into thinking there can be more than 1 most important thing to do.
    • Pareto’s Principal states that 80% of outcomes are the result of 20% of causes. aka the 80/20 rule.
      • ask yourself – what is the my priority? slowly decide what it IS by eliminating all the options it is NOT.
      • will this be worth my time if I say my hourly rate is 50$/hr?
      • what is the least amount of effort I can put in to get the maximal result?
      • Warren Buffet attributes 90% of his wealth to 10 investments.
      • what could you do today to eliminate some of the noise in your life?
    • Learn to embody “no” as a response.
    • “we need to learn to slow yes, and the quick no”.
    • Get out of the vicious cycle of “sunk cost bias”. stop losing. continuing to lose is not a circle that will bring you around to success.

    more to come,

    AL