Coffee With Tanya - Vol.21

Talking about: Pirate Wires newsletter, Hemingway hack, 3D realistic art, Smell teleportation, Morse code game, November in history, Carcolepsy.

Here is what's on the menu for today:

1. Media - Silicon Valley's most honest newsletter 🗞️
2. Productivity - How to finish what you started 🏁
3. Art - Blur line between art and reality 👨‍🎨
4. Science and Tech - Smell teleportation - real or fake? 👃
5. Fun Times - Could you be a spy? Morse code game 🫥
6. Word bites - Carcolepsy 🔡

You may be disappointed if you fail, but you are doomed if you don't try // Beverly Sills - an American operatic soprano and a significant cultural figure in the arts.

Media - Pirate Wires: Silicon Valley's Most Honest Newsletter

Want to peek inside the minds of tech's most influential thinkers? 🤔 While reading The Atlantic, I bumped into this gem!

Pirate Wires - a daily newsletter that became Silicon Valley's must-read brain food.

Founded by Mike Solana (Peter Thiel's protégé), this isn't your typical tech newsletter - it's a window into what the most powerful people in tech really think, delivered with zero filter.

Here's why I believe Pirate Wires deserves a spot in your inbox (while you can get rid of other stuff you don't read):

• Quick & punchy - Three sharp takes daily, no outbound links, designed to be digested with your morning coffee ☕
• Inside access - Get scoops and insights from the tech world that mainstream media often misses 🎯
• Authentic voice - Raw, unfiltered perspectives on tech, politics, and culture that you won't find anywhere else 🗣️

It's like having a backstage pass to Silicon Valley's thought process. With 100,000+ subscribers (mostly young tech professionals), it's striking a chord.

Want to understand where tech is heading and why? This is your ticket.

Check out Pirate Wires here and start your mornings with some spicy tech takes!

PS: Make sure to also follow Mike Solana on X/Twitter for additional insights and engaging debates about tech's future.

"The Hemingway Effect": A Way to Finish What You Start

Ever wonder how Hemingway consistently crafted masterpieces while living such a vibrant life? 🤔 He had a simple productivity hack: knowing when to stop.

Let's start with who was Hemingway (👨‍🦳🌊🐟 anyone?)
Ernest Hemingway, the celebrated American novelist, journalist, and adventurer, profoundly influenced 20th-century fiction. Known for his bold, direct prose, Hemingway pioneered the "iceberg theory," leaving much of the deeper meaning beneath the surface of his text - just like an iceberg.

His most notable works include: "The Sun Also Rises" (1926), "A Farewell to Arms" (1929), "For Whom the Bell Tolls" (1940) and "The Old Man and the Sea" (1952) - hope you guessed the emojis before.

Enter the Hemingway Effect - a science-backed strategy helping people work smarter, not harder. The idea? Stop working “when you’re still going good,” at a point where you’re excited to continue.

Why This Works:

• Staying engaged - Pausing at an intriguing point makes you eager to continue.
• Easy to start again - Knowing the next steps makes it simple to dive back in.
• Boosts focus and motivation - Studies show this approach helps keep your mind sharp and engaged.

How to Try It:

• Pick a key task - Choose a task you want to tackle.
• Work until you reach an engaging point - Find a point where you’re invested but can stop.
• Pause with clear next steps - Stop once you know what’s next.
• Let your subconscious work during breaks - Use downtime to let ideas simmer in the background (coffee break, exercise, laying on the floor).

Example from My Recent Project:

• Task - Creating the Services (consulting and mentoring) page for my website.
• Engaging Point - I made a high-level list of services divided between companies and individuals, and after making this list, I stopped.
• Next Step Clarity - I realized I needed to expand each service with more details.
• Pause - I took a break to make lunch. While cooking, I brainstormed about additional points to include, letting my mind process and refine ideas naturally.

By building these strategic pauses into your day, you may just unlock Hemingway-level focus and creativity (and finally finish that big project!). Check out the full article here.

Mind-Bending Street Art That Makes Reality Optional 🎨

Ever seen a wall come alive? 🤯

Cosimo Cheone Caiffa's 3D street art will make you question everything you know about murals.

From a child reaching for the moon to snakes that seem ready to slither off the walls, these aren't your average paintings. His hyper-realistic style transforms ordinary urban spaces into magical portals where art breaks free from its 2D constraints.

Ready to have your mind blown?

Dive into these 23 incredible pieces that blur the line between imagination and reality.

I especially liked the windows of the building in Milan and the guy grabbing the shirt of the guy walking by - what was your favorite?

Smell-O-Vision: Osmo's Scent-sational Breakthrough 🌸👃

Hold your noses, tech enthusiasts! Osmo Labs just pulled off a mind-blowing feat in the world of olfactory innovation. While they haven't quite mastered smell teleportation (yet), they've done something equally impressive.

