Ronald William C. Brady Jr.

Enjoy it isn’t a word I would use to describe my experience, but…

Revisado: 05-19-23

I found this book difficult, and personally enlightening. My younger siblings grew up watching iCarly, and since I was the one usually looking after them, I watched quite a lot of it myself, and always found her character to be my favorite. I never knew there was such a story behind all the smiles.

This book was extremely difficult for me to listen to because so much of what she went through has an analogy for me in my own life, but at the same time, it was good to know that I wasn’t the only one struggling with very similar things in completely different circumstances.

While I can’t say I “enjoyed“ the book, I can definitely say I do not regret, reading it, listening to it, or whatever you wanna call this. I think this is an extremely important book for several different reasons.

One is that it deals with mental health as openly as possible for the person telling their own story.

It really reminds me how complicated it is to be human.

It reminds me that many of us have trauma that we’re not advertising, for obvious reasons, and if there is a way forward. And last, but not least, I hope at long last Jeanette McCurdy is doing well. I recommend this book to people who are interested, just be prepared for some difficulty.

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Ghostbusters that’s who I am calling

Revisado: 12-09-22

This was a surprisingly good read. The novelization, for the first film was even funnier than the movie in many ways, though the movie will always be a classic. There was a Narrative device that was not present in the film, which was really enjoyable. Certain scenes were told through the comedic lens of two every day, New York citizens.

The real surprise, though was the second novel which corresponds to the second film. It’s become pretty fashionable to call the second Ghostbusters, movie, the inferior film, and to make fun of the writing. The novelization shows that the writing is equally strong, though the story feels a lot more brief, and that’s maybe why people were disappointed. However, as a lifelong Ghostbusters fan, I really enjoyed both and would recommend it to anyone who is just as nerdy for this stuff as I am .

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This was something I didn’t expect

Revisado: 11-01-22

I’ve had a long-standing interest in dreams as someone who had recurring nightmares and night terrors. Over the course of my life, I realized that I began to devalue my dreams and the content in them. This book reminded me of the reasons I used to pay attention to them and make an attempt to decipher them in an attempt to get to know my inner landscape all the more.

This short audiobook from the great courses is a nice way to get your feet wet, and get the wheels turning and thinking about dream symbolism and how it works its way into the fiction that inspires and is inspired by real life. If you have an interest in any of this, I would definitely recommend it

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The Nutrition Book I was looking for

Revisado: 10-28-22

So, I have been looking for a science Bex nutrition book that actually explains a lot of the research behind more ideal dietary guidelines, as opposed to the ones that are dictated primarily on political compromises due to public policy pressures. And this book fills that gap.

The recipes in the book however in the second half really left a lot to be desired, but that’s more so a matter of personal taste rather than a critique of the concept of the book itself to some extent. The book does a really good job of explaining how to make healthier choices based on what you were already like, the basics of how to read nutrition labels and what to watch out for, and provides for a sample of recipes that are good inspirations for how to continue forward knowing what you know after finishing the book.

The one caveat I would make is that the author recommends cooking with canola oil which is not necessarily one of the healthiest choices you could make. I would remove that from your healthy oil list, and just use olive oil and coconut oil more sparingly. The other thing I would add to this caveat is that he mentions there is no discernible difference between high fructose corn syrup and table sugar, which isn’t necessarily true… Newer research has born out the fact that overconsumption of high fructose corn syrup has similar effects on the liver as over consumption of alcohol, and should probably be moderated/avoided if possible. I think from that I thought this was an excellent overview of contemporary nutrition research(as of the 2017 edition) and I would definitely recommend this book to someone curious about nutrition and looking to make healthier food choices that are sustainable long-term.

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I didn’t know what to expect, but I’m glad I listened

Revisado: 05-11-22

The story was appropriately aggravating that part, being totally relatable when it came to extremely close relationships between Asian parents and children, at times smothering. Sometimes, they’re difficult. Sometimes, we have completely different visions of what life should be. But always, At the end of the day, there is a lot of love there.

It was a beautiful reflection of the complexity of the dynamics there. And also a beautiful and bone showing exploration of intergenerational trauma, skillfully carried out by a wonderful cast. If this catches your eye, I would definitely recommend you give it a chance.

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A Philosophical Breakfast

Revisado: 03-16-22

Breakfast with Seneca

I’ve been grappling with stoic philosophy for a few years now, and as much as I appreciate modern Stoicism in general, I have started feeling like there were too many books that tread the same territory using different words and editing The cohesiveness of stoic philosophy to suit they’re particular taste. And while that can be useful for some, it irritated me.

This is one of two books I don’t really feel is guilty of that. This paints a pretty holistic picture of the way Seneca thought of his philosophy, as well as maintaining his pension toward philosophical eclecticism. This is another “stoicism for beginners” book. But what his book does differently, is what I think makes it more valuable than a lot of others. It dives into Seneca specifically, only using other sources incidentally where it helps elucidate Seneca’s points.

The other thing is that it doesn’t shy away from the Roman conception of Stoic cosmopolitanism, reducing the philosophy to a series of life hacks, nor does it shy away from the stoic conception of the logos, fate, the gods, etc.

