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Sixteen Fun Facts About Me
Building on a meme started by Bryan Caplan and Richard Hanania.
Ilya Somin | 7.8.2026 8:48 PM
Prominent economist Bryan Caplan and political commentator Richard Hanania have started a "Sixteen Fun Facts About Me" meme on their respective blogs/substacks. Here is my list (in rough chronological order):
1. I was born in the then-Soviet Union. As an infant and toddler, I spent a lot of time in the hospital, due to various ailments. One time, a nurse asked my mother if I was her only child. She said yes. "That's unfortunate," the nurse commented, with typically awful Soviet bedside manner, "because this one probably won't live." Fortunately, the nurse turned out to be wrong, and I survived.
2. I didn't learn how to read in either English or Russian until the age of eight - a consequence of lack of motivation and possible undiagnosed dyslexia. But when I finally did learn, I almost immediately started reading adult books, rather than those meant for kids. My daughter Lydia - probably the family member most like me - didn't learn to read until the age of nine. A consequence of dyslexia which did get diagnosed. We spent many hours memorizing sight words with her to overcome it. When Lydia did finally learn, the first book she read on her own was the classic science fiction novel Ender's Game, which is intended for adults.
3. I grew up in the Boston area and have been a big Boston sports fan since I was about nine. The first team I followed closely was the 1982-83 Boston Bruins, who had the best record in the NHL, but lost in the conference finals in the playoffs (I'm still mad about that). My favorite player was Rick "Nifty" Middleton, the Bruins' leading goalscorer. In retrospect, the best player on the team was actually Ray Bourque, who went on to become one of the two or three best defensemen ever, and arguably the second-greatest Bruin after Bobby Orr.
4. In middle school and high school, I often worked as a babysitter. I wish I could say I did it to break down gender stereotypes (most babysitters are female, which was even more true back then). But the real reason was that I found babysitting less onerous and unpleasant than mowing lawns, and other yard work. A five-year-old I sat for once told me that he obeyed me far more than his parents. I asked why that is. "Because," he said, "when you tell me to do something, I know you really mean it." When I became a parent myself, many years later, I came to understand why........