Even though aluminium is the most abundant metal on earth today, no one had ever seen it until 1825. French Emperor Napoleon III famously used aluminium cutlery and plates to host his most important, highest status guests, while the lesser guests and "commoners" at the banquet table had to make do with dining on standard gold and silver. It was a metal so coveted it was displayed at Tiffany’s and chosen to cap the Washington Monument. Then came the discovery of electrolysis.

Familiarity removes novelty costs upon cognition. We’ve all been there: the first day at a new job, driving in a foreign city, or the first hour staring at a complex piece of software. By the end of the day, you’re mentally obliterated. You want to quit everything. Your brain feels like a browser with fifty tabs open, and your internal cooling fan is whirring at maximum speed. The High Price of "New" This exhaustion stems from Novelty Costs. Every time we encounter something

The city of one’s birth often becomes the background music to life: constant, habitual, and, after a while, almost invisible.