Personally, I found my way back to philosophy in general, and Stoicism more specifically after spending a year in therapy, specifically engaged in cognitive behavioral therapy. And I found that while the therapeutic protocol itself was very helpful, after I “graduated“ I wondered where all of these techniques, clinically glorified versions of the life hack version of stoic philosophy, fit into a larger framework. So I began to study. I begin to rebuild who I was into who I wanted to be.

If I had had this book from the beginning, that process would’ve gone far more smoothly. I have always found Seneca to be the most approachable of the big three, by himself, and this book makes him all the more approachable. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who is interested in stoic philosophy, or in the way Seneca sees it. This is definitely a great way to start the day! This is one of two of the best introductions to it that I have found, the other being “how to think like a Roman emperor“ by Donald Robertson.

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The Economic Hitman's Hit Was A Success

Revisado: 03-10-22

This book hit hard! This was one of the most interesting and page turning nonfictional books I’ve ever read. Reading it feels like reading a conspiracy theory that deep down, you know to be true. Listening to John Perkins tell his story through the lens of being the main character and watching his evolution as he wrestles with himself I think it’s something we can all relate to.

He covers very thoroughly the corrupting mechanisms that big businesses used to influence and shape events on the scale of nations. There were sections of this book where I found myself being extremely depressed, but at the end of the day, his mission is to expose what’s happening, to give us ideas about what we can do to change the course of events, and to encourage us to do just that. I definitely recommend this book to anyone interested, and to anyone else who would listen to them in turn

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I would phreaking recommed

Revisado: 03-10-22

So, the story revolves around a young freshman girl who is blind, and feels like a lone wolf seeking a pack, oh while her mother is sick with a mysterious illness, and her dad is dealing with a deteriorating marriage and his own internal denial about who he really is and who he’s attracted to. The story also involves a man who wanted to be a soldier and never really got the chance, the only thing he got, was the chance to take inventory of beer and coffins.

As the story unfolds, the girl finds her people, a father never fully comes to grips with who he is, and that would be soldier finds a purpose only to discover it might not be all it’s cracked up to be. This is part coming of age story, part conspiracy, and historically inspired.

As someone with a disability, I found Emma, the young girl to be one of the most relatable characters in the story. And having a grandfather who served in both Korea and Vietnam and was exposed to agent orange, I could also empathize with and understand the worldview of the other characters in the story.

I have always been fascinated by the beginnings of what we would call hacking, that started with the phone freaks, and the story brought that whole zeitgeist to life, as the world changes, so do the mindsets of the people living in that age. I would definitely recommend

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A good intro to thinking about retirement accounts

Revisado: 02-28-22

So over the last year or so, I’ve been on a quest to learn all of the things about personal finance that nobody was able to hand down to me. And on that quest, I have learned quite a lot. This book has been very helpful and helping me and the rest of my family understand the difference between the different retirement offerings out there, with the benefits and drawbacks are of each, and has helped us begin to build a strategy that involves multiple accounts, and an overall stable portfolio strategy. Like many have said though, it’s not the most page turning book in the world, but when it comes to finance… There are generally two types of books, ones that are useful in terms of the raw advice they offer, and ones that inspire you to do better. And I would say this falls into the former category more so than the latter.

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An honest look into a parallel world

Revisado: 02-19-22

Dope world review

Niko Yorobyov is one of those people that if you were to meet him in real life, I have the feeling that on the face of it he would be almost entirely unassuming. He grew up the son of what we would consider white-collar workers. Goes to University and becomes a small time drug dealer, eventually evolving into a much larger time drug dealer LOL. You spent time on the inside of a British prison, he’s listened to the stories of people convicted for nonviolent drug offenses as well as horribly violent ones, and by the time he gets out he is inspired to turn his life around, and to shed light on what he thinks is a gross misapprehension of the problem our society has with drugs.

Armed with the background knowledge given to him that most people with the humanities related degree will be familiar with, a healthy heaping of a dark sense of humor and a comfortability with irony, a healthy heaping of skepticism and brutal honesty, he delivers one of the best examinations of the “drug problem! That our society finds itself in.

He talks about his own experience both dealing Molly, LSD, weed, cocaine. And a small handful of other elicited substances along with his experience with smuggling something we might not think of: gray market cigarettes. What we don’t realize is that things like that are baked into the business strategies of companies like we find with big tobacco. The taxis in the strongest markets are so high that they often “intentionally lose“ part of a shipment in some Eastern European country where they can be snatched up by enterprising young people and turn for about a 500% profit easily.

Along with that we get a historical and sociological examination of the Italian mafia, the American war on drugs and how it impacts various regions of the world like in Latin America, how drugs are different in Asia… With a healthy sprinkling of various interviews so we can get a sense of the actual people behind the stories and the environments they developed in.

All of this in my opinion, leaves you with a pretty delightful book that takes an extremely honest look at drugs, and our relationship to them. If you like creative nonfiction, and are fascinated by what you might consider true crime, and the effect of black markets around the world, this book is definitely right up your alley… Especially if like me, you have watched a whole lot of Vice over the years!

At the end of the book he talks about his motivations for becoming a journalist, wanting to turn his life around and hoping his parents are proud of him. I’m glad that people like him or writing books that are this honest and forthright. I can only hope his parents are proud of him for turning his life around and turning his attention to a really large issue.

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