Some of you have been worried about me. You’ll be happy to hear that I didn’t die or abandon this journal—I simply got a job.

Thankfully that is coming to an end soon, and I’ll be back on here again with more techniques and articles (and hopefully footage, whenever I get a video camera).

In the mean time, I thought you may be interested in hearing what my other interests are outside of jiu-jitsu. And even if you’re not, indulge me this one actual “blog” post about my personal life.

Since I last wrote…

I’ve been researching cognitive sciences, particularly disorders like prosopagnosia, synesthesia, sleep paralysis, autism, savantism, and feral children. Thank the Discovery Channel, Kim Peek, Daniel Tammet, Wired magazine and Carl Sagan for turning me on to those.

I’ve been playing around with Möbius strips, Klein bottles, the forth dimension and ten spatial dimensions. This all started because I use one-sided loops to entertain bored kids.

I’ve been trying to wrap my head around Newtonian and quantum physics, the electromagnetic spectrum, the uncertainty principle, and the theory of relativity. It struck me that I should probably try to understand the largest advancements in science of the past century.

I’ve been studying evolution, natural selection and genetics for the same reason.

I finished The Tipping Point and Blink by Malcolm Gladwell. The first explores how social trends and ideas suddenly spread and become popular. The second looks into rapid cognition and snap judgments. I felt The Tipping Point was the better book, but Blink has its good moments too.

I read Freakonomics by Steven D. Levitt. I never realized statistical analysis could be so fun. Or that sumo wrestlers cheat.

I am nearing the end of The Demon-Haunted World by Carl Sagan and look forward to reading more of his works, such as Billions & Billions.

I may or not finish The Long Tail by Chris Anderson. The original Wired article was probably enough.

Gladwell, Levitt and Anderson form part of a circle of authors that reciprocate quotes for the covers of each others’ books. The next in their “clique” I want to check out is Jared Diamond, author of Guns, Germs, and Steel and Collapse.

I received copies of River Out of Eden by Richard Dawkins, The Origin of Humankind by Richard Leaky and The Way Life Works by Mahlon Hoagland.

I just began Science Matters by Robert M. Hazen. Set a crash course for psuedointellectuality.

I was halfway through Cat’s Cradle when Kurt Vonnegut passed away.

I read The Areas of My Expertise by John Hodgman in my quest for COMPLETE WORLD KNOWLEDGE and hobo names.

I’ve been listening to Illinois by Sufjan Stevens and 23 by Blonde Redhead.

I beat Legend of Zelda: The Twilight Princess.

I finally got into Lost, and I’m looking forward to Heroes starting again.

I’ll get back to the regularly scheduled jiu-jitsu updates soon.