Bonjour !

That's French for "good day". Welcome to this week's Sunday Surprise...delayed because of the me being on-call for a hospital to the Monday Moment. As I write this, Melbourne is back in another lockdown. The silver lining is that traffic is much MUCH better. But more about what I've been up to a bit later...

As always, a small favour? Could you forward this newsletter to just 3 people that you think would like one of the articles? It helps A LOT! If you're the friend reading this, click the link below to join! Glad to have you here!

In this week's email...

• Week in the Life - read on the blog
• Creative update - randInt EP 011 - Random traditions & snake dreams
• Gadgets & Tech - Hyperjuice 66W charger (~$70)
• Read - How the Miracle berry turns sour to sweet (~5 mins)
• Listen - Naval: The begining of infinity (~60min)
• Random fact - Foos yer Doos (~1min)
• Quote - “Base metals can be transmuted into gold by stars, and by intelligent beings who understand the processes that power stars, but by nothing else in the universe.”

Week in the life

Firstly, congratulations to an****71@gmail.com for winning the books (had to blank our your full email)! Shoot me an email to claim your prize! Thanks to everyone who entered the giveaway to celebrate the 1st birthday of the newsletter. Welcome to the new readers and I'll be doing more giveaways soon.

It's surreal when someone you've been following over the years responds to your messages. It's even more so when they sign up to your newsletter. Niall Doherty has done just that. He's a blogger/entrepreneur I've been following for YEARS as he experimented with online businesses as he travelled all the way around the world without flying!

Anyway, enough fan boy-ing. On with the show...

While not surprising, the lockdown in Melbourne has meant that catch ups and the like are on pause again. I actually had a few meals with friends planned so it ended up being a LOT of eating out prior to it kicking in.

Apart from brunch, also managed to get a walk in between work at the nearby suburb of Williamstown. It was a gorgeous day and I think I spent the last few hours prior to lockdown quite well...

More on the week that was over on the blog...

Creative

randInt() podcast EP 011 - Random traditions & snake dreams (~20mins)

https://anchor.fm/randint/episodes/EP-011---Random-traditions--snake-dreams-e14jk7k

randInt is back with another episode just in time for another Victorian lockdown!

This one explores random traditions that we all follow and their origins as well as some of the more "unusual" ones that my parents seem to have come up with.

It's a minisode, so it's short and (hopefully) entertaining!

Gadgets & Tech

Hyperjuice 66W charger (~$70)

https://click.linksynergy.com/fs-bin/click?id=Bx/pOmwu3ME&offerid=779022.182&type=3&subid=0

I recently got the Lenovo Yoga 9i laptop which awesome battery life and a nice pen that slots in for editing photos. While the laptop itself is fairly nice and light, the power brick is exactly that: a brick! I'm glad I have the bigger HyperJuice to charge it instead. This new charger is less than 100g and can charge up the laptop with quick charge in no time!

Unlike the 1st generation ones I mentioned previously, this one is TINY but has 3 ports to charge your phone and anything else too! If you're travelling with a giant power brick, well worth getting one of these. If you use the code "CHIEF!" 10% off.

PREVIOUS/OTHER PRODUCTS

Some previous things that have been featured:

• LuminarAI 40% off sale - My go to laptop photoeditor is currently 40% off! It's the easiest way to edit with just a click and drag of a few sliders. Currently, it's the cheapest I've seen it.
• Nord VPN - Keep safe on the internet with a secure VPN. This is the cheapest, most reliable VPN that I've tested.

Read

How the Miracle berry turns sour to sweet (~5 mins)

https://www.discovermagazine.com/the-sciences/how-the-miracle-fruit-changes-sour-into-sweet

I thought this was some Youtube meme but it turns out it's actually real! There is a fruit that can make sour things taste sweet. This was all discovered decades ago but just how it worked remained a mystery til not too long ago. This article is a nice summary of how it all works

Book I'm reading:

• The Beginning of Infinity - I've just finished the book (finally) and IT IS GREAT! The concepts presented are like nothing I've read before with insights from science, quantum physics, maths and philosophy all rolled into one. Overall, it's a book that tries to convince you that knowledge, ideas and criticism are the special ingredients that have served out species well and how to harness these forces for the future. It's one I'll be re-reading and well worth the effort to read.

Listen

Naval: The begining of infinity (~60min)

https://nav.al/infinity

When I started reading the book, the topic was so dense that it took me a while to get started. This podcast is a much easier way of approaching the book and gives your a birds eye view of the contents of the book so that it's a lot easier to navigate.

Since I really enjoyed the book, I can't help but recommend this great podcast. If you like, you can listen it in 1-5min blocks too.

Random fact

Foos yer Doos (~1min)

https://aboutaberdeen.com/Foos-Yer-Doos

Came across this from a friend who mentioned that this was actually a greeting in the dialect of Doric in Aberdeen. Literally translated to "How's your pigeons?"

Thanks Gregg for explaining how the greeting works!

Quote I'm pondering

“Base metals can be transmuted into gold by stars, and by intelligent beings who understand the processes that power stars, but by nothing else in the universe.”

- David Deutsch

Given I have been reading a lot of his works lately, his quotes have been on my mind a lot. Most of them need a lot of context to explain, but this one stood out on it's own.

One of the central themes of his book is the fact that almost all theories we have of space or the universe have never actually been observed by a human. In fact they can never be: how do you observe the surface of the sun?

But even without directly seeing something, we can observe with instruments, come up with good explanations and harness the literal forces of the stars to create things that need supernovae in the natural world to create.

That's incredible, don't you think?

That's it for another week ! Hope you have a wonderful week ahead and hope to see you next week.

Adios!

- Raffy

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