Picture this: You're craving the sweet aroma of a juicy summer plum, but it's the dead of winter. Soon, you might be able to whip out your phone, tap an app, and voila! The scent of ripe plum fills your room 🤯

It's not science fiction anymore; it's Osmo's reality.

Here's The Scoop

Osmo's whipped up a "Principal Odor Map" (POM) that's like a crystal ball for smells. This AI-powered marvel can predict how a molecule will tickle your nostrils just by looking 👁️ at its chemical structure. No need to whip up concoctions in a lab - the POM can explore billions of potential scents digitally.

But here's where it gets really wild...

Once the POM picks a winner, it doesn't just leave you hanging. Nope, it cooks up a recipe for that smell and sends it to a special "scent printer." This gadget then mixes up a cocktail of aroma ingredients to recreate the exact scent.

It's like downloading a smell from the cloud and printing it out in your living room. Talk about the future of fragrance!

Here's Why This Is Huge:

• Groundbreaking tech: Osmo's using AI to map and recreate scents with astonishing accuracy.
• Long-distance sniffing: Imagine sending your favorite cologne scent to a friend across the globe!
• Medical potential: This could revolutionize early disease detection. Sniffing out Parkinson's, anyone?

While we can't beam that fresh-baked cookie smell to your BFF just yet, Osmo's breakthrough is bringing us one giant step closer to a world where digital scents are a reality.

Follow Osmo Labs and get ready to have your mind (and nose) blown!

P.S.: Anyone else suddenly craving plums? 🍑😋

Fun Times - Can You Guess the Word?

Could you survive as a Cold War spy? Well... This Morse code game will tell! 🕵️

In the shadows of the digital age lurks a challenge that separated elite operatives from amateur radio enthusiasts. Today, it's your turn to prove your worth in the world of dots and dashes.

Meet Morsle - the daily Morse code puzzle that turns you from civilian to code breaker in 21 heart-pounding attempts.

But here's the catch:

• Starting at expert level - 40 words per minute of rapid-fire dots and dashes. Only the top could handle this speed in the field. But there's hope - every three failed attempts, the transmission slows by 5 WPM. The handler's giving you a chance...
• Your mission parameters - One guess per playback, with only green letters confirming your progress. 21 attempts to crack the code before the mission fails.

Think you have what it takes?

It's also a lot of fun to compete with your partner, friend, or colleague and see who comes out on top!

Head to morsle.fun and put your skills to the test.

Word Bites! 📚🌟

Today we have... Carcolepsy 😴🚗

You know that mysterious sleepiness that hits you the moment you become a passenger in a car? One minute you're wide awake, maybe even buzzing from your morning coffee, and the next thing you know, the gentle purr of the engine and the hypnotic sway of the vehicle conspire to make your eyelids heavier than lead.

People jokingly call it "carcolepsy" - that irresistible urge to sleep despite your best efforts to stay alert. The best part? As soon as you reach your destination and step out of the car, that drowsiness vanishes as mysteriously as it appeared, leaving you wondering how something as simple as being a passenger can turn you from perfectly awake to nodding off in seconds flat.

November in History

Did you know November is packed with game-changing moments that shaped our world? Like huge events...

• November 1, 1993 - European Union Created 🇪🇺 The Maastricht Treaty went into effect, transforming the European Community into the European Union and creating a unified European citizenship.
• November 4, 1922 - King Tut's Tomb Discovery 👑 Howard Carter discovered the entrance to King Tutankhamun's tomb in Egypt's Valley of the Kings, revealing one of archaeology's greatest treasures.

• November 7, 1867 - Marie Curie's Birth 🧪 The pioneering physicist and chemist was born in Warsaw, later becoming the first person to win Nobel Prizes in two scientific fields.
• November 9, 1989 - Berlin Wall Falls 🧱 The Berlin Wall, symbol of the Cold War, began to come down as East Germany opened its borders, leading to German reunification.
• November 17, 1869 - Suez Canal Opens 🚢 The canal connecting the Mediterranean and Red Seas was inaugurated, revolutionizing maritime trade between Europe and Asia.

Fun fact: November was originally the ninth month in the ancient Roman calendar? That's why its name comes from the Latin word "novem" meaning nine!

Which of these November milestones surprised you the most? 🤔

That's all for today... Stay tuned for the next coffee with me in December for Hanukkah, Christmas, and New Year edition!

Meanwhile, you can also check my brand new newsletter that will be focused on product management, business, tech, and productivity hacks called "The Product Palette", and check out my Linktree for extra goodies (Spotify playlists, Sketches, etc.).

You're one of 91 humans who love to feed their curiosity.

If you have any topics you want me to explore further, please send them to me.

Feel free to reply with your thoughts and insights! Ciao!