🗞 The Newsletter Binge 🍽

[🚀 I am leaving Medium. Please come to wootwoot.hk 🙌🏼]

I have been on a binge lately.

I started subscribing to Tim Ferriss’ 5 bullet Friday about a year ago. I didn’t add anything, until I came across David Perell’s interview with Austin Rief and Alex Lieberman, the founders of Morning Brew.

The podcast episode had all the feel-good listen-and-then-feel-accomplished elements- an entrepreneur I could relate to (a Uof Michigan alum), a “just-do-it-it-will-work” story arc, a “from-nothing-to-something” promise, and a “million-dollar-idea-that-costs-nothing” … idea.

So I added “Retail Brew,” and was subsequently mesmerised, both by its writing and its almost pyramid-scheme like sharing incentive mechanism.

Then the binge started. 🍞🥯🍞🍞🍦🍬 🥯🍦🍦🥯🍬🍬🥯🍦🍦🍦🍦

Tools, art, curated readings, self-help, a newsletter about newsletters, coaching, books. (I am still searching for a few video games related newsletters…) I ended up subscribing to 28 newsletters. 😅

Most of these newsletter are weekly ones. So almost everyday, I would get a dump of new issues into my mailbox. My “morning routine” has since evolved around the newsletters:

5–6:30am: workout, stretch, and or thinking about thinking
new morning routine block

{ 
6:00am - Cook breakfast and coffee
7:00am - 7:45am (if my kids let me): Newsletter time
}

7:45–8:20am: breakfast for family, change diapers, attempt to engage with the verbal loops my son would unleash, nagging (with 33.5% of yelling) my daughter to hurry up, comb her hair, put down the book, stop gossiping about your girlfriends, and hurry up.

And I thoroughly enjoyed them. I learned more about random tools, how to rebrand confusion into a leadership hack, the history of door handles, and why only “macaroni and cheese” sounds right and not “cheese and macaroni.”

So, here are the ones I most look forward to:

1. https://www.getrevue.co/profile/Recomendo — I have found some many random tools, apps, stuff that I actually ended up using. It’s run by Kevin Kelly (founding executive editor of Wired magazine), Mark Frauenfelder (co-owner of Boing Boing) and Claudia Dawson (she runs the Cool Tool website).
2. https://thewhippet.substack.com — She writes about stuff that isn’t about current affairs, which is wonderful because it’s a literal break for my eyes and my mind. I learned more about iron eating mices and meaningless personal values.
3. https://austinkleon.com/newsletter — Austin Kleon makes me believe I am more a writer than I really am. Even if I don’t end up being one, he gives all subscribers the permission to buy more beautiful notebooks.

Lastly, I considered this a binge, because it has all the characteristics of a binge, and it has all the psychotic color-tones of binges. It’s not all rosy, but this is where I am today 🤷🏼‍♂️.

Have fun.