- Hey friends, welcome back to the vlog.
It's Valentine's day, and so of course,
this is going to be a super productive day in my life.
The day starts at 8:30 a.m
as I'm rudely awakened by my iPhone alarm.
But because this is a special day of romance and relaxation,
I get back into bed and watch some videos on the YouTube.
I'm watching Graham Stephan reacting
to David Debrick's new home,
and then I browse Instagram to see
if I've got any Valentine's Day messages.
Sadly, I have none.
So, after an hour of screwing around on my phone,
at 9:30 I decide to stop being a complete waste man,
and shower and change
into my special Valentine's Day outfit.
This is a new t-shirt courtesy of my friends at Ugmonk,
who make the best desk setup accessories too.
Next, I do my usual skincare routine,
moisturizing and using an eye cream,
and of course, I'm using my million subscribers' plaque
as a mirror because I need the reminder
that I've got friends.
I head into the living room
and open my first Valentine's Day gift, a balloon.
Which, it turns out, was sent to me by mother
because she feels sorry for me.
Then it's time to make some American style
blueberry pancakes in preparation for my move
to the U.S. at some point in life.
I add in the flour, baking powder,
salt, milk, and eggs,
and whisk it into a smooth creamy butter.
At one point, the recipe calls for a knob of melted butter.
So first, I Google to find out what the hell a knob is.
And then I figure out a way to melt the butter.
I feel the microwave would be a reasonable way
to melt butter, which then goes into the mix,
which I whisk like a maniac.
Then I spend 20 minutes making the pancakes
like the domestic goddess that I am.
We decorate them with golden syrup
and fresh blueberries and tuck in.
Around 11:00 a.m. my brother and I hop online
to record this week's episode
of our award-winning podcast, Not Overthinking.
We discuss the emotional roller coaster I've been on
this week with lots of issues with
the book that I'm writing.
We spend some time talking about his startup
and some of the struggles with that.
And we end with a therapy session where I read out some
of the mean comments that I've seen about myself
on the Tattle Life website
and analyzing how that makes me feel.
"His life seems both exhausting and a bit sad,
"the constant quest to be productive every nanosecond
"because you've got nothing else going on."
Oh, my goodness.
(Sheen laughing)
Wow. - This is brutal.
- Wow, this is brutal.
After I wipe my tears at reading these mean comments
on the internet, we wrap up the podcast at 1:00 p.m.
To make myself feel better, I open a Valentine's Day card
from my housemate, Sheen.
Oh, Valentine's Day, two pounds, very nice.
"There's no one I'd rather ignore
"while we both work from home."
"Dear Ali, everyone loves you, including me.
"Thank you for making 2020 less sucky
"and for everything else.
"Lots of love from your king, Sheen."
Oh, that's so sweet.
Look at that, this card is recyclable, right?
Straight in the bin, argh, miss.
Then she gives me a nice pep-talk
and we talk about my feelings about these mean comments
and how it's okay to admit if they make me feel bad
and it doesn't necessarily infringe
on my masculinity to admit it.
I didn't film that bit of the conversation
because I have to maintain an image
of being a Stoic sage here on YouTube.
Anyway, at 2:00 p.m. I hop on Zoom to have a catch up call
with some friends from medical school.
We talk about what's going on with our lives.
And as usual, they ask me how my quest
to find a wife is going.
I tell them that my chances of getting married this year
are similar to the chances that the Pope converts to Islam.
While I'm on the Zoom call,
Sheen is very kindly baking a cake,
which we're going to decorate later in the day.
She's absolutely not using a cake mix, obviously,
and creating all the ingredients from scratch,
as she has forced me to say.
After the Zoom session with my friends, I hop back
to my natural habitat, my desk, to bash out some work.
We've got cohort two
of the Part-time YouTuber Academy starting tomorrow,
and so I'm sorting out some last minute prep
to hopefully help make things run smoothly.
At 4:30, it's time to relax with a cup of tea,
my iPad and the Kindle app,
where I'm reading Steven Pressfield's,
"The Artist's Journey".
I start to feel a bit lethargic
and I think about going for a run,
but then I decide against it
because I'm not a complete weirdo.
Instead, I film Sheen decorating the cake
and we spend some time doing a photo shoot
for her Instagram.
(moderate music)
Then at 6:00 p.m. I hop on a Zoom call
for the Not-Overthinkers, the private community
that my brother and I have started around our podcast.
