22 from '22

2022 superlatives

1. Favorite new bee-boop computer tool: It’s a 4-way tie between Arc browser, Cron calendar, RSS feeds, and Clearspace. If I have to pick, it’s Clearspace, which cured my addiction to Instagram and TikTok.

2. Favorite new restaurant: Killer Noodle in Sawtelle, Los Angeles

3. Favorite new town: Bend, OR

4. Favorite new video game: Three-way tie between Control, Inside, and Portal 2

5. Favorite aesthetic: Lovecraftian Cold War-era Brutalist Surrealism, i.e., whatever they’re going for in Control:

1. Favorite book series: The Three-Body Problem series (AKA Remembrance of Earth’s Past)

2. Favorite non-series book: Dreaming the Beatles

3. Favorite movie: Everything Everywhere All at Once

4. Favorite show: True Detective S1. Wow.

5. Favorite song that I had never heard before: Pyramid Song by Radiohead

6. Favorite new artist I never knew existed: Pond

7. Favorite essay/blog post: “How to do what you love” by Paul Graham

8. Single best meal: Dim sum at House of Dim Sum in SF

   

9. Best performance: Sir Paul McCartney at SoFi Stadium

10. Most awe-inspiring moment: Standing on the edge of Crater Lake. Runner-up: seeing the Milky Way in Lassen Volcanic National Park.

11. Lowest moment: Friday, February 11th, in the middle of pivoting and middle of YC, trying to force-fit a crypto startup idea at ETHDenver, feeling absolutely directionless and defeated. And it was cold.

12. Highest moment: Playing pinball with Katie, Vinesh, and Kunal in Bend after I took edibles. Highest in many ways.

    

13. Biggest regret: Not surfing once while living in LA

14. Whatever the opposite of “biggest regret” might be: Doing YC

15. Most useful article of clothing: Outdoor Voices Cloud Knit Sweatpants

16. Best living space: Current new apartment in Philly

17. Worst living space: Tiny basement room in Oakland

18. Most important new learning: A very, very small minority of humans get to do what they love, but it’s possible! Getting there takes discipline, intent, and lots of iterative output.

19. Most profound new idea: The universe is silent not because it is devoid of life, but because inter-species game theory implies that those who reveal themselves are destroyed. See Three Body Problem.

20. Favorite tweet:

    

21. Best experiment: auditory-only mushroom trip, Johns Hopkins-style

22. Proudest trivial achievement: Being a top 0.05% Beatles Spotify listener this year