Hi, I’m Jay.
Thanks for stopping by my digital home. Make yourself comfortable!
This blog is mostly a place for me to share ideas, experiences, and opinions, mostly about life, relationships, and careers.
Here are the basic, snooze-fest facts about me:
- I’m currently traveling the world with my awesome wife for at least the next six months. We’ll see how it goes!
- I went to a high-falutin’ private university on the West Coast. I graduated with a degree in Urban Studies, which is code for “Thank you so much for letting me graduate.”
- I’m from the best city in the world and real capital of the United States: Los Angeles. Facts are facts, folks.
Want to know more? Of course not! But let’s continue with something light-hearted anyway:
- My wife’s and my wedding dance went semi-viral. Apparently Montell Jordan was impressed by our take on “This Is How We Do It”.
- I
believeknow In-N-Out is the best burger in the world. I consider myself a really friendly, open-minded person, but I will fight you on this. Like, physical altercation-fight you. - I know Nelly’s entire rap from Jagged Edge’s “Where the Party At?”. Jealous? Of course you are.
Here are some things I’m proud of:
- I quit a great job to do something I’d always wanted to do: travel the world. I’m incredibly risk-averse, so doing so was a big deal for me, but I was advised to only trade once-in-a-lifetime opportunities for other once-in-a-lifetime opportunities, so I made the jump.
- I changed careers from recruiting engineers to doing data engineering & analytics, then to product management. I love people and connecting them to great opportunities, but felt that I was lacking technical skills that would help me better understand the people I was recruiting. So I learned to code and doing so helped me land a great job as a data engineer, then eventually as an analytics product manager.
- I learned to drive stick without damaging anything — that I know of — on a seven-day road trip across the United States. My best friend conned me into helping him get his car, a Jeep Wrangler with a manual transmission, from California to Connecticut after he moved. I thought that meant riding shotgun the entire time; he envisioned something different. I spent the last four days of that trip white-knuckling across the Great Plains and through New York state, hoping I wouldn’t cause an accident, or worse, stall in a crowded urban intersection.
Most days, you’ll find me noodling on questions like:
- What makes a good life? More importantly, how much of what we could experience as a good life is actually a product of our mindsets, rather than achievements or acquisitions?
- In what ways do societal trends reflect anti-patterns in the pursuit of that good life? I know. Gag. But much of my interest in financial markets and investing has led me to believe that mass adoption of certain positions or behaviors is often a sign of bad times ahead and that taking the other side of that bet is often a good one.
- Is there a more perfect food than pizza? I don’t really noodle on this, actually. I mostly remind myself that the answer to this question is “No. Not even close.”
I’ve been talking (writing?) at you a lot though, so reach out and say hello. For now, you can reach out to me on Twitter , LinkedIn, Instagram, and, if you’re bookish, Goodreads.
See you around!
J. de la Torre 