One thing that business school has done for me is it has rekindled my love for books. I used to read a lot but I guess as I got older I got busy with life, family and work so reading got pushed back to something that I rarely did. But now that I am as busy as I've ever been I am reading a lot more.
I also discovered some non-traditional ways to read as well. First, since I spend about two hours every day in my car driving to school and back, I use that time to listen to books from Audible. If you spend a lot of time in your car I highly recommend you check them out. For about $15 I get one book per month.
The second thing I recently discovered is Amazon's Kindle. In case you haven't heard of it, it is a new ebook reader and in my opinion is the best thing since sliced bread. I love being able to read the Wall Street Journal while laying on the couch and being able to read a book whenever and wherever I want. Feel free to ask me any questions about it but I'll tell you I think it is going to be a hit. It sold out within 5 hours of being released (luckily I placed my order within that time frame) and is currently on back order. But really, I can't recommend the Kindle enough. It is worth every penny!
So here is a list of books that I have read since July 2007, the books I'm reading now, and books I plan to read within the next couple of months (although that list is subject to change as books interest me). Two of the books were for class (The World is Flat and The Goal) but they were both excellent books so I'm including them here. The rest were just for fun.
Books I've read:
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey
The World is Flat by Thomas Friedman
Shadow Divers by Robert Kurson
How to Win Friends & Influence People by Dale Carnegie
The Goal by Eliyahu Goldratt and Jeff Cox
Confessions of an Economic Hit Man by John Perkins
The Age of Turbulence by Alan Greenspan (this is a great book!)
Books I'm reading right now:
Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand
A Random Walk Down Wall Street by Burton Malkiel
Books I plan on reading in the very near future: (with the exception of the first one which I have in hard copy, I have samples of these books on my Kindle)
Reminiscences of a Stock Operator by Edwin Lefevre
The Nine: Inside the Secret World of the Supreme Court by Jeffrey Toobin
A Term at the Fed: An Insider's View by Laurence H. Meyer
When Genius Failed: The Rise and Fall of Long-Term Capital Management by Roger Lowenstein
In an Uncertain World: Tough Choices from Wall Street to Washington by Robert Rubin
The Secrets of Economic Indicators by Bernard Baumohl
The Accidental Investment Banker: Inside the Decade That Transformed Wall Street by Jonathan Knee
The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith
Saturday, December 8, 2007
Thursday, December 6, 2007
A new look
Well in less than a month I'll leave for Morocco with Nolen and David. David and I decided that we didn't want to tell anyone that we are military officers (for operational security reasons). David is going to grow his hair out but I've tried that once and I look terrible with long hair. So I've taken the other route and shaved my head and grew a goatee. It's certainly a different look for me but I like it. And one unexpected side effect is that my kid's friends think I look even more intimidating than before. Since I have two teenage girls at home that's not a bad thing :)
Thursday, November 29, 2007
So true....
Nothing I can say to add to this :) Click on the comic to view the full size (and readable) version.
Thursday, September 20, 2007
A bad decision
Tonight I did probably one of the stupidest, and certainly one of the more dangerous things I've done in a long time. I drove home. Lately I've been extremely busy with school and I have probably gotten maybe 8 hours of sleep in the past 48 hours. Last night I was up until about 1am working on a paper that was due today. Then I got up at 5am so I could get to school early enough to practice the presentation. Needless to say I was exhausted today. And we had a reception from 5-7pm so I knew it was going to be a long day.
The reception ended around 7:15 and I wasn't feeling too bad. But I should have known better. I live about an hour and 15 minutes away from school and that drive can get very monotonous, especially after dark. About 30 minutes into the drive I knew I was in trouble. I couldn't find anything on the radio worth listening too and none of my CD's sounded interesting either. At that point I should have called someone so I could carry on a conversation, pulled over to take a nap, I don't know, but I should have done something. But I'm a guy, and I don't like to ask for help; I like to think I can do it all on my own. But tonight that was just a dumb idea. I probably fell asleep at least 5 times while doing 80mph down the Interstate then 3 or 4 more times driving 60mph on the road that takes me into Aiken. Luckily it was only for a second or two and I woke up each time before I got too far off the side of the road.
I guess the moral of the story is that pride can be a dangerous thing. I should have never attempted that ride home, at least not without a plan in case I got tired. But instead of admitting that I needed help and couldn't do it on my own I put my life at risk and anyone else that might have been around me had I gone off the road. I have three months of school left before I go to Morocco and 2 1/2 hours in my car every day. The saddest part is that I can't promise I won't do this again but hopefully the next time I am this tired I will remember this night and make a better decision.
