📚 Finished reading: Better Than Before by Gretchen Rubin, ISBN: 9780385348621

This was good. Lots of entertaining anecdotes and (some) supporting data. In my opinion the most useful section of this book was her “four tendencies” framework, which the author later spun off into its own book (which I plan to read).

It’s hard not to compare this to James Clear’s Atomic Habits, which I read last May. I feel like Atomic Habits had more useful advice and had a cleaner, more methodical structure. However, Better Than Before made me laugh more. Both good. Both useful. Both recommended.

📚 Finished reading: The Road by Cormac McCarthy, ISBN: 9780307386458

What a fucking punch to the gut this was. I knew nothing about this book going into it and I had a more visceral reaction to it than I did to 1984 or Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Dolores Umbridge may be more evil than Voldemort). It didn’t help that the two main characters (The Man and The Boy) are roughly the same age as me and my son. This was a very, very tough read (emotionally). I’m glad I read it, but I’m probably not going to return to it in the future. Not fun.

The Boy and I recently finished watching 30 seasons of The Simpsons (minus 3-4 episodes that were too adult). It took nearly two years at an average of just under one episode per day. He started at Lisa’s age and finished at Bart’s age.

📚 Finished reading: The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin, ISBN: 9781443418195

I enjoyed this. A lot of the specific advice from her project wouldn’t necessarily apply to me or lots of other people, but it’s useful to see this as one possible recipe.

I camped 42 nights in 2019, which was fewer than normal (65 in 2018, 51 in 2017, 43 in 2016), but the locations were definitely more spread out.

📚 Finished reading: The Road to Sparta by Dean Karnazes, ISBN: 9781609614737

Great book. I read it last year, but I decided to read it again with The Boy when he chose this for his school book report. Dean sometimes takes shit from other ultra runners for self promotion, but we think he’s terrific. There’s a lot to like here.

I ran for 24 hours with a new personal best of 117.35 miles. It was a rough night, but in the morning I got to ring the bell when I surpassed my previous best of 112.33.

Melissa reached 101 miles and rang the bell for a new distance personal record. Will has covered 33 miles and only has 9 more miles to meet his goal.

Will has started his 24 hour run at Across The Years. Melissa slept a few hours and she’s started day 2. Track them here (Mel 1623, Will 1975): https://my.raceresult.com/145502/results?lang=en#0_F5FB0C

Melissa has covered 30 miles in the first 6 hours of her Across The Years 48 hour race. It’s nice and cool out—good for running, less good for spectating.

📚 Finished reading: Everything That Remains by Joshua Fields Millburn & Ryan Nicodemus, ISBN: 9781938793196

I love this book. This was my fourth or fifth read through, which is probably more than any other book I’ve ever read.

📚 Finished reading: Allies by Alan Gratz, ISBN: 9781338245745

The Boy picked this one up at a school book fair and I read it with him. It was a bit gruesome and upsetting at times, but he didn’t seem to mind reading that kind of stuff right before bed. He enjoyed it and has since picked up another similar book by the same author. I thought it was fine.

📚 Finished reading: The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett, ISBN: 9780064401883

I read this one with The Boy as he was reading it in school. I didn’t love it, but it did have some good parts.

📚 Finished reading: How to Stop Feeling Like Sh*t by Andrea Owen, ISBN: 9781580056809

I didn’t get much from this one. Admittedly, I’m not the target audience of women with low self esteem, but this was heavy on anecdotes and light on science. Very life-coachy. Maybe it would have seemed better if I hadn’t just finished the amazing Lost Connections book.

📚 Finished reading: Lost Connections: Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression – and the Unexpected Solutions by Johann Hari, ISBN: 9781632868329

Excellent book. So much new (to me) information in this book. Full of well cited scientific research. Audiobook read by the author was very moving at times.

📚 Finished reading: Natural Born Heroes: Mastering the Lost Secrets of Strength and Endurance by Christopher McDougall, ISBN: 9780307742223

Good, but not as good as Born to Run. The style of this book was nearly identical to Born to Run, though I found it much more difficult to follow the story this time. I did enjoy the story of Greek resistance fighters during World War II, it just didn’t seem very coherent.

📚 Finished reading: The 4-Hour Workweek by Timothy Ferriss, ISBN: 9780307591166

Where do I begin with this one? The “lifestyle design” and travel parts of the book are actually pretty good. There’s a lot of interesting advice, and much of it is even somewhat useful. The business advice, though, is a mess. Most of it seems pretty sketchy (this guy comes from the infomercial world). If you have to follow up a piece of business advise with the disclaimer, “THIS IS LEGAL!”, then you may want to reconsider your life choices.

Audiobook from Apple Books.