The View From The Crow's Nest: Recent Episodes
Romeo Crow
@RomeoCrow | RomeoCrow.me
Distracting my monkey brain by sharing the thoughts, ideas, strategies and tools as they go through my head each day! They could be related to my current projects in music, fiction, film or photography, or my business interests, family and worldschooling our kids, travelling or anything else that springs to mind! Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/theviewfromthecrowsnest/support
Welcome to Episode 218 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest and it is Sunday the 14th Valentine's Day is may 14 February 2021. And today I wanted to share with you an idea that kind of stems from, do what you can with what you have right now which is a motto that I have that I've tried to stick to over the years. And in this particular example it's about something really simple, go home for a walk and effectively what it's about is, we often want to do things with our lives in our lives and I'm sure you felt this way about many things, but you just don't have the time and you know you'd like to fit that in at some point, if we imagine our future perfect lives or where we're heading to, we think yes and I'm going to do this and I'm going to do that and blah blah blah. And the problem is, it never happens. And the reason it never happens is because we don't make it a habit. Now, by doing what we can with what we have right now so if one habit is, or if you want to have the life in the future where you think it will be lovely and then, you know, in this particular case, we'll go out to lovely walks in the countryside etc etc. You may not live in the countryside maybe only they have a park near you. Maybe you don't even have that maybe, you know, there's just, you know, just houses near you blocks or whatever. But it's no it's almost never the case that one transitions from not doing something ever to it being a permanent fixture of their life normally it's steps to get there, and a case in point was today you know we were saying, Be nice go for a walk and blah blah blah but they said the other. And then it just came in after lunch and say, Look, let us go out for a walk. Now, let's get in the car drove five minutes, 10 minutes maybe tops and just go for a walk like off a side road kind of thing so we did and we went up a side street or side road and that kind of led us into the foothills of the mountains, and we had a really nice walk and it was blowing snow into us it was icy icy cold, but the four of us had a really nice walk. And again, it didn't have to be a big thing we only went in the end it was probably about an hour and tops, but we're only planning to go for about 20 minutes one way 20 minutes walk the other way and soon enough. It was an hour. But the point being, rather than thinking some big expedition or it's got to be this big thing or it's got to be there or we have to pick the route or this study other, it was simply a case of just find a place nearby a gun, have a walk. Now we're fortunate because we live in Castroville Erie where we're very close to the mountains but when we're in London, we were right in the centre of London and there's no countryside there you know so you go for a walk in the park. And we were missing, not having a park near us when we were in sa Ischia for seven months to the lockdown. But then you walk through the streets and actually there are some nice streets in Ischia so the point being that you find whatever you can. You do what you can with what you have right now. And you start building, whatever it is that you want to do, into, you know, a proper portion of your life into a habit into a routine. And from there, of course, as you move as your circumstances change you can expand on that habit you can expand on that part of your routine in your schedule. But if it's not already there it's going to be very difficult to start it. Just overnight and make it a substantial part of what you're doing. So the whole point I guess of today's podcast is think about the things that you're not doing that you'd like to do, and consider how can you start them even, even if it's just 10 minutes in a day. How can you start them in the smallest viable way the minimum viable product, something which we'll talk about in another podcast but that's an idea from the Lean Startup side of business but basically it pretty much just means, what's the least the smallest thing simplest thing you can do to
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I was just thinking about work and taking time off, and that, you know, constant chase to have balance in one's doing. So we've sheduled recently we've scheduled every Friday nights family movie night. And now we also doing every Saturday night is family games No, and I had. It's Friday now and I had a couple of client calls this afternoon, and I was really adamant that I was needed to get off the phone because it's family movie night. And so, I put that limitation in with the client I said, Look, I've got to get off at this time blah blah blah I didn't exactly tell him why but, you know, make this happen. And it was making me think about Parkinson's Law, and if you've not heard of Parkinson's Law before it's an adage that work expands to fill the available time for its completion. And it basically means that, you know, you use it if anybody's ever studied anything and you've got exams you generally cram, you know, right to the end of your exam time or, you know, if you've got four weeks to do a project, then you'll still be working on that project right up to the end of the fourth week, whereas if you've got two weeks to do probably exactly the same project you get it done in two weeks. And we've all done that you know when you've. When we had to pack our house. Remember when we had to move, you know, we knew we were moving at least I know a month or more months before that we're moving but we literally the night before we move and we found ourselves doing most of the packing, and we were still packing on the day we were moving. Equally, when we only had kind of 24 hours 48 hours to do the packing we did it, you know we got it done it was haphazard and also over tip, but we got it done. So, it's made really making me think, well, what is Parkinson's Law suggests, it suggests that the less time that you have, you're still going to get the stuff done the less, the more time constraints you put on yourself, you'll still get the work done or at least the important stuff. It might be rough around the edges. It might not be as smooth as you'd like but it will be done, and recently I've been thinking a lot about you know Seth Godin talks about shipping, you know, you've got to crate and ship the work it's no good just creating it you've got to get it out there. And it's better to get it out and get it done. Then, you know, get it perfect. And today, I was listening to a podcast of the co founder of Netflix and he was talking about how originally they were doing a B testing, which is where you have an idea that something might work better so you create an experiment to test that against what you've already got so A is what you've got beers what you're testing against. And they said, he said at the beginning, it would take them two weeks to design an A B split test a split test on something, because they made it really perfect. And then they got that down to one week and then they got it down to, you know, a few days Then one day, and then in the end they were doing four or five tests a day. And he absolutely, you know credits that with one of their major reasons why they became successful, and he was said that the tests that they were doing were terrible in the punctuation the grammar would be wrong they'd have watermarks on photos and have the wrong photos. And he said, but what it allowed them to do is, it didn't matter how bad the, the periphery was, it was the crux of the idea and getting out there it's the same principle. So when they gave themselves less time to do the split testing they actually got far better results because they got to the point much more quickly, and one of his ideas was you know as soon as you've got an idea to do something get out there however rough it is you know test it, test it in the real world, straight away. And this is really making me think, you know, protecting these this work life balance trying to, for me personally trying to find more time for the family and whatnot. I'm not getting through a
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In our building in Castroville Hurry, it's a communal apartment block. And there are very set times to put different types of rubbish out different types of trash. And there are like three or four different bins of maybe five bins you know glass paper, etc. And you have to put them out certain times, and if you don't put them out at the, at the right times then letters come through people complain. It's really annoying, but that's fair enough. And then, the problem is the who that the bins the communal bins are really, really small. So they like they're not big enough for blocks of apartments with lots of people living in them. And the person in charge of the apartment block would say that if you can't leave rubbish in bags outside of the bins, next to the bins they have to fit in the bins or you don't leave them there at all. And if you have rubbish outside then the council will find him. And when we said to him, why don't you get bigger bins he says I can't because the council supply the bins. So this is ridiculously stupid situation you know the bins are too small, they don't get all the rubbish but you can't leave the rubbish outside and if you're not quick enough to get there when the bins, when it's the right thing day for that particular bin, then everybody else has filled it up and you've got no chance. And it was just making me think about this idea this concept of crusade or comply, because you get really annoyed about it, and it's very easy to get annoyed about situations like this or other situations. And at the end of the day, you really actually only have two choices, you can either comply with it and do what you're meant to be doing. Or you can actually crusade against it and I don't mean complain because this was three choices really it's crusade complain or comply comply. You just fit in with what has to be done you know it's the cost of living wherever you're living it's the cost of doing business wherever you're doing business complaining gets you absolutely nowhere but annoys you and really takes it on board and gives you you know changes your mood and changes your viewpoint on on where you're feeling at the moment and he's just a complete waste of energy. But the other one is crusade. If you care about it enough, then you must do something about it but not complain actually do something about it, you know, be that person that makes the change in the council be that person that makes the change in the community, or whatever it is that you're that you're, you know that you're fighting against so to speak, whatever it is that you want to make better. So, it just made me think there's yeah three choices actually not to really, I just automatically discount complaining but it's crusade complain, or comply. Or maybe complain comply Crusade, maybe put it that way. There's just no thought that came to me and I wanted to share it with you, you know, when next time something bothers you decide which of those three that you really want to do complaining i think is useless complying might be the best option because at the end of the day it might not just be worth hassling about just, you know, fall into line and get on with it. And in other ways you might want a crusade. And that is, you know, that could be your own art you know making a career out something you really care about, or you know whatever it is the new product that you're building within your company or whatever it is. So, comply complain, or crusade. So that idea for you. Hope you find that useful.
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Welcome to Episode 215 of my podcast The view from crow's nest, and it is Thursday. The something of something. Thursday the 11th of February, 2021. Today was an enforced day off from the point of view, we had to take Mina to get dental X ray, but the if we without waiting one month to get one in the local hospital. We had to travel to the main city in the region, which is an hour and a half away. And it also happens to be the main city where my driving licence is in the process of being changed over from British to an Italian one. And we did that in November. And they were like, yep, come back and see us we give you a piece of paper that will let you drive for the next couple of months, come back and see us at the end of that. Can you tell us if the licence is ready, no no no you just have to come and see us. Okay, so we queued there for an hour and a half at the motor place and they said no, it's not not been done. So we'll give you another extension for a month and then you come back and see us again and see if it's been done, classic Italian stylee. Fortunately, the guy was very kind and actually gave us a three month, piece of paper. So now we can go anytime next three months that was good, then we took Mina to the hospital and or the the scanning clinic, and she was very anxious very worried about having a scan that she hasn't had an X ray done before. And she's had a couple of experiences with doctors, or such that has meant that she's, she's rather fearful of the situation so it took us nigh on three hours to kind of get her to into the room and then get her to take the scan and blah blah and then she conquered her fear, and that was really really cool because, you know, it's easy for me it's a lesson for myself as well you know it's easy to look at something and say well that's just simple or easy just get on with it. But of course, whatever that is, if one is fearful of it, then that's it, they're fearful of it there's not a problem there. What's the challenge is, can that person overcome that fear and get it done anyway and, you know, and do it, not, not you know get not ignore the fear not get rid of the fear fear is good to healthy in a lot of places, but to conquer it, you know, to overcome it is a real boost to self and we can really see that Mina really was pleased with our achievement once you kind of got over it and obviously you know anyone who's ever had an X ray knows that there is nothing to it. So she was never in any danger from our point of view, but from her point of view, you know, it was a scary thing. So that was good and Leonardo was very very patient the whole way through. Despite it being boring as can be. We played whilst we're waiting and it was all good. The net result was that by the time we got back home it was like three in the afternoon or something for nearly three I think, and I did some work for an hour or so a couple hours for a client, as mid speed to it, five, and then we couldn't, but that's basically was my day. But there was something that I read today that has really resonated with me. And I just finished reading yesterday I just finished reading a book called The magic of thinking big by somebody I can't remember. I think it's Dr. Schwartz but I could be completely wrong there. And this is I think it's 1959 book, I'd heard of it. I'd never come across it particularly or read it but I read it. I think brilliant book, and well worth everybody reading it, it goes straight up to one of the best books I think I've read, full of practical advice, but no fluff and No. You know no over egging the pot. Just a really good book it I think it really lays out some, some good wisdom, basically and age old wisdom about the magic of thinking big but you know just about how to improve oneself so I highly recommend that book. The next book I started reading last night was Seth Golden's new newish or new book, I think, called things called the practice, create and ship work, or something like tha
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Welcome to Episode 214 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest. It is Wednesday the 10th of February, 2021. For the second night in a row. I fell asleep around about midnight. And I was so tired, yesterday. Because midnight now is late late for me, whereas it might have been normal. A little while ago now though, waking it sort of six and getting up 630 to seven midnight is now starting to be late. And last night I was in bed at 930 really tired, just falling asleep and the next door neighbor's making a racket until basically like 11 or whatever and couldn't sleep. And, which was really frustrating. So I woke up this morning and I was just I had zero motivation and no energy I just couldn't face, doing stuff. It took me a good while to get out of bed. And then our training this morning with Abdel he'd put it back a couple hours which isn't like him but that's fine. So it was going to be at 10 o'clock rather than eight o'clock, which meant that kind of the whole morning is, you know, it was easy to kind of just not really do much this morning so the morning disappeared although we did train so that was good, and then a bit of energy after that had lunch, as much energy after that. And then as I really must do some work so I've plotted myself and got a few bits done stuff for clients, predominantly. So it was a pretty nothing, a day, really. And tomorrow we are out more or less for the day. We have to go and then go to travel to the main city in the region to get some admin stuff done because Italy is kind of another day which can be frustrating but equally. I realised this morning, aside from the late night last night. Really, I think it's because again I've done a kind of like 1014 or days or whatever of working. And though I've taken much more time off in the last couple of weeks in terms of resting in the afternoons. I've had really intense mornings. And, again, just not left the house not gone out and I think my body was saying well you need some, some time off dude you need to kind of just chill. Ideally, leave the house and go somewhere but there's not really too many places to go the minute actually that's that's a cop out there are places we can go into the mountains or whatever. Well, I can't get there my licence but my driver's licence but that's part of where we're going tomorrow, maybe I'll get my driver's licence or maybe I'll get a piece of paper telling me I have to come back within a month. And they might have it ready by then, so we'll soon find out. But yeah, again, I think just time off, so important, it's just a reminder, you gotta chill out a few times. Occasionally, apparently, so they say. So that's it, not really much to report. I did do my vocal practice today and then again played the set through the. My EP they come and go I rain play those six songs through, and I'm trying to get them up to being able to perform live as a set because they'll probably be the first kind of set that I stopped playing. Certainly, to try and get me out performing again but also I'm intending to do sort of online concert, concerts, and since this is the EP that I've got out at the moment. This is the one that I'll make sense to be concentrating on. So, I will recorded that did try to play them all through in Mongo and Leonardo came in the plasma track and was dancing about in front of them. So that's, whether I do anything with that video or not it's definitely a lovely video at least for us. So it's nice to have a fan. So yeah, that's the view from the crow's nest, not much to report. If you've got anything to report then you can find me on Twitter at Romeo Crow, or you can go to Romeo crow.com slash podcast and leave a voicemail on the show. short and sweet today thanks for listening and I will be back