The reception ended around 7:15 and I wasn't feeling too bad. But I should have known better. I live about an hour and 15 minutes away from school and that drive can get very monotonous, especially after dark. About 30 minutes into the drive I knew I was in trouble. I couldn't find anything on the radio worth listening too and none of my CD's sounded interesting either. At that point I should have called someone so I could carry on a conversation, pulled over to take a nap, I don't know, but I should have done something. But I'm a guy, and I don't like to ask for help; I like to think I can do it all on my own. But tonight that was just a dumb idea. I probably fell asleep at least 5 times while doing 80mph down the Interstate then 3 or 4 more times driving 60mph on the road that takes me into Aiken. Luckily it was only for a second or two and I woke up each time before I got too far off the side of the road.
I guess the moral of the story is that pride can be a dangerous thing. I should have never attempted that ride home, at least not without a plan in case I got tired. But instead of admitting that I needed help and couldn't do it on my own I put my life at risk and anyone else that might have been around me had I gone off the road. I have three months of school left before I go to Morocco and 2 1/2 hours in my car every day. The saddest part is that I can't promise I won't do this again but hopefully the next time I am this tired I will remember this night and make a better decision.
Friday, September 14, 2007
Another day in the life....
First of all, as a precursor to this story, understand that grad school is probably the most time consuming thing I have done to date. I am busier now than I was as a company commander in the Army. I don't know if it's just because I've been out of school for awhile or what but I have to work very hard to stay on top of my schoolwork and not get behind. Essentially I have no life right now outside of school, I come home from school and study until it's time for bed. But luckily there are a few people at school that keep me on track and help me to understand things (they know who they are I think....lol).
So anyway, tonight Tina and I got into a little argument because I am not going to Sara's soccer game this Sunday in Atlanta (I have two group project meetings on Sunday and an exam on Tuesday) and because I spend every night studying. School is definitely taking its toll on our family life and can be hard to deal with at times but as always, we will survive :) Apparently Sara and Morgan heard us arguing and naturally didn't like it but for some reason Sara was more upset than we were. I think she wanted to get out of the house so she asked (told) us to take her to the football game. But it was already 9pm and supposed to rain so we told her no.
So what ensued was a "conversation" we had after we told her she couldn't go to the game. She didn't want me filming her while she was mad so she was trying to get my phone from me. Sorry for the blurriness but I was trying to hold my phone at arms length so she couldn't get it. She eventually cheered up....but life is rough when you're 15.
So anyway, tonight Tina and I got into a little argument because I am not going to Sara's soccer game this Sunday in Atlanta (I have two group project meetings on Sunday and an exam on Tuesday) and because I spend every night studying. School is definitely taking its toll on our family life and can be hard to deal with at times but as always, we will survive :) Apparently Sara and Morgan heard us arguing and naturally didn't like it but for some reason Sara was more upset than we were. I think she wanted to get out of the house so she asked (told) us to take her to the football game. But it was already 9pm and supposed to rain so we told her no.
So what ensued was a "conversation" we had after we told her she couldn't go to the game. She didn't want me filming her while she was mad so she was trying to get my phone from me. Sorry for the blurriness but I was trying to hold my phone at arms length so she couldn't get it. She eventually cheered up....but life is rough when you're 15.
Monday, August 20, 2007
It's good to be the king
Today we started a new class called International Management which focuses on the management of the multinational corporation. Since this was the first day we didn't cover a whole lot in class but instead spent some time covering course objectives and introducing ourselves and our backgrounds to show the wide diversity of people and experiences we have in the class.
Then we had an afternoon session which was rather interesting. We met at 1:30 to undertake a cultural simulation. We divided the class into two groups, the Alpha's and the Beta's. The object of this simulation was for each group to have a completely different "culture" and then observe how we interact and see if we could figure out the other culture (however, we didn't know this until the end). I'll try not to give away too many details of the game because I don't want to ruin it for future classes.
I was in the Alpha group and our culture was a very social or relational culture. We liked to touch each other (which wasn't always necessarily as fun as it sounds) and valued the relationships we forged more than the results of the "game" we played. One rather interesting twist was that the Alpha's have a patriarch. This person was chosen at the beginning and was usually the oldest male in the group. So that just happened to be me. My job was to protect and oversee the group, and especially the women of our group. As you can see, this part of the job wasn't so bad :)
Then we played a game. We each had three cards (although one of them was a bad card) and we would shuffle them then reveal them. To be honest, I don't really know how the rule worked about who "won" the chips because as the patriarch, I automatically won every time. Again, not such a bad deal. So all we did was hang out with each other and play this game.
We sent small delegations to the Beta group so we could try and understand what they were all about. When our people came back we would all gather around and listen to them tell what they learned (or didn't learn).
And I must admit we really made the most of this game. Amit even came up with an Alpha song and Nolen performed the Alpha dance for the group.
