Well, it’s been a moment. The last time I sat down to ramble was around Thanksgiving last year. It was consumption-focused: a mini piano, an expensive leather jacket, and a pair of boots.
I’m happy to report that, of the wish list, I only bought the cheapest item: a pair of boots, which I’m happy with.
but money still comes and goes… and goes
It’s the middle of March now. Since November, besides the boots, the only item of note that I purchased was a Nintendo Switch (more on this later).
But somehow money still drains away. My kids and my wife have this life velocity in them that cost lots of dollars. They are always out in adventures during the week and, on weekends, we go on expeditions. Many times these expeditions, due to the distance from home, involve spending the night in the area.
A local expedition comes with lodging expenses, restaurant bills, and other associated consumption items: fuel, snacks, parking, etc. These add up very quickly, but I still think they are worth the price.
In addition, kids grow fast and they need more clothes and more shoes and more food. There are, of course, “bang for your buck” techniques to cut expenses by 50%-75%, but I’m usually exhausted physically and mentally to set any of this up.
got hit twice healthwise
The year began on Day 1 by catching the super flu. Knocked me down two weeks and left me fatigued for another week or so.
Then again in early March, caught something that I’d describe as the super cold. Again, knocked down for a week, with a long recovery tail.
I’m finally out of it and need to catch up with my training. Compound exercises, mobility, and running. Easier said than done.
reading: practical implications of the limits of knowledge
No classics and no literature or history so far this year. I have dedicated the first three months to study mathematics and statistics not from a computational perspective but an epistemological one.
The advantage I have (I think) is that I’m a financial markets practitioner. The markets, with the correct perspective, is a real world playground to test ideas about the limits of knowledge. People play Russian roulette without knowing the game they are playing. Or sometimes they are highly confident that there is not bullet in the barrel.
When the time comes to set aside this topic of risk and decisions under uncertainty, I’m drawn towards literature. Perhaps The Sun Also Rises, or Walden, or some other American writer that has survived the passage of time.
starting to play with AI
I’m not an early adopter anymore due to allergy to neomania (for certain things), but appears that the most recent versions of AI models have gotten significantly better. I now use Claude every now and then for small projects at home and for larger, more complex processes at work.
So far, I’m intrigued, even though I’m convinced the market side of things will suffer greatly due to overinvestment/overspending. At a micro level, Claude works well. Actually, Claude was an active participant in the redesign of this website.
musicland
My Stratocaster hangs on the wall. My acoustic Epiphone hangs next to the strat. I wish I wasn’t tired after everyone goes to bed at night, but there are laws of physics and physiology.
By the time the house is quiet, I manage to grab one of the guitars every two to three days and play for 20 minutes tops.
It’s not fun this way.
In the rare occasions when we stay home on the weekends and I plug the guitar to the amplifier, the kids come and start messing with the dials.
One day I will play and practice and play. Not today.