tomorrow Toodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 213 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest. And it is Tuesday ninth of February 2021. Today was good, because I actually managed to start work I think it's seven o'clock and woke up around six and then go I bet half six started work at seven o'clock, and actually managed to fit in the first hour was writing. So working on my screenplay one night in Soho the second draft of my screenplay. And it's a bit of a psychological barrier to get started as it often is you know starting the hardest thing restarting. And I noticed the last time I opened it was 25th of September last year so it's taken me like four months just to open the script, but I did it, and I spent an hour and it was good I made good progress I went through about a third of the script, doing the edits that I wanted to do, basically just the dialogue really capital plot points I need to just move, I could make better. Yeah, made the pay off a bit better later in the film, or in the script but yeah that was good and then after that, I was on music. And finally, I discovered something so exciting for me at least. There's a thing in music so I'm working on a song called take what you want, I think, from my album, a blind eye to love. And there's, there's two types of entry for music, if you will. One of them is analogue or acoustic instruments which you might plug in and play and they're recorded as like waveforms you might have seen them they're the kind of things that go up and like a wave that goes up and down showing the sound, and the other type is called MIDI and MIDI is just all it is is information basically on or off and media itself doesn't make any noise but the information in it, and triggers sounds in other things that are usually digital can be analogue as well but. So with MIDI you have huge control over where you place those notes and you can make the computer divide up in a bar of music perfectly into whatever divisions you want and place those notes exactly etc. And there's a thing called quantize, which is where you basically just press a button on the computer and it will automatically move the MIDI notes to the timings that you want so all of a sudden if you play a bit sloppy as I often do with things like piano. If I've done it in MIDI, then I can straighten it up so it sounds more rhythmically correct. Today I discovered. There's a same functionality for audio for like, if I plugged in a guitar and I'm playing something I can basically just press a button and it will move it into time. And that's a bit of a revelation for me I never knew I could do that. I don't know what version of the software I use they started that it might have been six years ago and I didn't even realise, but said that was very exciting because basically what it means is, I can take the bass guitar, the electric guitars, and the MIDI parts cables etc and I can make them all really locked together. So they sound much more tight, is exactly the word. So, that was a great discovery huge discovery, I cannot over overstate the discovery of hugeness that that was basically finished the drums, so more or less now I've got the, the bed track. The original bed track done. And now I'm going to with the next couple of sections sessions add other sounds and instruments into it to give you a bit more depth and width and interest and whatnot. But that should be fairly swift now so hopefully that track will be done pretty soon ready for the vocals, and then I'll only have I think one or two more tracks on the album to do. And then the vocals for the wall, but, you know, it's getting there. So again, my process one hour on the writing was great one hour on the music that was great. Then I had a tonne of where the time went actually but then I had, you know, client work and stuff. And I worked through till two o'clock. Didn't get as far into the work as I'd want to you know there's still stuff that's pressing client stuff. And I feel like it's just a constant thing w
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Welcome to Episode 212 of my podcasts review from the crow's nest and it is Monday the eighth of February, 2021, at about five to 10 in the evening. Today Monday first day of the week but also very importantly, another day, kind of trying to work towards our new structure our new. It wasn't perfect today but it was better than yesterday and I think my gut says we actually Finally I think finding something that's going to work, to tick all the boxes home, family, work, etc. and started the day off with training with Abdel. And it was, it was actually a bit of an easier session for me but it was, I think a bit easier because someone has not had like a week and a half off or so so we're gonna ease back into it, but nonetheless I had a good sweat on so it wasn't so easy, but it's a good way to start the day had a shower. One of the things that we've we've done. I've been doing for about I guess a week or so is instead of dressing in, you know, jogging trousers and cheap t shirts from Primark I've actually put on jeans nice enough trousers and a nice shirt and actually kind of dressed up for the day put on a bit of aftershave, even though I know that I'm not going to see anybody other than the family because they don't leave the house and they're the only people here. You know, part of this kind of, I think. Recently, I mean it's been happening for about six months or so but certainly in the last month it's really accelerated this focus on planning for the future and you know new goals and whatnot. And what we realised is 10, years ago, we sumana and I were working together towards these goals we were both striving towards them and we pretty much achieved it achieve what was the main goal that we set out to, which was to be able to live anywhere because our income wasn't dependent on where we were living, and to be able to travel, bring up our kids homeschool them, and pretty much, you know we'd achieved that last year, then coronavirus came and destroyed our income stream so that was a bit of an annoyance. But, you know, we will get around that, that's fine. But we had kind of achieved it. And although we discussed some you know tentatively some other ideas for the future. We realised that, you know, middle of last year, whenever we really hadn't actually come up with what we're going to do for the next 510 years because that plan, more or less took us 10 years. So, this time around, I'd been thinking about the plan but Simona hadn't been so much because she was basically chronically sleep deprived because she puts so much time into the children and gets up multiple times during the night for the kids and gets up first thing in the morning for the kids, and had been staying up late spend time with me so it's a recipe for disaster and she didn't have the energy that she had previously. And a couple of weeks ago we had a discussion about it and it was that, that moment when, you know, not saying at all. She's an alcoholic, non alcoholic but that moment when you know you can't tell an alcoholic you need to sort yourself out. You need to stop drinking, there has to be the aha moment when they finally think and a few weeks ago so when I finally had the aha moment about needing to sleep more as simple as it sounds, and since then it's been a real switch. She's getting to bed earlier. She's getting more sleep she's more energetic she's more vivacious. And as a consequence, now we're more balanced we're thinking about the future. You know it's not just me trying to pull in one direction now it's the two of us working towards it and as a consequence, we've, I've definitely felt this renewed push towards you know making changes in it, and going after the new goal and the new goal. The next 10 year goal though, I would do it quicker than 10 years but the next big goal is to buy rather ambitious, it's a lifetime goal really but to buy our first house, which will be. I probably in or hopefully in Tuscany. In Italy, and the Tuscany region and b
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Welcome to Episode 211 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest, and it is Sunday the seventh of February 2021, and it's been about three days since my last podcast, which I guess was would have probably been like Thursday or Friday is what three days is. Why is that why is that well around to it basically I were on a flex of. We're on a permanent flex actually Simona and I have tried to find the right balance. And I guess that's what everybody in life is trying to do trying to find the right balance between work and fat and leisure, or family life, but then within that there's family life being with the family with the kids, there's family life being you as a couple just you and your spouse if you go on or your partner. And then there's individual time, which may be stuff that is to do with work but also maybe stuff that is not to do with work, dare I say, and then work itself, certainly for me is quite a varied thing there's, you know, it goes from music to writing to photography to marketing to working with clients to other stuff. So, there's such a you know overlapping stuff going on that. It's always difficult to find the yeah the right back. I'm sorry, I just got distracted. I won't tell you what I got distracted with. I'm going to keep my eyes on the prize. And so, I'm sorry he's fighting it but I'm gonna have to go in the other room now. I'm walking past the kids bedroom. And they're asleep. Finally, yes. And so it's finding a balance between, you know, between everything and seminar always trying to work out a different way of doing things, a routine this or the other. And the thing that we definitely a weaker at is our routines sheduled sticking to them, etc. And they are so much at the core and more and more I realised how at the core of any kind of success in any kind of endeavour they are. So if you listen to my podcasts of a few days ago in the last week, so I've tried I've tried this new system so system and schedules those I think are the two key things, and the system I've been using is every day. I start working just on my music and then I go on to other things, hopefully after my music it's then marketing my own stuff. And then it's working with clients and other sort of stuff. And to, along with that I've been running a timer for an hour each time and pretty much sticking to it. So do an hour on my music then I'll do an hour on the hour, and I'm finding that this is really enabling me to get through stuff in a satisfactory way like I feel like I'm making progress, even though it's complete false summit mountains like every time I get anywhere. There's another summit to climb ahead and I think certainly thinking about as a creative songwriter or an author or what have you, there's always going to be more work to do, is literally there's no end in sight. But nonetheless, you know, working through stuff like that at least I'm getting through stuff and I'm actually closing in on finishing my album The blind eye to love and this kind of stuff. But that on its own isn't enough. We need the structure so that I can do homeschooling with the kids so that I can play with the kids so that I can spend time with smaller so we can get the housework done so Simona can have time for herself etc etc. So the last few days we've been talking a lot and starting to implement a new you know schedules and hopefully this time round, you know the schedule that we're trying we try once a couple of days and we need to tweak it we're tweaking it. And it's such kind of boring dull stuff and yet it's so fundamental to getting, I think, towards any real goals in life any success. That one wants. So yeah, that's been the last few days. And part of that and I guess we're having done the podcast the last couple of nights is because Friday nights is now family, or has been for few weeks but family movie night. And we watched. Watch Chronicles of Narnia. And on Friday. And then last night we had our inaugural family games night. So, we, w
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Welcome to Episode 210 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and it is Thursday, the fourth of February, 2021. And today, I woke up again so 630 raring to go, which I never thought would be a sentence, I'd say with any kind of enthusiasm. So the you know the earlier nights had most definitely working or that in that I think I slept till 11 last night which. The great thing is now seems like late, whereas previously two o'clock in the morning would seem a bit more like late so that's good. But then one thing and another. I didn't get started working. And then in the end, Simona and I had a discussion about routines and about structure and whatnot because there's always so much to do as an individual as a couple as a family. And with the house. Work etc. And I might be being naive but I'm convinced that there's a way to fit it all in. And that convinced this, because that is a word. I'm sure is tied into systems and shadows and routines and habits. And I'm sure there's a way of combining them all in a way that works for us that unlocks the optimum use of time to be productive and constructive in all the ways that we want to be. So we discussed off this morning, we've got a new plan, which pretty much involves getting working straight away when we wake up and trying to finish work by about two o'clock have lunch and then have the rest of the afternoon off. So probably starting work at seven and working through till two. As a general rule of thumb, but also cause I quite like to try and work in one to two days off or ideally two days off a week. Family days out and whatnot. So, I don't know what seven till two. That also includes time for exercise as well. So we'll see. So we've got a plan we discussed it with the kids, mean had some very good questions Leonardo had some very good monologues, of which was the I wanted to join in the discussions that I was sure I followed the thread of most of them because they involve grandma's house. So I'm not sure how that related to our routine but it was good. And then when I did start getting working you know worked on music. I did the hour of music to start the day with which was really cool. The only frustrating thing was that the work that I did was working on. Basically the new drums for song number. 11 on the album. And after all the work I did I don't think I'm going to keep what I did. So, it was productively unproductive. You know, I got closer to what's right I just don't know what's right yet. But obviously, I'd like to have made more concrete progress with that. But you know it's coming along and putting in the time that again habit, you know it's forming system, doing an hour, hour 15, you know it's it's working on moving forward with that. Outside of that you know i client add to running, which is good, starting to get results for one of the new clients that's really positive. Now, there'll be the, the necessity of explaining to them or going, you know, going through ways that they can then profit by the results that we're getting. So that's another stage sent a website off to another client. So we'll get their feedback hopefully in the next few days and. Fingers crossed. They won't want too much change but we'll see. Or at least, hopefully they'll be happy with the basics of it and then we'll go from there. So you know those are those are positive. Didn't get through once again, didn't get through my task list though for the day, and also didn't do my kind of hour which I'd normally would do after, after the music didn't do an hour of like marketing where I'm promoting my own stuff so that was kind of lacking a bit today. Fact by the time I finished music photography he's talking this morning I did my hour or so music and then at lunchtime. And then my father in law came over just at the end of lunch, it was his birthday yesterday, and he brought some sweeties some pastries, which were tasty but probably shouldn't have eaten them. And then by the time that will finished
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Welcome to Episode 209 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest. And it is Wednesday third of February 2020. And for some reason I got good sleep last night but I woke up in a bad mood, I think it was still like a carryover from yesterday just having, basically, a nonworking day which, which also wasn't a day out either so it was kind of like, got to me I don't know, but I had a good, strong training session with Abdel this morning strength training, kind of whole body. And that kind of sorted me out, and a nice shower. But then I carried on with my system, and I've got to say my system is working. So it's pretty simple three step system step one set an alarm or timer for one hour, and basically everything that I do is pretty much just one hour, even if I've not finished it. Even if I'm getting on really well. It's an hour. And actually, I'm finding that no matter pretty much what the task is okay. hour and 15 maybe but pretty much whatever the task is, you know, an hour is about the right time because more than that, and I start maybe losing focus or getting distracted or, whereas an hour is like okay I'm gonna focus on that and give it a really good hour and then I have a little break and it seems to be working well. So that's one second one. Even better, the first hour I'm doing is working on my own music, specifically on recording so in Cubase so producing songs, basically. And to that extent. I'm now just finished the 10th of the 12 songs for my album blend it love. And when I say finished I just mean the backing tracks so I still need to do the vocals for most of those, and all of the backing vocals, but the bedding tracks are basically done and that's going to be huge because then it's like, okay, I don't have to think too much more creatively I just have to do the vocals, you know, although the backing vocals would be a bit creative, I guess. And I've never really done them so that's gonna be a bit interesting but I'm getting closer. And it's because I'm doing like an hour a day on it. Brilliant. And then the second hour I do after that is on marketing, my own stuff. So currently, I've actually just been catching up with the lab posts, which I'm a bit behind on but I'm now making strong headway. After that, I'll be catching up on the photography side of things that I was posting. And once I've got those two things kind of up to date. Then, I'll be looking at sort of other marketing stuff more outbound marketing stuff but again during the hour a day I can see things moving and it's great. The third thing again really simple is, I'm using a task management software, so all the projects I've got that listed out, they've got their tasks tasks got deadlines, and each day. I don't have to think I just go into my task list, and I work through so I think Kate let's do an hour with one client. So I work on their stuff for an hour going through their task list in their project, and then. Who would have thought that being organised actually worked. I'm sure I tried this stuff before and either, it hasn't worked or I hadn't maintained it. So it's only a few days in so let's see whether I can maintain it or not but so far it's, meaning that when I am working, I'm putting really productive luck I'm feeling like I'm really getting some good work done. And the only thing that I hadn't been doing and I did manage today was vocal practice and getting to play my own music to get ready to start gigging again. And then this evening. To do that, I did a vocal practice and then some of the kids came home and they have seen was going to cook dinner so I said okay well. Can I come in and serenade you. And as sloppy as it sounds like. I just I'm not used to because I'm not used to playing in front of anybody that includes also my wife and my kids, you know, doing lack of performance or a console, you know, and so it was really nice to sit in the kitchen and just play some songs whilst Leonardo was banging forks on the table and crushing wat