In the end it was a lot of fun and I think we pretty much figured out the Beta group. We saved our best analytical minds for last as evidenced by this picture of Ryan (AKA Blur) briefing the group while John (who was our Alpha bouncer) stood guard.
Until next time....
Then we had an afternoon session which was rather interesting. We met at 1:30 to undertake a cultural simulation. We divided the class into two groups, the Alpha's and the Beta's. The object of this simulation was for each group to have a completely different "culture" and then observe how we interact and see if we could figure out the other culture (however, we didn't know this until the end). I'll try not to give away too many details of the game because I don't want to ruin it for future classes.
I was in the Alpha group and our culture was a very social or relational culture. We liked to touch each other (which wasn't always necessarily as fun as it sounds) and valued the relationships we forged more than the results of the "game" we played. One rather interesting twist was that the Alpha's have a patriarch. This person was chosen at the beginning and was usually the oldest male in the group. So that just happened to be me. My job was to protect and oversee the group, and especially the women of our group. As you can see, this part of the job wasn't so bad :)
Then we played a game. We each had three cards (although one of them was a bad card) and we would shuffle them then reveal them. To be honest, I don't really know how the rule worked about who "won" the chips because as the patriarch, I automatically won every time. Again, not such a bad deal. So all we did was hang out with each other and play this game.
We sent small delegations to the Beta group so we could try and understand what they were all about. When our people came back we would all gather around and listen to them tell what they learned (or didn't learn).
And I must admit we really made the most of this game. Amit even came up with an Alpha song and Nolen performed the Alpha dance for the group.
In the end it was a lot of fun and I think we pretty much figured out the Beta group. We saved our best analytical minds for last as evidenced by this picture of Ryan (AKA Blur) briefing the group while John (who was our Alpha bouncer) stood guard.
Until next time....
Thursday, August 16, 2007
Financial Accounting final tomorrow!
Thank goodness the accounting final is tomorrow! That has been one of the harder classes for me this summer because I have absolutely no accounting background at all. I know how to balance my checkbook (although knowledge is different from actually doing it sometimes) but that's about it.
But conceptually it was a very interesting class. I liked learning how to read financial statements and understanding the plethora of information a company reveals in those statements. For instance, one thing that I still find intriguing is Coca Cola. Two months ago if you had asked me what their primary business was, I would say that obviously it is producing coke products. But in actuality they essentially a syrup producer. They produce the syrup but the bottling companies are the ones that mix and distribute the final product. For some reason I found that kind of information fascinating.
Another thing I got out of this class is the relativity of money. We would read statements and see companies throwing around millions or billions of dollars. Companies would make multi-million dollar decisions and refer to them matter-of-factly. Then on the other hand, some weeks I struggle to come up with the $35 it takes to fill up my gas tank every 3 days (it is 55 miles, one-way, to school so I spend a lot on gas). It's all a matter of perspective I guess.
So I like the ideas and concepts we learned in this class. But the t-accounts still mess me up, still not sure I am doing the journal entries correctly, and I can live without doing things like determining the amount at which investments are reported on the balance sheet and the amount of investment income recognized by the investor on the income statement.
Alright, break time is over....back to studying because I have the final, which is 50% of our grade, in 23.5 hours :)
Oh, and by the way, in case anyone was wondering it is still hot as heck out here. Today at 3:00 the temperature in Aiken was 105 degrees with a heat index of 117. But luckily it's supposed to cool off tomorrow and only get up to 102 :)
But conceptually it was a very interesting class. I liked learning how to read financial statements and understanding the plethora of information a company reveals in those statements. For instance, one thing that I still find intriguing is Coca Cola. Two months ago if you had asked me what their primary business was, I would say that obviously it is producing coke products. But in actuality they essentially a syrup producer. They produce the syrup but the bottling companies are the ones that mix and distribute the final product. For some reason I found that kind of information fascinating.
Another thing I got out of this class is the relativity of money. We would read statements and see companies throwing around millions or billions of dollars. Companies would make multi-million dollar decisions and refer to them matter-of-factly. Then on the other hand, some weeks I struggle to come up with the $35 it takes to fill up my gas tank every 3 days (it is 55 miles, one-way, to school so I spend a lot on gas). It's all a matter of perspective I guess.
So I like the ideas and concepts we learned in this class. But the t-accounts still mess me up, still not sure I am doing the journal entries correctly, and I can live without doing things like determining the amount at which investments are reported on the balance sheet and the amount of investment income recognized by the investor on the income statement.
Alright, break time is over....back to studying because I have the final, which is 50% of our grade, in 23.5 hours :)
Oh, and by the way, in case anyone was wondering it is still hot as heck out here. Today at 3:00 the temperature in Aiken was 105 degrees with a heat index of 117. But luckily it's supposed to cool off tomorrow and only get up to 102 :)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
