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Latest — 14 Jan 2026

A bit of this, a bit of that

Reading Ted Gioia is always inspirational, and he recently shared how he came to love reading, and what that might imply for encouraging reading. The factors that influenced him: I was exposed to the joy of storytelling at a very early age. I soon learned how to read for fun,

More issues

2025 book roundup

The best books this year reminded me of the importance of working day by day, laying brick by brick.

Washington State Income Tax Thoughts

I’m having some cognitive dissonance around Washington State tax policy. We are a progressive state, I am ok with paying for a strong set of social services, and we have a regressive tax structure, so I get the arguments for an income tax in place of a sales tax.

Carrots and Sticks

The 2nd Trump administration has allocated ~$75B to deportation efforts (One Big Beautiful Bill). Additionally, there might be another $2B in funding diverted from military spending. I am sure there are other monies squirreled away in different budgets. But whatever, $75B is a significant number. And it is many, many

Looking past the current disaster

I could spend this morning lamenting the current state of our government and leadership, but I would add nothing original to the discussion. I accept that most of our government institutions are going to be broken, and we need to start thinking about how to pick up the pieces. It

Grab Bag December 2025

(In addition to some travel, I am currently dealing with arthritis in my thumbs, perhaps from years of typing, mousing, and phone use. My typing is limited this week, excuse the terseness.) Affordability Often I see politicians spouting about the price of eggs or the price of hamburger. This chart

Lying down with dogs

I am traveling this week and won't get to writing a full post. But I did want to pass on one story from my father-in-law, Garry. He would watch people making poor decisions, spending time with the wrong people, and he would say: If you lie down with

Changing Structure

Trump's "maximum disruption" approach has created a mess, but let's use the opportunity to rethink and renew our policies.

Whither Program Management

I read this thread about Cursor, which has scaled to $29B in revenue without any full-time PMs. I am guessing “PMs” are program managers based on context. I have a great affinity for the program manager job — and I am glad to see program management reset, getting back to basics.

Agency

I didn't realize the importance of agency early in my career, and I wish I had.