Dear Readers,
How do you start your day? Perhaps you begin by reaching for a drink. Do you enjoy your coffee early in the morning? ☕ If so, you might be doing it wrong! Find out why in one of the articles below.
My opening greeting might sound a bit salesy, but anyway, how was your last week? Mine was great if you're curious. 😆 I enjoyed a three-day leave and a weekend with my loved ones. It was filled with meaningful spiritual activities and a farewell party as well. So yeah…
Move on, why am I talking about starting your day? It's because that’s the theme of this week’s newsletter.
So, grab your favorite drink and enjoy reading. Any drink will do!
Kyle
P.S. I should grab a drink too, as I don’t have one yet… ☕
💭 Color Palette: Retro Coffee Shop
Let’s begin by introducing this week’s chosen palette, inspired by a retro coffee shop.
It features shades of saddle brown and tan, complemented by metallic colors: silver and gold. Together, these colors create a modern yet retro, cheerful atmosphere.
See more on the 🚚 DELIVERABLE AREA down below to find some tangible goodies for you inspired by this lovely palette.
💭 These warm drinks…
Lots of coffee here. I am sorry! 😁
💭 a coffee poem from the author many years ago
Leaked on a Cup of Coffee by K. A. C. Galendez I wish I can save you all... sincerely yours, owner please save us... loving, drops of coffee I wish I wish... I can... sincerely yours, owner just put a saucer under the cup... loving, drops of coffee then silence takes the place.
If you want to know more about my older writing style. I’ll tell you it was dreary, odd, bizarre, bleak, wistful, and remorseful—just like this poem. 🐦⬛
💭 Why Checklists Works (Imprint Quick Read)
Somehow, my cup is running low. Now, let’s start working on our day. I said we would talk more about productivity and stuff, so please bear with me.
Here are my key takeaways from reading Imprint’s quick read entitled “Why Checklists Work.” It’s so effective that the World Health Organization sought to solve a serious problem related to life using a checklist.
That quick read shows more about how checklists work in most high-risk professions—but we won’t dig deeper into that stuff. We’ll just consider how it affects us.
Yes, us.
They say it is transformative, but let’s just talk about how it applies to us.
According to Atul Gawande, a renowned surgeon and public health researcher, in his book The Checklist Manifesto, there are three steps to creating an effective checklist: development, drafting, and validation.
Development:
First, we must evaluate the objectives of our list. Are they clear, specific, and concise? If not, the list may be too broad, too vague, or tedious to complete, making it less actionable.
Example:
❌ DON’T: Read a book.
✔️ DO: Read one chapter of Atomic Habits.
Next, consider what tasks you’d like to include. Remember, a good checklist is not a recipe where it teaches you how to get things done, instead, it outlines only the steps that are easily forgotten, the steps that they called “so routine” that they can easily be glossed over.Drafting
We need to plan out the “pause points,” or the natural breaks in our workflow. This process helps determine when to stop working to run through our checklist. Assign the tasks on our list to these specific pauses.
Example:
⏸️ Before reading a book
⏹️ Buy me some coffee 😁
⏹️ Prepare a coffee
⏹️ Prepare note and pen
⏸️ While reading a book
⏹️ Meditate each paragraph
⏹️ Jot down the key takeaways
⏸️ After reading a book
⏹️ Organize key takeaways
⏹️ Save and share it to Substack
📝NOTE: Try to limit each section to fewer than ten items. If a checklist is too long, we’re less likely to use it consistently.Validation
Then try out our drafted checklist. If any moments feel unnatural or if we’ve forgotten an item, check what’s wrong and either add to or subtract from the list.
We need to evaluate the order of the checklist as well — are there steps that are out of order or that belong to a different pause point? And finally, iterate on the list until it works for us.
📌 REMEMBER: For a checklist to be effective, it needs to fit naturally into your process.
When used consistently, a checklist provides a simple way to reduce mistakes and greatly improve the quality of your performance.
💭 Fun to Google around
A natural disaster occurred after I searched for “Chicxulub crater” on Google.
💭 Insights from The Huberman Lab Podcast on Delayed Caffeine Intake
This is the claim that I highlighted in the greeting about drinking coffee.
Andrew Huberman, Stanford neuroscientist and host of the acclaimed Huberman Lab podcast, always delays his coffee intake by 60–90 minutes after waking up. Surprisingly, this makes him more alert throughout the day.
This is because adenosine, a chemical that builds up while we’re awake to make us feel sleepy, is blocked by caffeine, a chemical found in coffee.
If we drink our coffee first thing in the morning, when the effect of the caffeine wears off, we’ll feel a dramatic energy crash in the afternoon.
That’s why, by delaying coffee consumption, we can avoid that crash and feel more energized throughout the day.
💭 Ko-Fi
Speaking of coffee, yes, I made a Ko-Fi account for me to hole your pocket, so I can buy lots of coffee. 🤣
Check the footer below for a little pun regarding this supporting system.
💭 “Coffee beans” aren’t beans—and they’re not cherries either.
Coffee “beans” aren’t actually beans—they’re the seeds of the coffee fruit, a type of drupe often referred to as a “cherry.” Most coffee fruits contain two seeds, which are what we roast and brew into coffee. Occasionally, a fruit develops only one seed—known as a peaberry.
🫙JAR OF WORDS
noctivagant /nɒkˈtɪvəɡənt/ adjective - someone who wanders in the night
Use it in a sentence:
Beneath a sky stitched with stars, the noctivagant girl stood still wandering nowhere yet entirely lost in the cosmos.
Origin:
Latin noctivagus night-wandering (from noct-, nox night + vagus wandering) + English -ant
🎮 ENTERTAINMENT AREA
Here are the answers to all answerable last week’s newsletter.
♟️Chess
Qc3 if Bxc3, Nc7#
Qc3 if Rxc3, Nb4#This chess concept is called Grimshaw interference—a tactical theme in chess composition where two different pieces (usually a rook and bishop) interfere with each other when they try to occupy the same square.
♟️Chess
After White mistakenly pushed b2 to b3 what should Black do in order to stalemate?
🃏Meme
🔤Riddle
I can roast, yet I'm not turkey,
Grindable, but not pepper, quirky.
Pressing's an option, no button's plea,
Brewing's my game, not beer, agree?
A bean, not magic, plain to see.
What am I?
🚚 DELIVERABLE AREA
Perfect Coffee Wallpaper
Since we talk more about coffee in this newsletter, we should try to create an amazing wallpaper for you to shine up your phone. The color palette was inspired by the color palette above. Make sure to download the wallpapers and spill them on… ☕
Color Palette Assets
Try to download the “retro coffee shop” palette assets for you to create your creative projects. The assets include CSS and ACO.
Did you like my coffee-inspired newsletter? Consider hitting the like below for you to get another like this next week. 🩷
Have you caught our confusing previous weekly newsletter? 😵💫
Check it out here:
💭 Week #4: Perplexing and Confusing
Here we tumble down the rabbit hole of delightful oddities—bizarre lamps, migrating penguins (that don’t), a failed childhood caramel experiment, and a math mystery involving lumber and board feet with grandfather. There's a logo perception poll, a nostalgic nod to Alice in Wonderland, a whimsical word of the week, and a curious chess puzzle to crack. It’s quirky, nostalgic, and filled with charming confusion—just how the Mad Hatter would like it. 🐇