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Welcome to Episode 208 of my podcasts review from the crow's nest, and it is Tuesday second of February. Correct. It is started on the first on Monday, Tuesday second of February 2021. And I, I sort of tried to start these podcasts in the morning, and the mornings a good time for them, but then I'm reflecting on the day before and it's just confusing me and then I forgot to do it this morning and now it's evening, so I literally don't even know where I am, maybe I shouldn't mess with the formula. But the upshot is yesterday, the first, I had a really good day, really good day I was really everything was about the hour, you know, as I talked about in the podcast day before. I was timing everything working the computer and got stopwatch going, and every hour, pretty much, you know, maybe a few minutes afterwards but then it's moved on to another project and as a consequence, I got through a lot of work yesterday I was really really chuffed. So that worked, worked well. And then I kick started the day in fact with a training session, and it was pretty challenging but my injury seems to have totally cleared up which is great, getting stronger and getting fitter so this is very good. So it's a good way to start the month it's a good way to start the week, and it's a good way to start. Whatever. And then, yeah, I guess that's that's yesterday. I talked about today do not talk about today to confuse I'm going to talk about today. Why not just going to do, just gonna jump in there and do it. Today I woke up really ready to work like really focused really hyped. And then, I couldn't work straight away because you know the family is up and I thought Acacia speak to them first rather than just go straight from my bed to my desk which is in the same room and getting on with stuff. And then Simona said, you know, we've been putting off going to the doctor, we need to see a doctor about getting a what's called an X ray for me it has teeth for an orthodontic treatment and identity streaming. And also, I got this little lump just in my chest. It's only a small thing I've had a couple of years and I'm pretty sure it's nothing but we thought I should probably get it checked out hasn't changed in a couple of years. But you know, let's do it. problem is we don't have doctors work around here because we're so used to the UK where it's so this than the other. So of course, first thing is, you go to doctors you don't have an appointment you just wait and however many people are ahead of you. You just wait. And then we when we eventually did get saved the doctor. Somebody called the doctor on our mobile so she answered it. Whilst we're in there and chatted to them for 15 minutes. So, can you just not waste our time, like, how about we just have an appointment and then you just talk to us that too. And yeah, that's how it works here. The other way it works here is, she couldn't do anything for us, so no no I can't do, you know, blah, iconographies or x rays, even if the dentist told you to come and see me. Where do we need to go you need to go to this office. Okay, fine. So Simona goes with the kids to this office. And then, after another hour she has been see two or three other offices and they've all told her different things. Now we can't have lice like goodness sake. So, typical Italian bureaucracy of being passed around and no one knows what's going on, which was a complete waste of my morning just blew out entirely. And then the afternoon. And I was ready to work this morning and then the afternoon, we had long story short, we, we were talking about a holiday. Later in the year and meeting up with my parents and then it got into planning and then we spoke to my parents and he went back and forth and blah blah and. Long story short, is we actually have now decided on something and my mom and dad have booked flights. And, you know, that's all good. But that was basically my afternoons, so the whole day is just just disappeared and it's put me in s
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Welcome to Episode 207 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest, and the day is actually the first of February, 2021, but this podcast is going to confuse me in time is about the is about yesterday, the 31st of January, 2021, but it's going to be dated first of February, because otherwise it's going to be far too confusing. Anyway, I made it, it's the morning, and I'm doing it so at least I remember this time. So follow up from yesterday. So, my plan of spending one hour per project started well enough, and then unravelled because I spent too long on certain projects, because the task that I was doing just took longer than an hour and I didn't want to stop it, but also I just figured that I could prioritise that task, because it was necessary and the other ones could actually wait. but what I did do is I've started yesterday again with working on my own music on a song on. I'm not your sucker or not your sucker, which is from album of blind it largely the vocals the guide vocals on it but I need to do proper vocals and backing vocals, much like most of the other songs on the album, but it's cool because the rest of the track is done, the bed track and it sounds cool so I'm really chuffed and it means I can move on to the next track. My plan is to get all of the 12 songs done as far as back backing tracks basically are done, and then go through and do all the vocals and get them done so I'm really excited about that because it's one step closer and it's very simple, just work on it every day. Who would have thought it. After that I spent a few hours working on a client's new clients, advertising campaign, because I wanted to launch that ideally yesterday but it will be today, but at least it will be ready to go. They've got a new single coming out a couple of weeks that's important I get on that early or early, you know, in time. So it was, it was pretty good. Everything unravelled not everything unravelled but at 530 last night. I got an email from my accountants, saying we've finished your tax return. Please can you okay now bearing in mind in the UK the tax return had to be done by midnight last night. So Sunday it's 530, they sent me the thing, and I was expecting. I don't know why but I was expecting pretty much no tax to be paid. And I was in for a rude awakening by quite a wide margin, which was an initial inducing moment, because as like far. And there's literally no way I could pay the amount that was owed. So long story short, One bonus is because of COVID, they are giving you a month's amnesty as it were without charging you late fees if you don't file your tax return. They will start charging interest on whatever you owe. As of today, but they won't charge you, the fee for being late if you fall before the end of February, and also a few things with a tax return that weren't quite right, which hopefully will reduce my tax load long and short of it is I sent an email back to the accountants, and we'll get it sorted this week, and then I'll probably speak to the tax office and see if I can stagger my payments over the next 12 months which I think they're also offering because of COVID, on account of last year, last tax year I had a business that brought in money and this tax year I have no business that brings in no money. So, I don't have the money to pay the tax bill, but it does highlight two really really important things, one of which I'd started doing recently, and the other which i'll come on to in a second. So the first one is, I need to set aside money every time I get paid for anything for tax and it's an obvious one, I know and everyone knows it, but of course when you're living hand to mouth, you don't, you know you don't have the 15 20% or whatever to put aside, or you do have it but you won't do it. Pay for other things like food and stuff. But I need to be really, really mindful of that and put that aside and be ready so that when tax bills come in, I'm ready to not get beat down by them. And that l
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Welcome to Episode 206 of my podcasts Have you from the crow's nest, and it is Sunday 31st of January 2021. And it is a tax state tax due date in a couple hours, which I will come to in a second. But first, it's the evening time is 930 in the evening, and yesterday on the podcast, I said, I'm gonna do these in the morning, maybe work out better now. Stop forgetting about them on occasion. And what did I do? I forgot entirely this morning. That that was the plan. I was I guess so focused on just getting up and getting on with work. I completely forgot that I was doing podcasts in the morning, but at least I've remembered now. So I'm doing it tonight. Hopefully I'll do it again tomorrow morning. And I guess that won't really be much to say tomorrow morning. Anywho. There was something that I did yesterday, which is kind of really what this podcast is more to be talking about, I guess. So maybe I'll just do that about yesterday. And then tomorrow morning I'll talk about today. We'll see. But I I tried a new experiment with my work because I always find myself thinking that I don't have enough time to fit everything in. And that's probably because I like to really want to fit a lot of things in and I had a call I don't know who was actually really To be fair, but I got invited to join this thing called lunch club, I think 100 Club dot something. And basically, you can choose how many you want to but you do video call meetings with people and they can be random. You can or you can decide who you want and you can specify criteria about them that you want to meet with certain people. And they say and I guess Entrepreneurs or business people or executives or whatever, but there are all sorts of people on it. And I thought, you know, this is a good idea, you know, networking with people from the comfort of your own home. So I do one of these meetings every Thursday now at lunchtime, and I was talking to this person, this girl on Thursday. And one of the questions asked her was, what sort of projects you're working on at the moment, blah, blah, blah, was a big thing. And then she asked me, and I replied with, you know, a few things that I'm doing. And she was like, Wow, that's a lot of things and I kind of guess it's easy to forget. You know, not just me, but you You yourself, everybody, whoever, it's easy to forget what we do and how much we are doing. And actually often it's quite a lot. And for me personally, you know, I find that there's so much I still want to do, no matter how much I'm doing. So I have this perennial problem of trying to get stuff done and I'm trying to move away from one, the mindset that don't have enough time because half of it is mindset. And the other half of that is being not being organised enough. So, I decided I'm going to do something very simple. I put a timer on my computer and I set it to one hour. And then I decided to try and allocate one hour to each kind of project. You know, that needs doing that day. So the day before this was yesterday, the day before on Friday, I had gone into my like task management tool and tried to organise myself a bit better. All the projects that I'm working on, you know, getting tasks and putting them on there giving them some due dates. The idea Being that my working day should really be open this tool. It's called nifty, open nifty, see what's on my task list for the day and do them. And if those tasks are for a particular project, let's say a client or an album or something like that and then group them together and work Call them for an hour. And then when the hours up, move on to the next thing, whether you've kind of finished or not. So I did that with yesterday and I had really good success with it. And I actually started the day by and this what I'm planning to do for the seeable future is start the day working on my own music because that's been taken such a backseat once again for the last six weeks. And if I don't do it first thing then I get embroiled in all
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Welcome to Episode 205 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest and it is Saturday, 30th of January, 2021, and it's been the longest time between my episodes, I think it's been five or six days so it gets nearly a week. And it's also the first time I have it's the first time but it's certainly the new switch for me because I'm going to be probably doing my podcast episodes in the morning, rather than in the evening when I'm going to bed. And therein lies the tale of why I've not done it for the last few days. I think probably yeah 24th. So, the 24th was last Sunday 25th was Leonardo's birthday. And I was going to be working majority of the day we can have a little party in the afternoon for a couple hours. And in the end, I didn't do much work, and we partied all afternoon, and I drank a fair bit as did Simona and we had a really nice relaxed afternoon and a really lovely and late evening. And so I didn't do my podcast. But, as part of that, because, you know, we're so do do I mean I'd worked I think something like 10 or 13 days or something without a break and I'd been doing, you know, kinda like 10 1012 hour days I guess most days. And I just I don't take breaks and I hadn't left the house. And it was just all constantly go go go. And I was pretty, pretty burnt out pretty tired. And I think on the Sunday just before, in fact, on the 24th I think I took the day off and then I sort of accidentally took Leonardo's birthday off on the 25th, and on the 26th I was so tired because we've got to bed so late, that I was, you know, wasn't gonna do any work. And that was the Tuesday and then the Wednesday I tried to do work but it was slow getting into it because I'd had three days off and I'd actually dare say it relaxed and unwound. And then you know it's been a process the last few days of trying to get myself back into back into working. And what happened also is because, you know, it was nice and relaxed so we had a bit of time, you know, we were talking similar and I about, you know, our plans and what we're doing and our routines and how we're working and, you know, we realised quite obviously that we just we spend too much time focusing on work and being productive and doing stuff that needs doing and not enough time on fun and on relaxation and on these kind of things. And the two of us came up with a very simple and obvious thing that we wanted to try, which is to go to bed earlier. And that's particularly prevalent for Simona because for eight years she's been going to bed, more or less, when I go to bed so fairly late, but then getting up a few times during the night with the kids, and then waking up really early with Leonardo, or with Mina first and then with Leonardo. And as a consequence, she's basically chronically sleep sleep deprived. And of course if you're like that you're, you're not going to have the energy, you're not gonna have the focus and the willpower and the motivation to do things that you might normally do. And so, you know, we thought well this is a really simple idea let's, let's get to bed earlier, you know, if I get to bed earlier then Simona doesn't feel like she should be staying up because otherwise we don't get time together or whatever and equally, if she goes to bed earlier. I'm bit more motivated circa well if I go to bed earlier what I wanted to do this year was be getting up earlier, but I realised I've been focusing on the wrong thing I've been focusing on getting up, but getting up is the. It's like the the effect, not the cause, you know the cause of getting up at 630 or something, is because you go to bed at 930 or 10 o'clock or something. But if I just focus on trying to get up at 630, and even I know I should be going to bed earlier I know this sounds like a completely obvious thing and it is completely obvious, but sometimes you know it takes a few times to kind of for something to really the penny to drop as it were. And so, since then we've been like okay let's get to bed earlier
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Welcome to Episode 204 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest. It is Sunday the 24th of January 2021. Now, after yesterday, where as the day progressed and then went into the evening into the night I got into worse and worse mood. And I knew that it was, you know, the way I was looking at things rather than things themselves you know, as is always the case it's one's own interpretation of things that, you know, judges, whether they're good or bad or whatever and I was looking at everything and everything I was looking at was looking bleak or bad or put at a seminar man. You got to sort yourself out. So, this morning. I came up with a very cunning plan. It's very simple plan. I stayed in bed all day until about four o'clock in the afternoon. And basically I realised I needed a day off the simple as it is. I needed a day to not think about work and not think about art not think about anything. Just, just relax really just mom. And as always is the case Simona was so helpful and supportive and wonderful and she bought me breakfast in bed and then she brought me lunch and cuddled with her cuddle with her kids I fought with the kids in bed we battled each other. And I just, I watched UFC all day, basically. And just blanked everything It was really needed, like really needed. It was pissing down rain outside the whole day. I landed at four o'clock. I got dressed got kids got dressed, and the four of us went outside to play basketball there's a porch area that sheltered from the rain so we played there for a bit. And then, Leonardo wanted to go in the rain and then meanwhile it's going to rain I said yes we'll go in the rain. And there'll be big, big puddles and we thought Screw it. So we, the three of us, me and the kids were just jumping in the puddles and I got so soaked. Like, literally from, from tip to toe inside and out. Even my shoes you know all of the the kids and I our shoes which a waterproof had puddles in them you know it was like, totally soaked. And then we really enjoyed that and then we came in, had a bath together, and then go out and then went to get dinner and do video calls with friends and whatnot and then we had a power cup. And so, I celebrated the power cup by having some Baylor's which put me in a very good mood. And then we lit candles everywhere and had dinner, because at least the gas was working, and then got the kids into bed and then the power came back on so it was only out for about two three hours. It was really really enjoyable day. And I guess before that I'd worked for maybe about 10 days straight or something. And apart from the days that I had training I've been starting in about 10. And even with the days that I had training I'll be finishing at about 8pm. Pretty much every day. I don't know why I can, what to show for it but I've been doing a really intense and it's just been draining me and I because it's not, it's not the sort of work that gives you more energy, such as creative work is the sort of work that really drains you you know, studying marketing and business are working for clients and blah blah blah. So yeah, it's a lesson to myself and to anybody else who may be listening and feeling challenged at some point, sometimes we just need to pay off, simple as it sounds, and at least today. That seems to have done the trick. Of course, tomorrow's a new week I'll be back in it got a new client started so it's all going to be, you know, full on. But I think I need to get, as I've been saying for the last week or so or two, I need to get back to do my own art, I need to find a way to you know make that part of my regular routine again, because it was working for me very well, just before Christmas. And since then, you know, I wanted to focus on the marketing the business start building my fan base stop getting my clients fan bases, that's working, and to get back to what it is I'm doing in the first place. So that is the view from the crow's nest today at half 10 in the evening. So
