A writer friend was recently invited to speak in front of a group of students. He was asked to share his opinions on how to think about life, and career, in general. I had so many questions for him.

Another year, another amazing time at DCBKK meeting all types of entrepreneurs building cool businesses. I often find that I have some of my most interesting conversations over meals – and this year was no different.

This is a now page. I’m writing it because the question I get most from readers, when we meet, is “what are you up to now?” Until a few days ago I would joke that “my brains are scrambled from DCBKK.”

Why are we hiring? It’s pretty straightforward. We’re looking for a motivated professional to manage and respond to emails in a timely manner with high-level entrepreneurs (our DC members).

Creating business conferences isn’t something I thought I’d be doing 10 years ago. I never liked conferences, why create one?

The real numbers will obviously vary from person to person, and from task to task. But, for me, I’ve always preferred working on big screens.

Our idea was to have a mix of food, cultures, landscapes and level of development. I wanted to maximize what we saw (because it might be our only chance to go together), but also have enough time to kick back a little and enjoy each location.

In the chapter “Ph.D. or podcast” he uses this blog as an example of a Ph.D./MBA substitute. I certainly didn’t think of it that way when it started, and I’m not suggesting it is that. But what would be the downside for young students to start a blog and treat it as if it were their Ph.D. or an MBA?

A lot of people have asked us, since we sold our first business, are you going to start another? And the answer, precisely because of the above, is “not right now.” We’ll either buy one or invest in some. Starting them is too hard.

Last week, Ian wrote over 3,500 words about his new home purchase. But he skimmed over what might have been his greatest motivation for buying a big place– wrenching on an endless parade of cars and bikes (and finding somewhere to put them all). Every time I visit bossman, he’s got a new toy.

After a year or so of obsessing over Redfin and Realtor.com, I finally pulled the trigger and bought a house!

It turns out that automating a source of income can take years, but disconnecting your paycheck from your location is fairly easy stuff, particularly if you are willing to take a pay cut.

For two and a half years we’ve been sending weekly news emails to our subscribers. They included links to our favorite reads of the week, and a description of that week’s podcast. Occassionally we’d announce things like events or masterminds at the end of those emails.

Fair warning: what follows is 6,000+ words about road cycling, a hobby I picked up last year. These words poured out of my hands the morning after my first semi-competitive event.

Job opportunities have always been a big part of what we do at TMBA, and I expect we’ll ramp that up in the coming months as Ian and I put together a plan to make investments in the businesses of our readers.

I was at a cafe in London, reading a gossip newspaper (I enjoyed it). My friend, who tries hard to only read paper books, magazines and newspapers (like The Financial Times), was clicking around on his phone most of the morning.

Over the last few months, I’ve been working on building a portable podcast studio. This process has involved ordering a lot of useless equipment (sorry Bossman!) and lots of tinkering around. But, finally, I’ve fixed on a set-up that I’m happy with.

Our podcast is over 6 years old. During that time we’ve produced over 300 episodes. On the whole, I’m proud of the work we’ve done. I’ll be 34 this year, and so far, it’s been the best stuff I could come up with.

I thought about email a lot over the past few weeks. Every morning, I watched messages trickle in and pile up. My replies were sporadic. I scanned the incoming to-dos with a mounting sense of unease.

Episode #183 of Startups For the Rest of Us was one of my favorite podcasts of the year. On it, Dan Norris said some important things. For example– you actually can launch a business in 7 Days.