Sailing

Sailing by Jeremy Evans

Sailing the Inside Passage to Alaska. A Practical Guide to Sailing the Inside Passage. By Robb Keystone.

Every now and then I want to get a sailboat and get away from it all. With COVID, I thought I'd read up on the topic. While sailing still looks enjoyable, These two books cured me of the urge to sell the house and start sailing.

Sailing from Seattle to Mexico, and back, has been described as sailing uphill both ways. The winds constantly blow to the east, so going is slow. Most ports have extensive sand barges by them, so you have to time your landings well. The weather can be bad, so you may get stuck at a port of days. 

When you sail to Alaska, the winds can be low. You will probably spend 40% of your time powered by gas and not wind. 

The Biggest Bluff. How I learned to Pay Attention, Master myself and Win

 By Maria Konnikova

Konnikova, has a PHD in Psychology and has written a lot about decision making. She decides to see what it would take to become a world class poker player-- someone who has to control her emotions, and play the odds well. She enlists a coach (who is a world class player) and trains intensively for months. Within a year she became a poker world champion. 

"Less certainty. More inquiry." Is the mantra her coach uses with her. With probabilities you can never be certain. You can only ask are you being consistent within the odds? Are your opponents?

There are many layers of analysis to poker. The first is just knowing the probabilities and playing accordingly. This is called Game Theory Optimal or GTO. Next layer-- Learning if your opponents are playing GTO, are they gambling? are they working smartly within the GTO framework? For example, the person who is loosing the most at the table, may not be the weakest player. They may be having bad luck. The other way around, is someone winning because they are on a run of good luck, and not playing GTO. Over the long haul, GTO players will wine more than gambling players...

but... great players can predict what GTO players will play and use that to their advantage. 

Tells are way more complicated than TV would have you believe. Take hands that are easy to judge, v.s. hands that are hard to judge. You are going to take more time thinking through a hand that is hard to judge. This is a big tell that you have such a hand. 

Prisoners of Geography: Ten Maps that Explain Everything About the World

By Tim Marshall

This is an excellent summary of today's world geopolitics, and the way geography influences them. Of course our politics and economies are driven by the activities of people. Geography is the playing field. It helps or hinders what a country can do.

Examples...

A large portion of China's fresh water comes from rivers that originate in Tibet. It would be a crises if Tibet ever restricted access to those waters. Of course China wants to control Tibet.

While India and China are right next to each other, they have had very few conflicts, or deep trading relationships. This is because they are separated by the Himalayas. 

Russia only has one warm water port-- in the Crimea. Their other ports freeze over for three or four months of the year. The route from Crimea to the Atlantic takes them through waters controlled by the Ukraine and Turkey. Of course they don't want the Ukraine or Turkey to become NATO allies. 

Random situation I want to remember...

When pressing a Chinese official about human rights. The official responded "Why do you think your values will work in a culture that you don't understand?"