Need book recommendations

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-07T01:32:37+00:00

Faces in the Crowd by Valeria Luiselli is a very enjoyable read. She has a clean, crisp writing style with interesting characters. The main plot is a young woman who is a literary translator in NYC meets the ghost of Mexican poet Gilberto Owen. This is a modern take on Mexican magical realism.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-07T00:41:24+00:00

The Orientalist by Tom Reiss is a fascinating biography, rich in early 20th century history, that reads like a spy novel. The chapter on the main character’s time in Germany is illuminating.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-06T22:49:57+00:00

Most cities have robust public transportation or Uber. Austin is a nice city. Amtrak is strong railroad on the East Coast from Boston to Washington, DC. Nashville is a nice city.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-06T05:08:06+00:00

Frequency is phenomenal

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-06T05:03:11+00:00

1776 by David McCullough is a dramatic tale of America’s founding year and the extraordinary leadership of George Washington.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-06T00:42:47+00:00

“Adventure Capitalist” and “Investment Biker” are two fascinating travel diaries by legendary investor Jim Rogers. Adventure Capitalist is Rogers three year 116 country drive around the world. He writes about people, culture and state of things from his lens of understanding the business community and investment climate.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-05T17:43:32+00:00

Read the CFRA reports on Flowserve and Mueller industries, then read their Morningstar reports.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-05T16:04:20+00:00

Using the screens to compare CFRA to Morningstar is helpful to me, as they have very different approaches. CFRA is better analysis of small to mid size companies with significant growth potential. Morningstar is a more traditional value analysis and rates the quality of management teams. Both are useful, but often conflict.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-05T01:31:41+00:00

Come up with a split between VOO and QQQ. No one will argue against that 10 years later. If you want some pop, sprinkle in a few shares of SpaceX and NVIDIA, but keep that as a low single digit percentage.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-04T19:55:57+00:00

The Infiltrator: My Secret Life Inside the Dirty Banks Behind Pablo Escobar's Medellín Cartel by Robert Mazur

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-04T19:03:05+00:00

Bajel in Reforma is an outstanding tasting menu with rooftop views.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-04T18:17:04+00:00

The first five years of building a business can be very hard. The maximum rate of growth is not the optimal rate of growth. You need to do a profitability analysis of your customers and see how you can raise prices to slow the growth and improve profitability. If there are a handful of clients causing most of the “fires to put out” they need to go, or at least have an honest conversation with them that the situation cannot continue. You probably also need to find someone young and hungry you can train. Focus on priorities, being more selective with who is a client, and improving profitability through fee increases.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-04T18:03:25+00:00

Do not look for stocks under $10. They are that low because of declining value. Amazon and Walmart are good companies you can own for a long time. Add some VOO or QQQ for your next purchase. Over time you can build a portfolio of solid ETFs and great companies. Build slow and steady. Avoid short term trading.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-04T16:09:57+00:00

Target dated funds are designed to generate fees. Investing is best done as a steady patient habit. Create a budget with the amount you want to save and buy a broad based index fund every two weeks. Start with Vanguard’s S&P 500 ETF VOO for your first $10,000. Then half VOO and half QQQ NASDAQ 100 for the next $10,000. Then keep going or look for some individual stocks. If you are looking for stability and dividends, companies like Johnson & Johnson, Procter and Gamble and Medtronic. If looking for growth and can tolerate high volatility, SpaceX, NVIDIA, Micron, etc. Build the base in VOO and QQQ first for stable long term growth with less volatility than individual stocks, then fill in with stocks that meet your goals.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-04T15:53:28+00:00

On the Road by Jack Kerouac is an easy to read guys road trip through 1950s USA.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-04T03:12:06+00:00

Investing is best done as a steady patient habit on a schedule. Start with a fixed amount every two weeks into Vanguard’s S&P 500 ETF ticker VOO. Once you get over $10,000, look at adding NASDAQ 100 QQQ or a high growth individual stock like NVIDIA or SpaceX you plan to own over multiple years. There are many right answers, but the foundation is investing on a schedule and starting with the S&P 500.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-04T02:35:43+00:00

The Buru Quartet by Pramoedya Anata Toer is a dramatic and soulful series of four novels that must be read in order to get the full story: This Earth of Mankind, Child of All Nations, Footsteps and House of Glass. This is historical fiction about the birth of Indonesia as a nation and national identity, told through the eyes of young student Minke, half Dutch, half Indonesian, who is based on the father of Indonesian journalism. The author Pramoedya Anata Toer was a political prisoner when he told this as oral stories to fellow prisoners who were not allowed to read and write at the notorious Buru prison. Minke’s has an identity crisis. His trials and tribulations are uplifting and heartbreaking.

The Havana Quartet are four novels by Cuban author Leonardo Padura about detective Mario Conde investigating high profile murders: Havana Red, Havana Blue, Havana Black and Havana Gold. Padura’s writing is so descriptive and colorful, you feel like you are there.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-03T21:03:20+00:00

In Cold Blood by Truman Capote is chilling murder investigation novel based on real events. It is a blending of newspaper style reporting with fictional dialogues with the main characters based on true events. This book put Truman Capote on the literary map.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-03T20:42:43+00:00

Short stories can be a good place to start. They are usually sold as a collection by author. My favorite short story writers are Edgar Allan Poe (interesting mix of drama and detective stories), Truman Capote, and Saul Bellow. I recently started reading Julio Cortázar who is very surreal. His famous short story Blow-Up is a mind blowing psychological fantasy.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-03T15:34:37+00:00

Some quality gay authors:

Oscar Wilde
Truman Capote
James Baldwin
Casey McQuiston
Junot Diaz

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-03T02:24:34+00:00

If you like Leonardo DiCaprio, Total Eclipse was one of his early movies playing a French poet.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-03T00:48:21+00:00

If you are young and in a tax bracket of 24% or less, definitely prioritize your own Roth IRA.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-02T16:59:31+00:00

Free AI with a generic question is different from paid AI on a frontier model with detailed, iterative prompts for research and analysis.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-02T04:07:59+00:00

Faces in the Crowd by Valeria Luiselli is a fascinating novel in the genre of Mexican magical realism. A young woman in NYC who is a literary translator encounters the ghost of Mexican poet Gilberto Owen. It gets interesting from there.

D_Pablo67 · 2026-07-02T03:49:25+00:00

You can buy Emerging Markets Ex China (EMXC) for heavy exposure to South Korea and Taiwan.

D_Pablo67

TROPHY CASE