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Welcome to Episode 203 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest and it is Saturday the 23rd of January, 2021. Today Today I don't know where today when, frankly, I've kicked off the day with some training, and it's good and the pain in my pack is or that kind of area is getting less and less. So was able to do a little bit of exercise on it today, mostly legs but. And it seems to be alright so that's positive and getting better again so that's cool. And then after that, how that after on on my day when some new client, and in fact some other clients as well I've been talking about Tick Tock and if you're a musician, then everything keeps everybody keeps saying I need to be on Tick tock tick tock swears etc etc. Now, apart from a very very cursory knowledge of the platform I don't really understand and know it hadn't been on it really I haven't looked at it. So I thought, Well, okay, I've got a call this evening with the client who wants to talk about stuff that might include tic tocs Let me get my tic toc knowledge up, and thus and so I went tic toxifying myself today, and I watched a whole bunch of videos and webinars and they set the other and read articles and Dylan went on the platform and, and basically my entire day has been tik tok, and I've come to the conclusion that it's, you know, I can understand why people like it I can understand its uses, but as a as an artist. As a musician, I think it's an incredibly challenging platform to really you know do too much with on platform. Of course, you might be able to get people off the platform. And then you might be able to get them to other platforms where you can better monetize them. But, um, you know that sounds pretty. If that sounds pretty hot or monetize them is because, you know, if you're an artist and you want to make a living from your art, therefore you have to monetize it, and relying on streaming income alone is a really bad idea because streaming income is incredibly low, you know, if somebody streams your song you get like point 0004 P or something. So you need to have like, you know, a million streams just to get a couple $100 kind of things. So, you, you know, you need to have other routes to monetize, and I still firmly believe that the email is the best central part of that strategy central part of what you're doing. So my thought on Tick Tock is, it's fine. You could probably get some people watching you can get some followers you can get some traction on some things, but unless you've got a very good way of leveraging them off system, then, you know, I just think it's a lot of extra time it's a lot of extra work along with all the other things as a musician as an artist you need to do that, um, I'm not convinced of the, you know, I'm not convinced of the, the merit of. But one thing I did say in the video which I really liked it one of the videos, was an example of what it's called. Positivity bias, I can't remember what it was called, but basically it was a concept that we're using to describe getting in as an artist on tik tok but I really like the concept and I'm going to use it in other situations because great. It was during World War Two. I think it was the Americans or the Brits I can't remember, but they were losing a lot of planes, go out on bombing runs and whatnot and they'd come back and they'd have lost a load of planes. And so what they did is they analysed all the planes, you know, they came back they analysed all the bullet holes in the planes, and they saw that they were generally clustered around certain areas. So they were like, Aha. Makes sense. Well let's reinforce these areas and then, you know, that'll be better. So they reinforce these areas. But the stat the statistics would have seen they kept losing about the same number of planes. And then somebody, bright spot realised that if they're measuring the planes that came back, they're measuring the wrong thing. And in fact those planes that came back if they've got bullet holes
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Welcome to Episode 202 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest. And it is Friday 22nd of January, 2021. Today, I had a bad sleep last night. Didn't get sleep after three woke up, I guess. Seven something or something. I guess yeah what I was talking about yesterday, or maybe a day before, but yeah basically I think not enough creative stuff not enough fun work should we say too much of this marketing and business stuff. And once again, is taking me away from, you know, especially the progress I was making with my art, and it's making me antsy, but also something else that has been bothering me, I realised and I forgotten, is when the place when the house is a mess. You know the environment really makes a big difference to me and even though I might be in my room. A lot of the time, if I'm feeling challenged overwhelmed or frustrated, etc. Then when I go in the other room subconsciously if I see mess everywhere, and mess all over the hall and blah blah, then it really does affect me and today I had a bit of a bit of a shout out everybody and let's get this place sorted and blah blah blah. And what possibly kicked it off as well, is we had a washing machine we paid you know whatever a few 100 euros for the washing machine then we paid 60 euros for a guy to come in and fit it because he had to do some piping or something for the thing. And I went to turn it on today and just before I did it's got one of these German they're called schuko plugs, even though we're in Italy and you need an adapter. And it's pretty standard stuff and I was just thinking Hang on a sec though but this adapter is Max 1500 watts. And I'm pretty sure the dishwasher is probably stronger than that and it was like 2300 watts. So you shouldn't be running it through this adapter. So I went downstairs, because there's a shop downstairs that sells all sorts of things including adapters, and every adapter the maximum is 1500 watts. And I said, well, hang on a minute. That's a bit weird so I did my research and found out that basically, you don't really get these type of adapters, anything more than 1500 watts. And yeah, I know that all of the major appliances like white goods appliances washing machines dishwashers they already use the schuko plugs and a little while ago we had a melted plug from exactly this kind of thing from the washing machine. And we just put it down to it being old we called an electrician he rewired the socket put in a new socket, put a new schuko plug adapter on the washing machine, and I didn't think anything of it so I checked it today, and a little fucker put a 1500 watt on which you shouldn't have done because that's what causes melts and potentially fires. So I was very disappointed with both of these guys the guy who did the washing machine a few months ago and the guy who did the dishwasher. Plug in a couple of days ago. So we found another electrician, because it's dangerous you can't do it it's dangerous Yo, so find another electrician and actually he came like 10 minutes after we called him who was basically driving past. He had a look he said alright cool cool cool, I can do all of this, I might be able to come this evening. You know, we'll see. And he just turned up rocked up this evening with another guy. And not only did he replace the actual wall socket, so we don't need the adapter so you can put the sugar plug in, but he did the same thing for the washing machine. And he also did that in the bedroom here where I'm working I've only got one wall socket, he doubled up my wall sockets, and I think. Did he give me two shakos or one schuco in a normal one. Either way, He also took my English like soccer, I've got this tower power tower thing you've put all sorts stuff into, and he took the English plug in he rewired it to an Italian plug. So that was another 60 euros. So, the dishwashers cost us like, I don't know, whatever 270 euros, the dishwasher and then another 120 euros just to have people basically saw out the elec
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Welcome to Episode 201 of my podcasts, have you from the crow's nest and it is Thursday the 21st. Yeah, 21st of January 2021, welcome welcome welcome. I'm running out of, I'm running out of energy. Maybe I need a break or, I think, really what I need is a change of project focus. So, energy and motivation to focus on marketing, and those last few days, ironically now that I brought in another client for audience ninja. Hopefully, we'll see if they sign up, if they pay their invoice then they're definitely a client. But yeah, I think these last few weeks, three weeks basically I've just been focused big time on marketing, learning, you know, improving my skills my knowledge, putting it to practice starting to rebuild my fan base, helping my clients build theirs and it's been working it's been good, but I think I need to move into creative mode now and get some music and stuff done. So today, as part of my drive this year I'm intending to start gigging again. I do again yesterday I was talking about psychological barriers, and I'll summarise it. That basically, if you want to, to turn something into a habit or get something done. Often the starting point is the hardest bear so you need to try and do whatever you can to kind of con yourself into at least just starting, and they alongside that a similar idea is that basically don't worry about completing everything just get started. So today I pulled out this pedal which I bought, probably about five years ago and basically never used, which is, you can plug a microphone and an acoustic guitar into it, and then it gives you nice effects for the acoustic guitar and for your voice. And it's also got a looper functionality on it. And so, I don't know how to use it properly. I don't know how to use it, really. And I know it's going to take some configuring which is probably what's put me off using it in the past, because I'm bit lazy like that when it comes to pedals and things. So, but nonetheless I dug out the cables that I got the pedal the power supply all that stuff got the microphone set up, etc. So today I had a little bash with it. And though I didn't really try and get into any of the configuring side of things. I thought to myself, you know, just start off just get it all plugged in, get it working. That's the first thing. But I did start playing around with the looping pedal, and I forgot how much fun they are and I'm, I'm not very good with loopers particularly but straightaway, you can just create such cool stuff. And it does make me think, maybe I should get a proper lube station, you know, and really go to town on this stuff, because it gives such a different dimension, when specially when you're playing solo solo acoustic as well. So maybe that's something I'll look at in the future. But for now I recorded a few little ideas, nothing that I can probably redo and they maybe they're good for, you know, starting properly writing songs. You know in Cubase is just sort of basic ideas, but um, but it was cool. It was fun. It was nice to play a bit of music, just for the spontaneity and enjoyment of playing music which is something kind of not really done for a bit. I've written a couple of song ideas and noodled around the guitar. But when I'm noodling it's just like basically blues stuff yeah blues esque stuff and I fall in the same routine. But what's really cool about the looper pedal is enables me to do a little bit, you know like, you know, with my mouth or whatever, cymbals. And of course that means that whatever I'm doing on the guitar might be a bit different to my normal blue stuff so it pushes me in a different direction straightaway. So it was really cool I guess I really enjoyed that. And, yeah, that's that's pretty much it just, you know, moving forward, kind of think about to turn into a music flex or remember for about six months ago maybe longer probably even longer than that Simona was saying to me that she notices that I go through cycles, and I get, I go t
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Welcome to Episode 200 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest. It is Wednesday the 20th of January, 2021, or 20 2021 2001 2021. I'm getting myself confused. Anywho, sorry I missed yesterday. I got to bed late ish but Simona was already in bed asleep and the kids were sleeping the other room and I didn't fancy going in the bathroom and doing the podcast so basically I just didn't do it. I'm sorry. So, caught me where I was, but the last few days I've definitely felt overwhelmed. again, and so many things to do, trying to fit everything in, and, you know, everything is a full time job and I'm trying to do 10 of them so I'm definitely struggling with that. But nonetheless, you know, bit by bit I'm getting there I'm coming. I think I'm coming out of my recent sort of two three week three week probably Uber focus on music marketing, my own music and also other people's have an increase in my knowledge increasing my experience, and practising what I preach and getting stuff out there, etc. And now I think I'm coming to the point where I need to take a little bit of a break from that. That said, I've got a couple of, you know, clients for audience ninja and it looks like today, I've brought onboard, another client. So, they want to go they want to do it. They want me to invoice them so assuming they pay the invoice then we're in business. So that's really exciting. Another musician who's really dedicated which I really love because you know they're going to do what they need to do which is brilliant. And, you know, I'm getting good results so that my current clients so I'm very, very happy, very confident that we're going to replicate it with them. But of course it does mean that it's more music marketing work and less time for my other projects particularly my own music, and it also means the pressures on a little bit, and, you know, want to increase my skills and my knowledge even further because I really want to get good results for my clients. So yeah that's that's kind of a blind eye to love my album that's just, just will not die that won't that I keep doing for a bit and then moving away from for necessity. I want to get back to you by the end of January I want to be back working on that and, you know, knocking through the tracks, because I really want to get the album finished ASAP, which I've been saved for months I know, but I'm getting closer, but I just haven't put any time on into music production for a good sort of six weeks, I guess. So I've kind of feel a bit rusty but I'm sure once I don't want to two sessions I'll, I'll be back into it and it won't have that psychological barrier. I remember reading. Very true point about basically psychological barriers and how to kind of overcome them and often starting something is far more challenging. Getting literally getting yourself started mindset and getting started than actually doing it. So the thing that I'd read was about exercise, running in this particular case and he said, you know, instead of thinking you got to get up get stuff on bla bla bla go out and run and then you never do get your stuff ready and put it by the door so that you've got one less thing to kind of think about you see the stuff they just put my feet in there and, you know, any little thing you can do to trick yourself into making it easier in the moment when your willpower is going. I don't want to do that. You know will help. Case in point, I had drum kit downstairs in our old apartment block for like five years, and I basically never really used an electronic drum kit. And then when we moved into the flowers very excited to hear I was very excited because we got stuff Brian from England, including the drum kit. I set it up in this sort of storage room so this kind of music room. And, you know, you could walk up to it is you know you had to pull a bed or like a rolling bed out of the way, which was easy enough and unlock the door to walk in and I basically never touched it. And another mon
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Welcome to Episode 199 of my podcasts, have you from the crow's nest, then it is Sunday the 17th of January 2021. I'm drained man I'm tired. I'm feeling overwhelmed. Again I'm having one of my little overwhelmed moments, just with how much there is to do you know not even including all the various opportunities in various different areas and industries you know not talking about worldschooling Harbour, talking about anything else like that, just audience ninja even just talking about my own art, you know, my own music even. There's just so much work to do. You know this week I've been looking last week basically I've been looking at marketing and reigniting my marketing game. And, you know it's going well but at the same time it's just, it's a full time job, you know, and it's a full time job for multiple people to do it properly. And that's without spending any time working on actually creating any music, you know, not recording any music properly not writing any songs not vocal practising not practising to, you know, play live again, and not practising guitar, get my guitar skills back up. You know all these little things which in and of themselves take time. And, you know, trying to get it all done together, same time is at the moment. Yes training me and it's feeling pretty overwhelmed by or pretty tired. No doubt, I will, you know have another little breakthrough of energy or whatever tomorrow, think also, or part of it, I've got a lot of pain in my chest. On the right hand side of my chest. I've had it I guess I guess I've had a few weeks I don't really know. And I can't work out whether it's a pain from sort of muscle strain from training. And this musculature or whether it's anything more than needs more investigation. And that's I guess playing on my mind a little bit as well and, you know, all of the above. I'm not getting enough exercise and, you know, three times a week, I'm training with, with our personal trainer and that's fantastic but you know not walking enough I'm not moving my body generally enough, I feel I'm not playing with the kids enough and spending enough time with them or enough time with Simona. So it's all a bit, a bit overwhelming at the minute really. That said, you know, this is what I chose. And, you know, you want to make a career music is perfectly possible but you got to hustle. And I guess at the moment I'm feeling like I don't think I have enough time. Do you know to do all the hustles that are necessary for the hustle, but we shall see. So yeah, that's, it's gonna be short and sweet one today that's the view from the crow's nest. Tomorrow the beginning of the week. And hopefully I'll start with a bit of energy and be able to hit the ground running. We shall see. So that's it that's me today, that's how I'm feeling. How are you feeling, you can let me know on Twitter, Romeo Crow, or you can let me know by going to Romeo crow.com slash podcast and leave a voicemail message for the show. Well, I hope you're well. Hopefully you're not overwhelmed. And I will be back for my 200th episode. I hope tomorrow. And hopefully it'll be a higher note than this one. We shall see. Take care yourself Toodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 198 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest and it is Saturday the 16th of January 2021, I realised I haven't done a podcast for three or four days, which is probably the longest stint since I started there's no real reason I one of the nights I came to bed lay the other night came to bed with ghobadi I was tired I don't know what have you missed What have I missed well not really that much, and still focused on learning more about, you know, updating my knowledge about music marketing. The initial course that I did that I put into practice is working very well, I'm just unrolling it for some clients now sort of hybrid technique but it's it's cool so excited about that. What do we will do Wednesday, did I did I do on a Wednesday. They didn't think I did one on Wednesday maybe anyways we had a family day or Wednesday. And if I didn't do one I got the car stuck on a beach. We had to wait. It was a deserted beach and we had to wait until somebody rocked up an hour or so later who happened to have a tow rope and also told us how to fit a tow bar to a car where to find the tow bar and then towed us out of the sand. So that was cool. The kids played for three hours whilst on the beach very very happily, and while they did that I did a photo shoot my first one in a long time so similar to a bunch of photos of me, and also took some photos, sort of photographer. And then the final one was recording acoustic version of one of my songs so bass music video I guess just by just an acoustic rendition. And this is part of my plan this year to be playing a lot more but also to be releasing more music. I wanted to start doing acoustic versions of songs at the very first week of Jan, but I didn't just didn't get around to it basically I launched my photography portfolio on my website, and my photography Instagram profile Romeo crow photography on Instagram. And I've been maintaining those so that's good. But the acoustic versions haven't quite come up yet. But nonetheless, I'm working on them. So yeah, it was a bit windy but nonetheless I got a decent enough recording and one of the songs, and then worked for next couple of days and then today. I, we went out this morning. It was snowing here yesterday and Castro bellary, and Simona thought that it would be more snow in the mountains, which I'm sure it would have been. So we went out this morning we went up into the mountains and we went to find snow, and eventually we did find snow I mean it hasn't seen snow for years Leonardo's never seen snow so seeing him, stick his hands and it was quite funny, for the first time. Nonetheless, it was pretty cold up there about minus six, something like that. And I did another video I did another song, wearing gloves, so first time I've played guitar wearing gloves, but nonetheless I did it so now I've got a couple of songs in the bag, and I think I'll probably wait until I've got kind of four of these acoustic versions of songs. Before I sort of released the first one, then that way hopefully I'll be like a month ahead is the plan. But we'll see. But certainly, you know, the places around here are very pretty once we go to anywhere. And so it makes for very nice, very nice locales for the, for the videos, you know, outside of that, it's just kind of say, same oh no say well we got our dishwasher delivered how exciting. So after like 18 months without a dishwasher we finally got a dishwasher which might save us a couple of hours a day of washing up which is what is currently taking guy comes on Monday to fit it because he needs all extensions and stuff because of the way the kitchen is and blah blah blah. I'm boy with that. But that's super duper exciting. And yeah so tomorrow. Back, back at it for the day and see how the adverts have started for the first client. Hopefully they'll have done well like the ones that I run it for myself seem to be doing well. So yeah, all good all focused, moving things forward, and it's 20 to midnigh
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Welcome to Episode 197 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest and it is Wednesday the 13th 13th 13th of December 2011, and today marks a very important day because it's our first family day out in at least two months, possibly longer. And conversely, it's my first day out in probably about two months, six weeks, probably, I mean, certainly, there's a supermarket around the corner you can walk there in about four minutes. And that's pretty much the furthest I've been in the law in the last two months and the last time I went there was about a month ago, like, I don't leave the house. Generally, so we had this day out today and it was so bloody enjoyable. I mean everything shut, but we'd been told that there's these beautiful lakes. I see these lakes of Seabury beautiful lakes. So you went down to them and basically it's like a retirement village with these artificial lakes boating lakes, and it's just not very impressive put it that way. So we went down there we drove there. We had two missions one to see the lakes and the second one was to get me in some waterproof shoes. Boots she really needs some outdoor boots, so that we can say go hiking it's not that you know hiking but at least she can walk places that are muddy and wet and it's not going to get her shoes, her feet wet. So we went to these lakes and it and they kind of suck but it was fun we know we drove around and we kind of looked and we're like, yeah, this sucks but nonetheless. And that was basically lunchtime. And then we started to head towards the shopping centre where we might be able to get her shoes because you would have thought buying waterproof shoes would be a fairly easy thing. But it's missions around here. No one sells anything like it. And I saw this sign it was like come out of the retirement village of the boating lake and turn left and off you go. But tell Ryan, it was one mile from the seat one kilometre from the sea, and I just thought you know what let's just go right, see the sea. So we drove down and we drove down this lonely road, and then the sea opened up in front of us. And you can see these tracks where people have driven onto the, you know, into the sand or whatever. And there was this big puddle. And sumana said go fast go fast. So like fine. Let's do this. So I drove fast through this puddle. And I had completely forgotten or not forgotten I didn't realise. Yeah. Okay, I'm like that. I didn't realise that with the windows open the puddle would spray into the car, I just thought physics, it would spray out to the side but apparently not. So spray this puddle into me in his face into my face like dirty. Sandy water into the car, and I was laughing about it until I realised I driven too far onto the sand and I wasn't laughing because I couldn't move the car. And so they were like, ah, and there was not a soul about. And we're on this beach, and we tried to go forward we tried going back and of course all we did is bury the car deeper into the sand. And so, okay well you know or something out blah blah blah. Anyways, it transpired when I transferred some other they were, I don't know, some dude appeared. Eventually, some other dude, and he had a towing cable, and then he was like hey I can pull you out. And there's like a, like, Ah, well, you probably find it under the spare tire, really. So he never knew he had that he never knew how to tow him by and be we found out that there's a panel that you pop out of the back of the car and you can screw the towing bar into that panel. So you know, you learn things every day. So this dude pulled us out which is very good. And by that point the kids would go out of the car they'd, you know, finally got over their agoraphobia and they've got out the four walls and they're on the beach. And this is the middle of January, and it was beautiful sunshine, beautiful blue sky. And, you know, almost, almost t shirt weather for the beach. So the kids started playing, and they were happily playing on thi
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Welcome to Episode 196 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. And it is the 12th Tuesday the 12th of January 2021. Apologies I missed the show yesterday. I went to bed too late. Basically, by the time I went to bed Simona was actually in bed asleep for the first time in a long time she was in bed asleep before I was and she saw I couldn't do it in here and then the kids were sleeping in the other room and I couldn't do in there and then just basically was asleep. It was late though. So, what am I the last couple of days last three days I've been on the same flex as I was in the podcast couple days ago. I bought a whole bunch of music marketing courses and I've been working through them and implementing the ideas and seeing some results. It's brilliant. So really, really chuffed about that and super focused really focused at the moment. And I've, I've got it in my mind, I've, I was reading a book a couple of days ago that I can't even remember what it's called. I think it's called the personality mythical the myth of personality I can't remember anyways. But it made me think about, you know, having one goal in fact he quotes in it Peter Thiel his book, zero to one, which I read a few years ago but I didn't didn't really resonate as much but basically the general idea is that you know you should have one main goal and that's your motivational goal and whatnot. And I've always struggled a bit with that because it's like the one thing to the detriment of all else, and I'm like yeah but I love music but I love to photography I love writing I love films, and I can't pick one I really can't do it. And so to pick one goal one thing that would really move the needle it's like well is it music is it. And then I finally had a little breakthrough brainwave kind of days go as crass as it sounds, I realised I know what my goal is, at least my initial goal is financial, because from there everything else flows, you know, if you've got enough money to pay other people to do things that you either don't want to do or can't do or don't have the time to do, then you can focus more on the things that you do love doing or the, the where you can put the most value in, I mean it's obvious. And so, I realised that my goal is to get to 10,000, pounds a month in revenue, which from where we are right now is just ridiculously far away, because we've got pretty much no revenue so you know it's a lofty goal. and I originally I was thinking you know maybe I can get there in three years time or four year. And I thought, No. Give yourself a, you know, give yourself a beat, why play small Why think small, you know, so I've given myself a goal of getting to that by the end of this year. So, these courses come at a great timing up, it's not just from my music, that's the whole point. Having the goal of 10,000 pound a month. It's not important where that comes from. So, the question I'm now asking myself is any activity I'm doing anything I'm doing, does it bring me closer to that goal. So it could be photography related thing, it could be a writing it could be business related agency music, whatever, you know, the point is, if it's moving me towards that goal then great. Continue if it's not then stop it and don't do it. Pause it, you know, put it on the back burner. And so that's going to be my little filter to try and use as a framework for deciding what you know what i'm doing because, you know, I think it's, it's easy to have a dream and it's easy to have ideas and goodness knows I got enough ideas, but obviously it's harder to make them happen. And one of the most influential self help books ever is Napoleon Hill. Think and Grow Rich which is like what 1920s something I think he has he breaks it out into I think the 10 or the 12 sort of laws or rules of Getting Rich or getting successful. And one of the first ones is, you know, having a very definite goal of definite purpose, and having complete faith that you'll hit it. And so I think that I've had
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Welcome to Episode 195 of my podcasts, have you from the crow's nest, and it is Sunday 10th of January 2021 10 to 10 in the evening. And I'm feeling good, and I'm feeling good because yesterday. As I mentioned yesterday's podcast in fact for the last couple of days I've been focused on learning new marketing ideas tactics, techniques, etc. and putting them into practice straight away, because no good getting knowledge, if you don't use that knowledge was the phrase as a great phrase that someone like to know and to not do is not to know or something like that. Anyways, so I kicked off some, some ads yesterday for this strategy to build fan base, both emails and Spotify followers, etc. And I've got to say straight away works. It's working straight off the bat, like anything can always be improved, and also like anything, one may be lucky with one, you know, piece of content and piece of advertising, and then you try and replicate it you don't get as good results. So you know, It's still early days in that sense, but I'm really chuffed because it's, it's hitting the ground running. And that means that it's ideal for promoting my music, and it's an ideal part of my toolkit for helping audience ninja clients promoting their music. So I really excited by this prospect and it's motivating me big time. Because, you know, for the last few years really I've not been doing much about my own music and, as you may have heard on the podcast, particularly in the last three to five months, I've been working a lot more and working towards working a lot more on my own music my own art, and I am really excited to be kind of back in the game basically and you know stuff happening and seeing some energy and some action and it's really pleasing. So, yeah, I'm really chuffed and all I was doing today was working on that. Finished. One man course I've got a few more courses to do from different people that I want to look at, see if there's, you know, more ideas there. Because, you know, I have a decent marketing knowledge, and I have marketing experience, and people pay me for that knowledge and experience, but at the same time, it's no good for anybody in any area in any industry to kind of still trade off of where they were even just two or three years ago because things change so rapidly. So I think it's Derek Severs who are really like said something like, you know, if you've, if you've not been doing something for the last couple of years you're no longer, you can no longer call yourself paraphrasing but you can basically no longer call yourself whatever that is. So for example if you wrote a book, seven years ago you can no longer call yourself an author because you're not. In his opinion, you know, etc etc. And I might be playing with the timescales a little bit there but the principles are basically, you can't effectively you can't trade on past glories. And, you know, those succeed. And by succeed I'm not talking about externally in other people's views. I'm talking about internally succeed in their own goals. Those people are the people who, you know, constantly strive to update their knowledge to update their skills etc and I really invite you to consider any area of your professional life, even if it's something you're not that interested in or and your personal goals and whatnot. What are your goals. What can you How can you improve yourself, you know what, training what experience can you get that's going to push you out of your comfort zone and expand your value, basically. So that's what I've been doing, expanding my value, both internally for myself and externally for clients. And I'm pleased with how it's going so far I've got to say the downside to all of this is I've done very little in the way of creative work, music, ironically has been pushed on the back burner. But then again, you know, 20% of business is making the product and 80% is selling the product. And if you don't ship it as Seth Godin would say you know it's not real
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Welcome to Episode 194 of my podcast the crew from the crew. I'll have to start that one again. The view from the cruise nest, otherwise known as a view from the crow's nest. It is Saturday, the ninth of January 2021 and it is a 20 to midnight. Today, started the day off with a personal training session, it was Wait for me this morning, strength training, and I prefer it to circuit training cardio, but it still was definitely challenging so that's cool. And then by the time we finish that blah blah to shower, then basically I spent the day the whole day. It's constant my desk, studying and putting immediately into practice some ideas on music marketing particularly with regards to Spotify. And so, I won't bore you with the details but I'm trialling a couple of things I learned a few new things I'm going to combine them in some other things. And over the next few days I'm going to be trying some stuff with some ads running to Spotify from Facebook, and hopefully they'll get some good results and why that's important is because one I wish to promote my music big time. And to because it will be something that I can then use to help my clients, Ford is ninja so I am. I really hope that works, but my brain is kind of melted, because that's nearly a third of the first course. And I've bought three different courses, and I might even buy a fourth course actually on Spotify on pretty much Spotify as music marketing but everything seems to revolve around Spotify, and I don't 100% agree with it. I think there's a way that one can deliver both what I agree with which is building your own email list, and also building Spotify I think the two can coexist. So we shall see. So I'm very excited because, you know, It's nice to learn new things it's nice to try new things and it'll be even nicer if those things work, particularly if you can deploy them straight away for the benefit of many people. So, hopefully, they'll go well, we'll know more about it in the next few days or a day like literally just head buried. During this stuff. It's important that I've done no creative work in the sense of you know music or anything else. I did share a tonne I did share a photo my third of the week on Romeo crow photography on Instagram instagram.com slash Romeo crow photography. And I did do some editing of that photo first in Lightroom so I was brushing up and my skills in Lightroom are reminding myself a few things. And so just keeping those skills, you know, dormant that a little bit, a little bit improved. And that's all the one can do just keep improving all the time whenever one can. That's all I got. So that's the view from the craziness today if you're on Twitter, hook a brother up say what's up at Romeo Crow, otherwise you can catch me at Romeo crow.com slash podcast if you want to leave a voicemail message for the show. I will see you tomorrow, and maybe report back hopefully report back some early success with the ads and the new marketing strategy we shall see doodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 193 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and it is Friday the eighth of January, 2021, and 10 plus 10 in case you're wondering. So today, I'm feeling as you might be able to tell a little bit more buoyant than I was yesterday. Yeah, yesterday I was overwhelmed. And I, you know, I've noticed particularly this year. I've been feeling more overwhelmed on occasion than I have in previous years, not sure exactly why that is but it seems to be happening a little bit more regularly than normal. Arguably, that's because I'm trying to do new things and things differently to have done them previously so that's probably got something to do with it. I guess when you're expanding your comfort zone