Kierly tan !

After watching Borat 2 recently, I thought I'd see what a common greeting in Kazakh was. That means good morning. Whew! What a week it's been this week! Work has been busier than ever, social obligations are rising and the Sunday Surprise hit a milestone!

More on that below but first...

A small ask (as always!). If you have a friend who you think would enjoy the this email, maybe forward it on? It helps A LOT! You can even use your own referral link:

Week in the life

As it gets closer to the end of the year, things are getting super busy! As you're reading this, I'm on Day 14 of a 25 continuous work stretch til I finally get some time off (I'm writing this on Sat night for once!). Here's Luna to begin...

Last week the list didn't finish til 0100 on Monday and it took me most of the week to recover. Goes to show how much of an old man I really am! In between the day job, I attended a friend's Indian wedding (see photos below), drove out to Ballarat (see PxR updates) and spent an inordinate amount of time in a bottle shop (even though I don't drink) to look for Kosher wines...

Apart from the wedding, I had to find an appropriate parting gift since I could no longer do one of the surgical lists due to logistic issues. Knowing that the proceduralist had a penchant for more adult beverages, I had to find something suitably Kosher and appropriate and in the process to asking the attendant at BWS, discovered a whole bunch of rules about it. Got me thinking about nice drinks that Muslims (and other non-drinking folk) can enjoy and hence I found some of the things that I've inappropriately left in the "gadgets" section.

Lastly, I started this newsletter with a goal to do 6 months worth and know that I was on to something if I hit 100 subscribers by then. Well it's week 25 now and I hit 100 subscribers about 5 days ago! Thank you all for signing up! We got there 1 week early! So any suggestions about what the next target should be?

PxR & Kickstarter update

PxR Store

https://www.photosbyraffy.com/shop

Holy Moly! So after a long day of work on Thursday (and barely recovering after the wedding), I headed out to Ballarat at 8pm. Thankfully, one of the newsletter readers, Chandra, came along to keep me company.

After arriving in town at the early hour of 9:30pm, we picked up... ALL THE PUZZLES! That's Chandra helping me wheel it all up to the apartment at 1am ish when we were both a bit delirious...

Yes folks, it's finally happened and by the time you read this, the first lot of puzzles are already on their way to some folks! Hooray! It only took tearing my hair out and ageing about 2 decades to sort out something that I thought was going to be super simple!

I ordered a few for the online store and along with the 2021 calendars, there up on the online PxR store.

Gadgets & things

Revov Coin Storage

https://revov-coin-storage2-messy.kckb.st/photosbyraffy

I'm a sucker for these designer knick-knacks. This is a pretty simple update on the classic coin jar that just looks cool!

It's simple and elegant and keeps things organised. Just the sort of thing I cant resist ordering on Kickstarter...

As mentioned earlier, I went looking around the interwebs for more interesting beverages that us non-alcohol consumers could enjoy and here's a few that I'll be ordering over the next few days...

Lyre's Non-Alcoholic Spirits

https://amzn.to/3qLjPwN

I'm told Gin & Tonics are all the rage during summer and this is the closest non-alcoholic beverage I could find from the reviews. Can't wait for it to arrive so I can taste test it with friends who can compare to the real thing.

They have some other non-alcoholic flavours like whisky, absinthe & rum. The gin and the absinthe seem to have the best reviews for taste.

SEE ALSO

Some people keep asking about previous recommendations etc so I'm going to link a few that have come up in conversation in the last week below:

• Fentiman's Rose Lemonade - Going with the drinks theme, this one was the other one I was going to feature. Maybe I'll put it up more prominently next week
• Floately floating planter - This is still awesome! Very much still enjoying my plants spin around weightlessly.
• Zens Wireless charging pad - My current wireless charging pad of choice. Works with iPhones and most Android devices and it's GREAT to not have to line up the charging coils!

Read

Neil Gaiman - The Graveyard Book

https://amzn.to/2IFE2me

After almost exclusively listening or reading to non-fiction, this recommendation from Tim Ferriss made me appreciate good fiction once again!

I decided to re-listen to it as an audiobook and it's amazing! It's read by the author and I found it an addictive listen and was staying up way past my bedtime to finish just a bit more...

Listen

Ghosts from the Past - Bang Gang

https://open.spotify.com/album/6dEQj0lykF7G5SRZSylYd2?si=EU55KEsITj-fcdiK9JrV7g

This was a Spotify recommendation that was spot on! It recommended the first track "The World is Gray" and it's been on repeat for me for the last week as a result. I keep starting the album as I drive to work and as such have only listened to the same 30mins of it. It's a very relaxed listening, especially in the mornings...

Quote I'm pondering

"Perfectionism has nothing to do with perfect"

– Seth Godin

I saw that quote and it immediately struck at something and I'm glad I found that it was the title of a short blog post. Seth Godin has a clarity of thinking and in his way of writing that compresses huge ideas into compact prose and this quote and blog post is no different...

Truly random

How are you finding the random section? Would love feedback if you liked this.

• Covid-19 boredom leads to cracking Zodiac cipher - Turns out while most people like myself were watching Netflix, a Melbourne mathematician was collaborating and succeeded in cracking the cipher from a serial killer case in the US that's been unsolved for decades!

Thanks again for joining me on yet another week of randomness. What was your favourite bit? Email me and let me know!

Stay safe and stay random!

- Raffy

Have you found any delicious non-alcoholic beverages? Or halal snacks? I'm curious to try some new stuff so please let me know!

Sunday Surprise uses affiliate/referral links in the newsletter. While this does not influence the product recommendations or verdict, if there are any that are likely to lead to Photos by Raffy receiving any sort of compensation from, they will be marked in orange. Non affiliate links will appear as blue.