It's a good session with around 15 of us
where we have a chit chat about meaning and purpose
and how to figure out what to do with your life
and where I share my woes about struggles with my book
and how bad these mean internet comments
have made me feel recently.
Thankfully, it's a very supportive community
and we have a lovely discussion.
By the way, if you're not following my weekly podcast
that I host with my brother, you should subscribe
to the Not Overthinking YouTube channel.
And you can also find us on Spotify
and every other podcast platform, isn't that fun?
At 7:00 p.m. Sheen and I spent 30 minutes
deciding what takeaway to order,
and then once we've decided on our favorite Indian cuisine,
I do a bit of practice on the recorder
which I bought yesterday to help drive out the neighbors.
(flute music)
At 8:00 p.m. our super healthy
and nutritious Indian takeaway arrives,
which we gobble down while watching two episodes
of "The Mentalist".
And then from 9:00 to 9:30 p.m.
I do some more recorder practice
and then spend some time replying
to comments on my latest video and FaceTiming mother
because I'm such a good son.
At 10:00 p.m. it's time
for our special Valentine's Day wind down routine.
So, we both change into our robes,
do on our headbands and apply a face mask.
Unfold the mask, gently apply.
- [Sheen] All right, open it, tear it open.
Now unfold it.
There is this plastic on one side.
- Oh, I should have washed my hands after doing a wee.
What is it?
I don't understand.
- [Sheen] Open it, it's gonna be a face.
- Isn't that creepy?
- [Sheen] Yeah, look, no (laughs).
- What? - [Sheen] Don't put it
on your hand. - Why not?
This is really creepy.
- [Sheen] Now take your glasses off.
Put the holes over your eyes.
- Does it look good?
- [Sheen] Yes, it looks weird.
No, but you have to put it properly.
- Well, I have. - [Sheen] You have to put
the upper lip on the upper lip.
- Where's the upper lip?
- [Sheen] But it looks terrible right now.
(mumbles) Yeah, put that
on your mustache. - What?
- [Sheen] The thing that's on your upper lip right now.
- My mustache is my upper lip. - [Sheen] There you go.
Press, don't be scared to press into your skin.
- Oh, why'd it break?
- [Sheen] Did you break it?
Not this, the rest of the mask.
- Oh, like this? - [Sheen] Yes.
Press it everywhere.
Ugly. - All right, how're we doing?
Is this good, what do I need to do?
- [Sheen] I feel like maybe your nose is too big,
that's the problem. - Wow.
All right, that'll do.
How do I look? - [Sheen] Beautiful.
- This is the perfect setup
for watching "Bridget Jones's Diary"
as we're both single on Valentine's Day,
which is apparently what one does
when one is in that position.
Because one is supposed to drown one's sorrows
on Valentine's Day, I decided to finish a whole bottle
of Schiller on my own as well.
The film lasts us until midnight,
at which point we spend another 30 minutes procrastinating
from brushing our teeth, and then I spend around 15 minutes
offloading the footage from this vlog.
Because I've still got a burst of energy
at the end of the day, the final order of business
in this supremely productive Valentine's Day
is spending half an hour working on a video
that I'm writing, which is a guide to Bitcoin
and how to get started investing in crypto.
This is something I've been doing since 2017,
and I always get comments from people asking
about my thoughts on crypto.
To help plan out this video, I'm continuing to work
through an online course over at Brilliant,
who are very kindly sponsoring this video.
If you haven't heard by now,
Brilliant is a fantastic platform
with online courses in maths, science and computer science.
Their courses are engaging and interactive,
and they teach you stuff
in a really fast, principled fashion,
so you're never just memorizing information
like we often tend to do in school.
These days, I'm working through their excellent course
on cryptocurrencies.
It starts off with a brief history of currency itself,
which is a great foundation to understanding what's so great
about cryptocurrencies.
We then go through the concepts of cryptographic signatures,
decentralization, and vulnerabilities.
This course has really been helping me
get a foundational grasp of cryptocurrencies
so that I can make more videos about them in the future
and also to be a bit more confident in my own investments.
If you'd like to join me on this journey
of improving our mental faculties
and understanding these important concepts in maths, science
and computer science, head over to brilliant.org/Ali.
And the first 200 people will get 20% off
the annual premium subscription.
Thank you so much for watching this video.
If you liked it, you should definitely check out
this short playlist of some
of my other ridiculously productive days in the life.
Thank you for watching, happy Valentine's Day,
and I'll see you later.
(moderate music)