Books:

I highly recommend “Dark Pools” which is about how we’ve come to the point where trades are measured in picoseconds (a trillionth of a second) in order to remain competitive. Sounds boring, but it’s written in the same style as a Michael Lewis book and if you ever wanted to know how a guy with lizards running around in his server room helped narrow the average holding period for a stock from two years to twenty seconds, well this is the book for you.

I also read “Savages” and it’s prequel (probably not worth reading). This was before I knew Oliver Stone was doing the movie. A cross between Weeds and No Country For Old Men – really very entertaining fiction.

Other books I enjoyed the last six months: Ready Player One, Deer Hunting with Jesus, This Book Will Save Your Life, The George Martin series, Open City (about NYC), 1Q84, Horns: A Novel, The Fear Index, 11/22/63, Smonk, & The Digital Plague.

Movies:

Believe it or not, “The Help” is excellent. I also finally saw “Too Big To Fail” which was surprisingly good and I liked “Rampart” about an LA cop in the 90’s. I watched “The Grey” because Liam Leeson lives near me and he is one cool cat. That’s about it – since I rarely have more than 30mins to myself, we’ve been watching TV (Mad Men, Big C, Dexter, Homeland, Boardwalk Empire).

Video Games:

I get around 10 hours a week in and played have played through ME3, Uncharted, Battlefield, Darkness, Gears of War, Arkham City, Modern Warfare and Fear on their most difficult settings this year. I actually just told a high school class that video games are good for you (hand-eye coordination, nonlinear progression, pattern recognition etc), which left their teachers understandably perplexed.

By far the best game I have ever played is Max Payne 3. Below is a screengrab from a fairly typical gameplay scene, so not for the fainthearted: