The Saturday List - October 25, 2025

What I'm Watching, Reading, Listening to, and Rediscovering

Watching: The Summer I Turned Pretty

Wait, WHAT? Dave, is that you? Is this thing on?

But…hear me out…it’s pretty good.

It’s a coming of age thing, and I am also interested in bonding with the last teenager in the house, so there’s that.

Available on Amazon Prime, and I’m only 3 episodes in, so no spoilers, please.

My teenager suggests that the books — there were three, written by Jenny Han, published from 2009 to 2011 — and the show are different, so there’s that element, too.

Reading: An Essay by David Heinemeier Hansson

It’s called “Give me AI slop over human sludge any day.” It’s glorious, it will take you a couple minutes, tops. Here’s an excerpt:

Listening To: The Hamburger Helper Mixtape

I said what I said.

Rediscovering: A 26-year-old Article About Leadership

Thanks to my buddy Phil Gomes for this one.

It’s an absolute gem — Phil called it the greatest article on leadership he’s ever seen — and it speaks to a lot of what is wrong with management theory today.

Sure, rules are rules and following them makes sense…sometimes. But, as you learn in this article, which appeared in Fast Company in March of 1999, bureaucracy has its way of eating managers alive.

Commander D. Michael Abrashoff threw out the bureaucratic rules that didn’t make sense by focusing on…get this…the people.

The whole article from Fast Company is archived here. Mike is on the speaking circuit (see below).

And he’s written books, with It’s Your Ship expanding on what was in the Fast Company article.

I’ll see y’all next week for another edition of The Saturday List.