and trying to grow, trying to learn new things and do new things I guess that is a feeling of frustration and overwhelm. You know, particularly when you've got a lot of plates spinning and a lot of those new plates, but nonetheless I got up this morning and I had in mind that I was going to get straight on I wasn't going to sort of amble through the morning as I had have been doing but I was really going to get cracking with probably the most important task which was my tax return, which has to be done and filed by the end of this month. So, that took me till about two o'clock in the afternoon. And then I had lunch and then got cracking on music marketing, I, as you may know from podcast I'm two things one focusing on my own musical art a lot more this year, which means I'm going to be an already have started doing a lot more marketing of my stuff. And two, I have this little agency which does marketing for musicians, basically. So, it seems beholding if that's even a word of me to in, you know, to update my skill set to, you know, to learn some more techniques so I bit the bullet a few days ago and subscribe to a few different courses. And so I'm just starting to work through the first one now. And it's, it's got some interesting stuff in it for sure a couple of tools, mostly tools based stuff that I didn't really know about. But I'm looking forward to this weekend I'm going to try out already started. You know, doing what they're saying and I'm about halfway through, so I'm looking forward to trying that it's a it's a similar approach to, to what I would normally do, but it's got a slightly different angle on it and a couple of different things so we'll see. But principally the the bitness maybe want to update is the clients that I've gotten potentially clients coming on board. Have all asked the same questions which is, how do I get my Spotify up. And whereas, I'm not a huge fan strictly speaking of focusing only on Spotify I think that misses the, the real goal which is to still believe you know improve your email list. At the same time, understand and appreciate that there's a, there is a value to it, and it shouldn't be overlooked and so I thought okay let me work out what the best strategies are that actually work and what people are doing so that's where I'm at. So, yeah. Also I guess I slept pretty well last night as well so I'm feeling a bit more energetic was feeling more energetic today. So, the downside to all of this is that I've done again as I said yesterday, very little of my own creativity my own art. I'm very much behind with the lab, and if you're a subscriber to lab I'm really sorry. I did say that I'd be quiet over the Christmas period, but I wasn't intended to still be quiet at this point. And I also have failed in getting my acoustic song up and out which my plan was to launch that this week, I have got my photography section up and running, and my new Romeo crow photography profile on Instagram. Now there's two photos on the Instagram one and I'm going to try and drop one more or less every other day, or three times a week. For now anyway on Instagram, and then once we call my website so I have made progress, but I would like to make more progress and, principally get back to that really good fl
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Welcome to Episode 192 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest and it is Thursday, seventh of January 2021. I didn't do one yesterday because it's just super tired I kind of forgot when I was just super tired and has kind of been my been my default setting for the last what seems like eight years was probably only a week or so but I'm really devoid of both energy are very lethargic and devoid of focus and devoid of motivation and it's it's really troubling me it's it's getting quite annoying now. And I feel really overwhelmed with all the things that I want to do and have to do. So there's not really much to this podcast other than as good about 10 I should just got into bed should pro kids are still up I think when Simona and I should probably sleep a lot can't just go to sleep, which has been annoying in and of itself. But I guess the look at some positives I have launched I think I said this couple days ago the photography section of my website with the first photo, I've launched my photography, Instagram profile, Romeo Crow photography, with two photos thus far and I'll add more to it. So made some progress, but I'm done didn't get I completely forgot that it was Wednesday that it was meant to be out but I didn't get out my acoustic track of the week, which was meant to start in January. And the whole point was I was on such a good flow and I came up with this plan and I was singing and I was practising every day and for about the last week I've not done anything. I'm not kidding. able to do anything just tired and throw hurts and blah blah blah. So already behind and the worst thing is the lab have not updated the lab with new posts since basically November's 19th or something which is terrible because it's meant to be every week and I'm just say I'm a bit overwhelmed at the moment and got a couple of clients that are taking my time for audience ninja. And what I really want to be doing is getting back to basics getting back onto my music, I was in such a good flow pre Christmas, then a I stopped for the Christmas quote unquote holidays and I haven't been able to restart so yeah, just feeling a little bit. Yeah, a little bit tired in always say overwhelmed at the minute. I'm sure it will change soon enough I will change it soon enough. That is a view from the crow's nest today. If you're bound Twitter, how are you doing in this new year? Let me know Romeo Crow. Otherwise if you don't already know Romeo crow.com slash podcast and you can leave a voicemail message or a question whatever you wish that I can include on the show. Thank you for listening and I will be back tomorrow hopefully a bit more. Brian Sparky and like, actually have done something more useful that I feel like I've done Today, we shall see. Well that is not strictly true because yesterday I did have been doing a lot of studying the last couple of days because I'm so tired. I was studying photography and techniques announced that it's museum marketing stuff, some new stuff. So it's it's stuff that will yield something eventually I guess I'm planting seeds for the moment, but I feel like it's not moving me forward. But I guess that's the whole point of planting seeds. You don't see anything for a while at least. Anyways, that's me. I will speak to you Toodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 191 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest. It's Tuesday fifth of January 2020 10 in the evening. I slept well last night for the first time in a week. I fell asleep fairly soon after I did the podcast I think, and then I woke at seven. I don't know if I woke just before my alarm or my alarm woke me it was a bit hard to tell but nonetheless I got a, you know, good. Eight hours sleep I think or something like that, very necessary, very necessary and then I thought I'll get up in a second. I'm just gonna close my eyes and then it was eight o'clock. So I really did need some good sleep. And similar slept in the other room with the kids so there was no disturbing during the night I think that's why I slept well. So then today. Trained actually was therefore ready to train this morning, sort of first session of the new year. And it was good. Running on the spot, was one of the exercises or sprinting on the spot. In fact, and we did 36 exercises well, six sets of six exercises and I've come to the realisation that I really disliked running, because that really, really ouches me, but nonetheless got through it so that's good way to start the day. Also, before I did that I did my, my music theory stuff so I'm keeping up with that each day So, and I'm improving I'm really, I can see my music theory knowledge is, is improving and skills related to it so that's really cool. And then I did homeschooling stuff with Mina, we start right, we're doing this now we're back on it. And so we did a whole bunch of maths for a good hour, hour and a half something and then some reading and then some writing basics, but by that point it was sort of lunchtime, and then watch how to share off the exercise lab by that point it was lunchtime. And then I didn't start working until like 230 or something like that. So, about three o'clock actually so didn't have much time to work, and basically was just doing admin stuff dealing with got a new client, which is fantastic for audience ninja. So, dealing with their new kind of stuff, did manage to just quickly get a video and some other bits that regarding the new part of my Romeo crow website where I'm now sharing a new kind of bit of photography every week, and also commercialising it so each one of the photos are shared there'll be 10 limited edition prints that people can buy of it I don't know if anybody will buy it and how successful that will be, but it's part of my focus this year to share much more of my art, create much more of my art. Share much more of my art, and monetize much more of my art. And so we'll see how that goes. And spoke to a good friend of mine, later in the evening who always brings me leads potential clients and people to to work with. And tonight was no different. He's got a couple of people in mind is can put me in touch with So, you know, that's nice to know there's a couple more people that I can speak to that might be interested in my services. But all of that is wonderful. Except I didn't do much in the terms of creation the last two weeks or so really since just before Christmas, I have worked on music, and it's definitely impacting me. Obviously it's meant my albums just ground to a halt. And I really wanted to get that finished, you know, I wanted it done by Christmas really but that would have been a push, but certainly by the end of January so I still got time, but I really need to have the time to focus on that and not other arguably more important things like clients and stuff which is obviously needed. And so trying to balance that out, that's going to be challenging but hopefully if I can get myself up earlier each day. You know that's going to make a yeah that's going to make a difference. I hope, Give me a bit more time and allow me to really get the album done so that is the view from the crow's nest today hope things are rock and roll with you. If you're bound Twitter. Say hello. At Romeo crow. Also, if you wish to go to Romeo crow.com sla
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Welcome to Episode 190 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest. And today is Monday the fourth of January 2020 yesterday, rather smugly was embedded about half nine. I think to my podcast, saying I'd been up at 630 in the morning and it's going to train the next morning and I was in bed already at 930 I was tired and I was, you know, looking forward to getting up and getting cracking and blah blah blah. And from 930 I lay in bed until seven in the morning without sleeping. Like, probably the worst I've ever had in my life, and I don't know why. Well I mean it was coming in and she couldn't sleep and Simona was going in and out. I just couldn't sleep. So, I then fell asleep about seven slept till about 10, and then cut up and had my day will be a very slow one, although I did actually manage to get a fair bit of the day. Well it was good. Nonetheless, I've got fairly good by peak, as you could probably hear. So, training tomorrow. Maybe I'll get up at 630 we'll see it's 2211 now. And that is the view from the crow's nest. So, kids are crying. Clearly, they're not going to sleep. Alright. How better Guess I'll be back tomorrow then. If you're balanced Twitter hit me up at Romeo crow. If you're barely where else do that, sweetie Tovar Toodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 189 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. And it is Sunday the third of January 2020. So I got really bad sleep last night, despite being super tired from getting up basically 630 in the night before, and having terrible sleep for last five or six nights. And, but yeah I got up 630 again today and, you know, I was a good, you know, a good star or second good star last two days in a row, and felt good I did some very basic gentle exercise and some Thai tea and then did my Italian practice and then did my music practice. Is it theory practice then Leonardo woke up and I spent two hours playing a board game with him. And after that I had to go back to bed, because I was just like dying. It'll type failing. And I just passed out for about half an hour or something. And then after that I still haven't really recovered. So it's good to get up early, but it seems to not be working for me quite now But I'm confident that if I stick to it. You know, then my hours will change appropriately and then I'll feel good throughout the whole day for doing it. I think also the diet, again, how neat and brilliantly today. And the changing day over Christmases I think really messing with me and always not nonetheless, you know it's it's a move in the right direction I think the dire we're back on our thing from tomorrow. We did sell the kind of dining table and six chairs today that had taken up a lot of space in the lounge that I put them in storage, but then they basically take out the whole storage room, managed to sell that which is brilliant because it means that we've got a bit of money which is great pays for a dishwasher, which will be really cool. And it also means we've got more room in the storage place in the storage room which is great so we can reorganise that and or after that whatever put some stuff in there but it's good to get rid of stuff. Outside of that Internet's been terrible today so when I did, and have tried to do some work everything's just taken like literally kind of seven eight times as long if not longer. Hopefully I'll be resumed resolved by tomorrow. But basically I guess I'm just looking forward to get back to work tomorrow that's pretty much it. That's all I got sumana decided to, to start attacking the kid room today. There's mould on the ceiling, and also in the bathroom and a tiny bit in the bedroom, so she started with the kids room today. And the net result is, we move the kids into the lounge for what will probably be about a week well we only treat the mould but Ryu, Simone is going to repaint the whole room and blah blah blah. But of course now. I moved the kids bed into the lounge but they aren't sleeping so easily because your room and everything so sim will probably spend a very uncomfortable night in with them tonight and be a bit zombified tomorrow. So that's the that's the rock and roll lifestyle really, that is the view from the crow's nest. That's it, not much to say not much to add today, but hopefully tomorrow get going with work and start moving projects forward and stuff. So thanks for listening. If you're about on Twitter. Let me know what your New Year's resolutions are you keep in the more you're really buckled at Romeo crow if you want to drop me a line otherwise Romeo crow.com, forward slash podcast if you wish to leave a voicemail message that I can use on the show. Take care of yourself. Thanks for listening and I'll speak to you tomorrow. Toodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 188 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. And it is Saturday the second of January 2021. Oh, it's been like a whole year since I've done the podcast, and by that what I really mean is the last one I did was on the 30th of December I didn't do one on New Year's Eve, because frankly, didn't even think of it far too drunk to even consider such a thing. Had you had a really nice New Year's Eve I didn't think it was gonna be quite as enjoyable as it was. But we, we organised a video call with my mum my dad and my brother and we had games. During the call with Mina and Leonardo and we'd set up a little tent with Christmas lights inside it and we did the call inside the tent, eating all berry foods, and actually were on the call for three and a half hours, it was really good. We were all I think very surprised how enjoyable and festive it was. And then after that, did a video call with some other friends, four of us in different locations, and that went on till, not sure when it went on until all I know is that I went to bed at six in the morning. Having drunk. I think four bottles of Prosecco myself. And so, as you can imagine, Friday the first of January. Yesterday was a bit of a Wipeout. It was a house was an utter mess, and I was pretty hung over. So that was just the, the right of the day, and then today. I instigated the first. Well, my only New Year's resolution actually. So my new year's resolution, I don't normally make new year's resolutions I just, you know, do new habits as soon as I'm ready to do new habits, which sometimes coincide with the year sometimes don't mostly don't actually but this one's a new year's resolution. I'm going to get up earlier. And I currently do that so I'm going to go to bed earlier. So this morning I actually had my alarm set for 7am I haven't set an alarm for her basically unless we get an early morning flight and set alarm for about seven or eight years. So, that was for seven and yeah I woke up at 630, which is actually the time I want to be starting to get up. I guess I was stressing about missing the alarm. I'm sure that won't happen all too often, but nonetheless I woke up 630 got up at seven. I immediately got cracking with Italian and music theory practice, and then I tackled the, the lounge which was in the kitchen which is total mess I spent the next 434 hours basically cleaning tidying up. And then, as I had lunch super tired. bath after lunch I think, read some read a book for a bit in the bath, and then get up and did the next bit of DIY. So we, one of my watch words that I used to have and I've kind of forgotten about and we're bringing back in, is really focusing on where you're effectively wasting time have spoke about us on the podcast previously. But where you can leverage your resources better to save time, ideally, so basically anything that you're doing. Consider whether it could be done by something else so some automated process, or someone else that frees you up to, even just chill with your time but certainly do you really need to be doing whatever the task is. And so every day, we're spending you know an hour to two hours doing washing up. And in this apartment. There's no place in the kitchen to put a dishwasher we looked at all sorts of different ways of doing it and it just can't be done. And we actually had a guy over a couple of last week to fix the hob, and he's the guy who instals dishwashers and stuff and we set him about maybe one under the sink and. And he said, just outside the kitchen, you've got a big double bookcase if you remove the lower two shelves on the one side of the bookcase, you could slide a dishwasher in there, it will look ugly as sin and it will poke out into the doorway of the kitchen, but it will work. And it's about the best you can do, and we hadn't thought of that. So like, you know what, that's a good idea because the dishwasher will save us. You know, hundreds of hours a year. So even if it does look a bit fug
