Make Time - Use it or Lose it

Okay, so we have a visit on Saturday, the house is a mess and I just spent two days at home and nothing got done. Oh I was working, but also sleeping and ... you know what the worst part is I can't actually remember what I spent the last two days actually doing. It's a lot easier to keep tabs on your activities when you're going to work. There you go, another worry when I finally go freelance again... will I succumb to the addictive lure aimless pottering. Well initially I might I guess. But I'll settle down. Depends if I have enough projects.

I came to a decision today though. I am going to MAKE TIME for stuff. There doesn't seem to be any time for stuff. By stuff I mean things I would have liked to do. I don't get enough time sitting watching DVDs. I don't get enough time just talking with the kids. I don't get enough time just talking with Mia. I don;t get enough time... for whatever. I think I am to blame though. I lead a busy life, sure, but I don't manage things very well, especially my time. But if I'm serious about improving my quality of life, I need to relax more, not stress myself out by staying up too late and gnawing away at projects when I should be kicking back and partying. I used to be that guy before now I'm turning into him again. It's got to stop, I tell you! :)

Oh, and check this out, it's awesome. Can't wait to see the rest of it.

Ah a couple of days peace

After a turbulent Summer of not quite having any time off, and when I did either having to work or look after the kids, I finally got a couple of days off. Yeah, I'll probably waste time and not get anything done but I'm fine with that. We have another viewing on Saturday so I got a bit of cleaning and tidying to do, but hey... I'll get done what I get done. The house has been on the market for about a year now so basically weneed the right person to come through the door. What we do to the house is not going to affect that at all.

Hattie is doing another performance of Wagner's Ring Cycle, a kind of cut down version by children but featuring live musicians and opera singers. It's at the Bishop's Palace in Wells on 14th September. She was really good in it when they performed it at St. John's Church in Frome, and all the adults working with her said she was a joy to work with. And she was the only kid on stage going for a proper performance. She wants to be an actor when she grows up so this is a good start.

Also big news Hattie had a couple of poems published. She entered a competition to win a place in a compilation book of poetry, and she got that but also they liked her stuff so much they took another one off her for another book. There's no stopping that girl. Oh and plus she's up to episode 4 on her podcast, but I talked about that already.

I'm still working on pre-production for my first podcast, Making Better Movies, based in part on the book I was writing. Actually what I may do is spin off interviews and ideas from the podcast to form the backbone of the book. Damn I love reusing assets. :)

Anyway, it's morning,
I've got a couple of movies to watch today along with a few bits of work, so I'm going to go now, but check out this clip I found on Revver.com... I like the sound of this movie.

ciao, cats and kittens

Music and Cheesy Spider Monsters

Two things today:

check out the work of Jonathan Coulton. Great lyrics and a twisted sense of humour. He's my current favourite musician, along with Kevin Reeves and my chum Paul Parker. I'll be featuring all these guys in upcoming podcasts.

And finally this... yeah it's cheesy but it hits me where I live. A dubbed movie which features long leggy women from the 50s and spider monsters? What's not to love?



So long suckers! OXO

Later that day...

Yeah... i was pretty tired today, so work is going really slow... I did however find this on the Internet while I was waiting for it to crash this afternoon...

I never do titles - wonder why?

Hi chappies,

after a long time of having days off, working a little bit, looking after the kids, I'm starting to gear up for next term, which starts in about four weeks. ONCE AGAIN I'm sorry about the lack of postings lately. I've got a whole bunch of new great tools on my Powerbook which will make this easy, even if I'm not online.

So what have I been up to? Oh lots, and I'll have to read back to see what I've said and not said... but anyway. I've been learning how to podcast, record and publish, do RSS feeds etc. As a product of this, and typically for her, Hattie said "oh, I'd like to do a podcast"... so I cut my teeth on doing Hattie's weekly show, "Baby Podcast" which now on iTunes. You can find it by typing "Hattie South" into the podcast directory. She talks (and talks and talks) and plays a few tunes from International bands and local bands. It's a pretty good show, and although she cusses a lot (sigh) don't let that put you off. That's why the show has the EXPLICIT tag. As I've said before I cuss a lot myself, working as I do in theatre. I choose not to cuss a lot in this blog for two reasons, firstly I think it's more intelligent to find proper words for things, and secondly dammit my mum reads this. But I allow my kids a certain amount of lattitude in their speech. Why? It's the modern vernacular, and also it breeds a certain relaxation in a home that has had its swimming hat on too tight for years. The kids have had it really rough during the marriage break up and their mum's illness. So what little freedom I can offer them I do. There's a bunch of stuff they can't do, but almost no words are off-limits.

What else? Apart from making and listening to a load of podcasts? Not a great deal. If you're not into podcasts I recommend you start. Get iTunes on your computer, click the PODCASTS menu on the side, and look up stuff to listen to. It's like radio on demand, and if you have an MP3 player or iPod then get one of those too. It's so much nicer, more diverse, more interesting, than the crap they broadcast on the radio. I can recommend "Digital Production Buzz", "The Daily Source Code", "Baby Podcast"of course, "Coolness Roundup"and the wonderful "Suffolk'n'Cool".

I've also been listening to the amazing Podsafe Music Network, a collection of largely unsigned bands whose tracks you can play on podcasts without any payment or rights violations. Any world where record companies and radio stations become unimportant is a good place to be.

Okay, enough for today I really have to go to bed. More of this either later today or tomorrow.

Until then cop this from Comic Strip Blogger:



Later dudes!