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Welcome to Episode 187 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest and it is Wednesday 30th of December 2020. We are one day from New Year's Eve, which means we're two days from the New Year. The new decade, which means well I guess new decade was 2020, but I'm looking at it as 2021 because that hopefully will mean all change after what has been a challenging year for I think a lot of people, US included. I've got to my podcast yesterday I was super tired went to bed couldn't sleep till four Go figure. So I miss training this morning. And as I will train tomorrow morning, and then Today was a bit of a slow day, all through. And I guess the reason. One of the reasons is because the last couple of days a bit since Christmas I've stopped doing music, because I had client stuff to do just before Christmas. And then it was Christmas and had a few days off, and then when it came back from Christmas I had admin stuff bit of client stuff to do. And trying to get myself organised further. The new the new me for next year. As far as my creative output is concerned and there's, there's a phrase that I'm using or a very simple idea that I'm using which is A, B, C, D, E, and it means a few things and I put it together myself so I'm quite proud of it. ABCD, it means baby steps, you know, all, all great, you know, novels are made up of paragraphs and chapters and paragraphs and sentences and words and letters everything comes from the letters. Anything you do starts from just those basic building blocks. It means doing things in order, you can't be going out of order, and trying to do things, you know, can't run before you can walk etc etc. So you have to go through those steps. So, I've got a bit of frustration the last couple of days which are going to in a second, but I have to go through that frustration because I've got to do these things in order, and it's to do with photography, which I'll come back to and what it also means is a always b b c creating D distributing and E engaging, always be creating distributing and engaging and again it's in that order, you know, ideally, I want to create something that should be my main focus creating the music creating new stuff. Then I want to be distributing it because this has been a big problem of mine, or but no problem. This has been something that I haven't done as much as I definitely could have done, and is the new me for next year is distributing, I'm going to distribute a lot more of what I'm creating and in various different ways and engaging, because it's no good, particularly in the modern world to be just creating stuff and distributing it you need to engage with people find out what they like if they don't like it, find the people that do like it they're your tribe etc etc. So, ABCDE. So the last couple of days have been frustrating because I've been focused in terms of distributing getting content out on creating a little content plan for next year. I'm going to release a new photo I think I said in my portfolio I'm building. The initial parts of a portfolio for my photography on my website, and then I'll put a new photo in each week, which will be available for people to buy. And I will also be sharing stuff onto Instagram with a bit more regularity I've started an Instagram photography profile, specifically for photography. I'm also going to be releasing a new song, each week just an acoustic version of a lie, a new song, a song, could be an old song could be a new song but a live performance. Suddenly I don't think I've released any live performances in years, it seems like. Certainly not my own music. So those two things, amongst other things are going to be, you know, are going to be high on my agenda for next year. So with the photography what has been looking at today is trying to get my head on the last couple of days getting my head around how to actually print, because I want to create limited edition prints of each of the photos that I put up probably just 10 photos 10
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Welcome to Episode 186 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest. And it is Monday the 28th of December 2020. I hope you've had a very good day, the bank holiday if you happen to be in the UK and possibly some other countries. Today it was good I got back on with work, which I really needed to start off the day with training with personal trainer and wasn't as lethargic or as, frankly, just splurge the fat lazy, as I thought I'd be after the Christmas munching and had a good session. It was actually dare I say it relatively easy. And I think that means I'm getting fitter, because it probably wasn't that much of an easy session, but that was good way starting off the day, and then had a shower much needed after that session, and did my got back into my sort of daily exercises that I started a few days before Christmas, back into doing Italian and then music theory, all sorts of different music theory exercises from bunch different apps, then I did my drum practice my guitar prep my piano practice. And then had lunch and then was like right must get on with stuff. And so, secluded myself back in the room and started working. I'm actually working. By the time I got to I did a bit of sort of administers. That took a bit of a while but I'm actually focusing on a little bit more and music marketing stuff at the minute for myself. And so coming up with a bit of a plan. So, as of January. In a few days time. I'll have a shedule of content that I'm going to be releasing. So, The first thing is first of January I have a new release on Spotify, which is actually a very old release, but re released. So my first EP I did in 2013. I put it on Spotify. And then I took it down some years later on, probably not even that long later. And then I had lost in 2019 yeah last year, I released one track, I think, a month from eight from that EP until I got about five tracks and then for some reason I didn't finish the sixth track can remember why. So now, the whole EP is going back on Spotify. On the first of June. And then on the, on the first Friday of each month. Subsequent to that I'll be releasing a new track on Spotify starting with my second EP grip the sky. So that will give me six months worth of releases, and by that point, I hope to have, you know, a blind eye to love the first track from that to release and onwards and onwards. So, that will be happening on the first Friday of each month. Then, on probably every Monday. I'm going to release a photo on my portfolio section of our website which is going to be launched next week. And this is because every year I do my calendar of photography, and it comes out of the blue, possibly every year because I haven't really been talking about my photography throughout the year. And so I wanted to make that a bit more of a regular thing that I'm actually doing something about it. And equally releasing photos. So I'll be releasing one every Monday, and that'll be available to buy as prints, or whatever, not the artist, but print prints, and possibly canvases as well, but we shall see. And I don't know where the people will buy them, honestly, people have indicated that they would be interested in buying prints, or having prints, but I don't know whether that will actually come to it, but my intention is particularly in this apartment we're in there's a lot of framed pictures and the pictures are mostly crap. But um, there's lots of frames, so my thought was well let's replace those with photography you know that we can enjoy the places that we've been or seen or whatever. And so I thought, I can kill two birds with one stone. I can buy a print, put it in a frame, put it on display here, enjoy ourselves and if somebody wants to buy it, then I can sell it and put another one in the frame and if they don't want to buy it. Then we've got some nice photography. So we shall see. So that's the plan for Mondays, and then on probably Wednesdays. I'm going to release a for the first time in a long time. I'm
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Welcome to Episode 195 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. It is Sunday 27th of December 2020, and I apologise. I forgot straight up forgot to do my podcast yesterday. To be fair, I went to bed actually really quite early about 10 o'clock, and was just really really tired, so it just it didn't even occur to me I was just knackered but you didn't miss anything because yesterday was, you know, a bit of a washout in the centre has had a day off didn't do anything. And that's all I got and that score. Today was actually much the same, the highlights of the two days. Well one of the highlights, because my father in law still here. Similar and I went out for a walk yesterday and today only for an hour, but it was very nice just got out of the two of us and the weather actually turned cold and wet hot from Christmas day onwards. So he reminded me weirdly enough because we're walking up sort of passed through the mountain of being, oddly enough in in Britain in Wales or something because it was like very misty, and you could seal the valley, and the hills and it was cold and wet so yeah reminded me of Wales. Other than that I've been playing with the kids a lot which is great and Leonardo, and I are bonding much closer than we have done in previously because I've been spending so much more time with him and playing with him and today he actually wanted to sell my lap and on some on his lap during lunch, even when the offer was made so it's very chuffed about that. So that's cool. However, I am now really, really ready to get back to work. It's been three days. I guess yeah three days off work and three days. Eating through big crappy stuff, quite a lot of crappy stuff chocolate and stuff. As Tobu we'd have training with Abdel, and that's going to kick off the week and it's back to the normal diet and back to working, basically. So that is it that is the view from the crow's nest I'm looking forward to getting. Yeah, productive again. That's all I got. If you got anything you could let me know on Twitter, Romeo crow or head to Romeo crow.com slash podcast if you want to leave a question or a comment right here as a voicemail. Take care of yourself, and I'll speak to you tomorrow. Toodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 184 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and it is Friday the 25th of December, 2020 It's Christmas Day. Therefore, Merry Christmas to you. You absolutely champion I hope you had a very nice day. If you're listening to this on Christmas Day and if you're not, I hope you had a very nice Christmas Day. As for ours. I couldn't sleep last night didn't get slipped about half, three, four o'clock and the kids woke up at seven. So a little bit tired, but the kids. Very good. They waited until 930 to open all the presents because we were doing a video call with my parents, and 930 Our time is 830 their time and happily my brother joined us as well. So, you know, at least we could kind of be together. And it was really nice we actually were on video calls about two and a half hours. And it was obviously not as good as us being all together, but it was still really really pleasant and 930 i'd cracked open the Prosecco, and that always helps things and proceeded with the munching. And I'm really happy to say that the presence that we, we got for the kids. And that Santa's got for the kids were very well received, and obviously and the grandma and grandpa sent over the kids, etc. Yeah, they're very well received and the kids are really tough with them. And so that's you know that's kind of the main thing about Christmas really when you're, you know when your parents you just do when you got younger kids you just want them to have a really good Christmas. And then we had lunch stuffed ourselves on the lasagna started cooking the chicken which was the second main and when I say, the chicken I mean a whole chicken, you know, legs head feet, the whole lot was in one. It was a chicken. In fact, if you go on our my Instagram, Facebook story, you'll see said chicken, put it in the oven and then didn't cook it in the end because what we could hear for a bit, but we realised we were so stuffed there was no way we're going to eat chicken. And in fact, I haven't. We haven't had any dinner either because it was just too much stuffing from lasagna, probably wasn't as much as I've eaten in previous years. And that's really positive, that you know my appetite has shrunk, especially in the last few weeks that I've been working on, you know, changing the diet so that, for example, our evening meal is always steamed vegetables, followed by usually some protein, and it's definitely made a difference. So that's really cool. So, they did feel stuff after and the cheese cake was delicious the sim made so yeah, that came that. So that was all good took some time, but I gotta say I was. It's been a bit of a certainly from the afternoon onwards I felt a bit low a bit blue, because it just, it wasn't Christmas, you know, it wasn't it wasn't with the family Somalia's dad was here with us and he slept the whole day pretty much in Liberty, you know, he slept on the couch until lunchtime got up ate lunch went back to sleep on the couch until we moved in few hours later because we wanted to sit down on the couch. And he's moved to the bed. We've got the, sort of, sort of Zed bed in the lounge for him. And just basically just slept all day. I guess you'll be up all night. And, you know, when you can somebody just got a snoring away in the room it kind of changes the dynamic a little bit and it I certainly missed having the, the Christmas cheer that we usually have my mum's or when we with my mum, dad when we were the family together so that was a bit of a shame. But that's the ice COVID yeah that's what's happened. So, I must say, we postpone training from tomorrow morning we said, you know, we're actually not going to train. Just come by the board we are hoping to do is since my father in law is here, seminar I go for a walk tomorrow morning. I'm not sure where it allowed but they're going into anyway. Hmm. So that'd be really really nice. But other than that, you know, kids were happy and that's, that's good, but I kind of already had two da
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Welcome to Episode 183 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. Here it is. Thursday, 24th of December 2020 which means it is Christmas Eve, and it is actually 20 past midnight so actually it's really Christmas Day is 25th, and we've just finished wrapping the Presidents because we are ahead of the curve. And we just put them under the tree. We're about to tidy up the last bit. And yeah exactly we've had him for a month but you know you don't rush these things. And so we are all ready and prepared today, as you may well expect was a day off, almost I did do a little bit of work, but it was more so I could rest up over Christmas knowing that what I'd done for a client was actually working. And I'm happy to say it was. I'm also happy to say, I'm glad that I did check because it was running some ads on Facebook and it turns out that the Facebook ads thing is really badly worded, and I was doing the entire opposite of what I was intending to do. So I'm glad I checked with Facebook help, but that's all good. So, today. sumana cooked in immense amount of stuff. And in fact, you can see that progressing if you go to my Instagram or Facebook story. You will see all the joys, including the presence as well or at least the, the wrapped up stuff under the tree. But yeah, basically, die off, and spend the day, you know, helping a bit but playing with the kids a lot, which was very, very nice. And I think it's no surprise that as I play with Leonardo a bit more. He's more, you know, happy to cuddle me or, you know, yes. Not necessarily have to go to mama for stuff. And so, yeah. Note to self who would have thunk it spend time with kids and kids want to spend more time with you. Well, there's a little thing I'm gonna take into the new year. Anyway, it's gonna be short and sweet one because tired and also who's got time to listen to me talk on Christmas Eve. No, I can't see anything. Yes, that's it that's all I got. So, have a wonderful Christmas Eve if you listen to this probably on Christmas day Have a fabulous Christmas Day. I will be back tomorrow on Christmas Day to the My podcasts, and they will be drunk, I did actually start drinking at 10 o'clock this morning, bottle of Prosecco got popped open. And so that was a good start. And, yeah, so let God take care of yourself and if you're on Twitter, say hello at Romeo crow. If you want to drop a message. Romeo crow.com slash podcast we'll take you here and you can drop a voicemail. Other than that, that's Romeo Crow, signing off tonight Toodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 182 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest and it is Wednesday the 23rd of December 2020 which means it is two days to Christmas who. Today, I tried to do the same thing that I did yesterday I'm really packing my day. So that I felt like I'd really got some good stuff done. So I ended up I couldn't sleep very well last night I think it's because I had a good sleep the night before, so I got up a bit late and we had training with our trainer this morning. So, I, I got up Simona was already out the house, amazingly she'd gone to do some Christmas shopping food and stuff. I really had even before training. So the kids were watching TV, because they were already up before me. And so I did my, my daily app practice that I kicked off or re kicked off yesterday so I did my Italian. I did my music theory various different music theory apps and exercises. Then we had trading, it was good trading session. And, you know, that was a nice way to finish just before Christmas. We've got an next one on Boxing Day. So, no, just having a break on Christmas day but other than that straight into it, that I did between that lunch drum practice, then had lunch beautiful sunshine again outside sales on the balcony had lunch out there then couldn't resist a cup of tea and reading a bit of book travel book to get inspiration for places to see. And then I did piano practice. And then I had a shower. And then, it was really time to do some work so it was about three o'clock in the afternoon. And so I did some work for a client for audience ninja kicking off their Facebook ads to get them, you know, fans for their music, and by the time I did that there was a few other peripheral things around that had to do. It was like seven o'clock or something. And then I came in did the dishes in the kitchen. And that basically, you know, had dinner brings it up to now. So, once again the moral of the story is once again and I feel really positive because I, you know, really packed a lot of learning into today. The one thing I didn't do, because I was working for the client was working on my own music, But thankfully that's now becoming the exception rather than the rule, which is, you know how I want it to be how it should be. So, yeah, I'm feeling again feeling good feeling like, yeah, things are things go well at the minute. Looking forward to, I think tomorrow, I'll probably do some learning stuff again may or may not work in music but pretty much. I won't do any client stuff that's for sure. And then, Christmas obviously having that off, and then Boxing Day kind of back on it ready, we'll see what happens over the next few days. But, yeah that's it so not huge amounts to report, other than I'm digging this flow that I'm in at the moment. I mean, added to it yesterday the piano. I added to it. The Italian again and the music theory apps. But the fluid started even before that with the drums and even before that we're getting on with my music, most days. So, yeah, at the moment feeling good if I can keep this going. This kind of pace. This kind of focus and discipline and then I really make really big strides in various different things that I want to make strides in over the months and years ahead. So yeah, that's the view from the crow's nest today. How is your day going to think you want to add feedback, what have you, ping me at Romeo Crow, or you just go to Romeo crow.com slash podcast, and you can leave me a voicemail message for right on the show. Thank you for listening, and I will be back tomorrow, Christmas Eve Toodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 181 of my podcasts, the view from the crow's nest. And it is Tuesday 22nd of December, 2020, only a few days till Christmas. Today it was a really really good day. I can't remember what time I fell asleep last night, but I don't think it was too late I think it was before midnight, the consequence of this was that I woke up at about 10 to eight. I think they're not I woke us up, which is earlier than I've been waking up because I've been going to bed so late. And before getting out of bed, I said, Okay, I need to, like, I've been wanting to kind of get back on track with some of my studying and by studying I mean I'm doing, Italian, and also some music study, I've got a bunch of apps, both for languages and music on my phone. And I wanted to get back to the point where I was doing a little bit every day because about the last five days, something like that. I've been doing 1015 minutes of drumming every day working through the first, you know drumming book that I've got relearning and some basics. And, you know, that's how I know that that's how you improve massively as by doing kind of 1520 minutes a day rather than you know everyday rather than once a week for an hour or two hours or something like that. And so I thought before you get out of bed. Don't start checking your phone for this at the other do these practices. So, I did my Italian. And the reason that Italian is particularly important I've passed my exam, which is what I needed my speaking exam or oral exam which is what I needed in order to be able to qualify to apply for citizenship. But because I'm intending on starting to gig again next year, and basically build up my build up my live act in the south of Italy whereas pretty much no live acts going on. I figure that either the complete lack of competition or relative lack of competition added to apparently according to sumana my exotic nature being a musician from London. May will play into my hands, or it will play completely against me, I don't know, but what I figured is it will probably be here's a really practical use for me apart from living in a country to be using Italian, because if I'm gonna be on stage talking to an audience or whatever or goodness knows if I get any publicity and I need to answer questions. It'll be helpful if I'm actually able to, because obviously I don't leave the house otherwise so I don't speak to anybody otherwise so I don't need Italian. So I started with it restarted with Italian practice, and then went through a bunch of apps like sight reading rhythm training ear training, that kind of stuff, key signatures and this. And so that was a really good way to start the day took about half hour 40 minutes. Got our bed, went straight into the kitchen. Did the washing up yes rock and roll. So we left the stuff from last night, and that took you know 45 minutes or an hour, but at least you know help out with some chores, and then being a bit it was a lovely morning, we all went out for a family walk. So we've got outside got some fresh air, went out with the kids, just an hour or so up the back like into the mountain next to us. And that was really pleasant and then came back, I put the washing out so did some more chores helped around the house, then I did my drum practice, then it was lunchtime ate lunch outside on the balcony because it was glorious sunshine top off sunglasses on. It was lovely. And then sat reading a book with a cup of tea outside of the sun. That was really pleasant they thought right come on you got to move on. Came back in the lounge did piano practice that's the first time in years, he is in years, so I'm going to try and start doing again 1015 minutes a day. Today I did something I don't think I've ever done, which was start learning my scales on the piano. I don't even know them properly on the guitar. So I thought it's about time as a musician that I learned these things, so you can see how they're related. And you know, using two hands
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Welcome to Episode 180 of my podcast interview from the crow's nest. It's Monday 21st to December 2020 just a few days before Christmas. So today, I had the day off yesterday. Today, I'm chuffed I'm on a roll. Um, yeah working on home music like almost continuously and it's glorious frankly, and I'm feeling really positive about next year, not just with music but just everything like, you know, it's definitely been a tough year financially but it's been a good year for getting other projects off the ground or re you know revisiting stuff like my album. So today, I finished the song I was working on yesterday, which is a song called never kissed a martyr. And there's a piano solo and in my first piano solo. And I recall i remember i coded it like maybe a couple years ago, whatever. And basically it's like it's almost me randomly in maniacally bashing the piano. And then open it sounds kind of good and I had an idea of what I wanted to achieve but I can't actually play piano so it's very difficult to do that. And so I kind of the great thing is because I played the piano through what's called MIDI which is basically allows you to edit stuff better it turns it turns sounds, or it turns stuff into computer information, basically, so that you can change a note by simply dragging the note up or down for example. And so because it was a MIDI, I was able to edit it and so today I was editing the timing and some of the notes and stuff and so now the solo gave it a little bit more melody, and it's cool, it's it's something different like it's, it's cool. So I'm chuffed with it and it's really, you know, the tracks now come together so that's cool. So, I decided to work on the next track. The next track I'm working on is a track called. Not your sucker, which isn't the original name the original name is badass motherfucker. And that was actually a song I wrote for Amy Winehouse going back, you know, 20 odd years or whatever. Before she, you know blew up and became particularly famous. So I'd written this track for her and I never actually met her I hasten to add. It was through a friend. I don't think you ever heard it, but I've adjusted it a little bit just to the chorus lyrics but other than that it's the same song. And, but the problem is when I've recorded a few years ago I realised i'd recorded it basically too slow. And it just, it's not. It just today is going to be a problem song. So I listened to it today and as our man this is gonna be, it's gonna be a challenge to get this one going. And, but then I managed to basically change the tempo of everything I'd recorded using the tools in Cubase. And, you know, read it a couple of the guitars and stuff. So that meant plugging in my guitar for the first time to record here and just getting a few cables out and getting a few things a bit more setup. So now that setup I can do that anytime I want which is brilliant. So basically, I was really chuffed because I can see how much my, my workspace is improving things you know everything's set up and everything I can leave it set up. I mean I did pack down the guitar and stuff afterwards but that's my own because I like to put things away, but you know the my I've got my area I've got my workspace. It's not exactly a studio but it's as close as I've got right now and it's good. And then moving into the digital realm. I've actually in a noticing that my, my skill my technique my ability to use the tools that I've got Cubase and other such things is really improving as well so I can do stuff so much quicker than I ever used to be able to I still had to Google a few things today to work out to do it, but I just yeah I can see I'm basically I'm just getting better, I guess at producing, at least, using those tools. And then, as a musician and arranger and producer in that sense. You know I've improved my craft there and the songs good So basically, I was really chuffed with myself because I moved it from God, this is going to be tough to ah, I'v
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Welcome to Episode 179 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. And it is Sunday the 20th of December 2020 today's gonna be a short episode on account of the day being short on things that I've done because I did next to nothing today it was a day off. So, last night we had a video call with their friends of ours. And we haven't spoken to them for like on video call for six months or something. And in the end, we are lovely cool with them. I drank a fair amount, and we basically went to bed at about three 330. And then we woke up for so hours later, and it was later right yeah this day is a write off bad a very pleasant day for that, you know, I really gave myself permission to do nothing today which I often have a problem with in terms of being able to relax. You know when one works from home and you're at home all the time. It's hard to relax at home when you love your work as well, but I managed it today so I don't really know what I did, but it was very pleasant nonetheless. But one thing that did happen today. I listened to the seven songs that I've nearly finished more or less finished there's still things that need doing to them, and they need mixing but seven songs from my album that I've done so far out the 12. And I listened to them on a little Google nest, which is like a digital photo frame with a speaker built into it and we've got one in the kitchen. And you know what's nice about listening to stuff on those kind of speakers is you don't get, you know, these big great hi fi speakers which make things sound nice or big money, you know it's a pretty standard speaker so if it sounds anything near decent on that, then it would sound very good on you know better equipment, and I sat here with smaller listening to seven tracks. I've got to say, I was really proud of what I heard, and it's taken me all of, you know, 25 years or something of of do music to kind of get to that stage where I can listen to a whole bunch of stuff together and it's not strictly doing other stuff that I've been proud of, but I can, I can really hear the improvements in my skill in my craft as a songwriter, as a singer on this as a producer. Just all round, because they just as a musician around, you know, just, I'm really. Yeah, really, really chuffed and feeling like it put me in a really good mood because I really feel like one. I'm getting very close to the end of this album which is definitely true and it's going to be out that door soon enough. And two, I am you know I am going to do something which I'm really proud of which will stand up on its own I think on its own two feet, and three. I've working faster I'm working better I'm working now that I'm really starting to get to know the equipment, get to know my tools and my workflow my process. I'm able to do things quicker with better results which bodes really well for 2021 when I intend to do a hell of a lot more music. I may well really push myself to try and get through to new albums I mean it's took me, you know, five years or whatever to do this first album, but I honestly believe I can get two albums done next year. Each about 12 songs so I'm really feeling very positive basically about that so it's half nine now and evening I'm super tired. Still trying to get the kids to sleep, but I don't think I'm long, or similar as long at all for going to bed so hopefully we'll have an early night relative and get up tomorrow morning for training full of energy. Do our session and start the week. Yeah, really nicely and strong. So, yeah, I'm feeling good, basically, that is the view from the crow's nest. As of today, if you've got anything at all that you wish to add or ask or feedback then hook a brother up at Romeo crow on Twitter, or Romeo crow.com slash podcast. If you want to leave a voicemail message for the podcast which I could include in the show. Thank you very much for listening hope you've had a good weekend, and I'll be back again tomorrow. Toodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 178 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest, and it is. But Saturday the 19th of December, 2020, and I actually just uploaded my podcast from or publish my podcasts from the 15th, because I'd done it but I just forgot to upload it and publish it. But the eagle eyed amongst you will say well hang on a minute, if it's a 19th today, and you just did 15th. What the bloody hell happened on the 16th 17th and 18th. Well, I would like to say, I went on a mad fear and loathing, You know, binge and just woke up. Three days later with my head shaved or something but No, none of the above. I just, I think one night I was just super tired, like super super tired. Another night I just didn't feel like it. And then the other night I forgot. Last night I think I forgot tonight a terrible day. But whatever I mean I can sum up the last few days, quite simply really I've been focused, again, thankfully on the release last two days on music again and just working on my album, I'm on the seventh of the 12th track 12 tracks. And it's nearly done that doesn't mean that all seven tracks are done, because some of them do need the vocals, or back end or backing vocals done for them, but the rest of the track is done. So it's just record those vocals and then they all need the whole thing needs mixing but but I am getting closer. Oh, my goodness. I'm getting closer to finishing this bloody album. And I tell you something. When I finished this album, and I start working on my next album, it's going to be such a quicker process. I you know one I understand my equipment, a lot better now. And two, I understand how to get some possible drums out of it which has been my biggest problem. And three, I'm not going to experiment or do like in the sense of the way I was producing the last album, and I'm not going to do batching, you know, all the things I'm going to do one track at a time. Get it done, get it finished, move on to the next, and I am looking forward to that second album, but first I got to get this first one out of the way. So, yeah, at least I've been productive. Outside of that, you know, I've done some work for clients for audience ninja some music marketing stuff. And so that's moving along which is good. But, but what is my camera my bias. Just, just, it's nice to work on music yesterday. That was it. I been struggling a little bit with, as you may have heard with my mornings kind of disappearing and then by the time I get started with work it's the afternoon and mid afternoon at three o'clock and that's not good enough. Yesterday I started at like half 10 or something 11 I spent the entire day actually working on pretty much one track which has been a bit of a pain but as of today I've basically. I've solved it. It was a bit of a mystery but I've solved it. But I, you know, I'm wondering whether I really need to get started earlier. But in the day like rather than rather than after lunch do before lunch but the thing is I'm enjoying having that time to either spend a bit more with the kids or whatever or also, you know, like this morning I had training with a personal trainer. And that just, you know, that takes it out of me for a bit and then you have a shower etc and that's basically a morning gun. But what I do think is probably true is, I really need to try and work on getting to bed early and getting up earlier and making more of my morning if I can start training earlier that would be better. The downside to all of that is that, Leonardo, and Mina are going to bed now half 910 o'clock they can't sleep. And so obviously by that point you just, you know, you'd want a bit of decompress time before you jump into bed. So after all after work our way around that somehow I'm not sure how. But all in all, it's all good. The, the other thing is today what today was quite nice David, two days ago, I spent lunch and breakfast actually on the balcony In fact I was actually topless it was that warm literally that warm toddler
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Welcome to Episode 177 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest. It is Tuesday the 15th of December 2020, and today is a very special day because today is my anniversary or our anniversary some honours and I know you may be the eagle eared amongst you may be thinking well hang on a minute Didn't you guys have a 10 year anniversary back in June. And whereas, it's true. Our 10 year anniversary of our wedding was back in June. Today marks 13 years that we met. This is our anniversary of meeting, and it also coincides very Luckily, whoops, sorry, putting water in something to put into so that didn't work. It also coincided very Luckily, with having really good weather. We had about a week of rain, we've had very good weather this year in south of Italy we had weaker rain, and then yesterday or the day before it started getting better. And yeah, Sunny got better. Yesterday was good. Today was really nice. I mean, beautiful blue skies so we actually had. We decided you know I'm gonna take the day off of work, and it was meant to be the morning stroke mid afternoon, it was always going to be the day. And we had breakfast outside, on, on the balcony I was in. In, you know, shirtsleeves having breakfast in the sun, it was just gorgeous. Then we went to my to Jupiter, the village about 20 minute drive where my father in law is from. And the plan was to drop the kids at his and then go for a walk. It's Tibbets is one of the famous things about Jupiter is a UNESCO World Heritage village. Nestled in the mountains like proper in the mountains. And next to it, there's a gorge cut by this river The ragged Hello, and there's this bridge the devil's bridge, and we have been down there a couple of times, once or maybe twice in a car with my parents for years ago. And then we walked down there once like probably about 13 years ago 12 years ago something like that. And so we were going to walk down there for that'd be very nice. And we got there and my father in law was asleep. And he had, he had a bit of an accident and they had been in hospital is all fine but we thought we best let him sleep so we just kind of hung about for. I mean, we've got aunts and cousins and stuff. So we hung about for a couple hours point being, by the time he woke up, we, it was lunchtime and we were really hungry so we made some lunch, and then the kids wanted to sort of watch cartoons were like, you know, you guys can watch cartoons while we're eating, we're going to be outside. So we had lunch the three of us my sister and my father in law out on the, the little sub bar panorama the Vantage one of the vantage points which looks down into the gorge and down to the valley and it's really beautiful and it's really peaceful. I share quite often share photos or videos from that place. There's picnic benches there And generally, only this time of year there's not many people that go for it. There weren't anybody while we were there for lunch. And, again, shirtsleeves sunshine I thought this is nice, good wine that helped. So we did that and then we're like right okay now we're gonna walk down to the gorge so seminar I did, and it's a, You know, it's, it's not easy going on the knees to get down there, and then getting back up is certainly not easy I want any part of your body, but it was a really glorious walk. And we went right down actually went down past the bridge which itself is quite a tall bridge over the gorge and we went down right to the, the actual water, really really nice and then after having that nice lunch nice way to walk out. And then after that we came back got the kids came back home. And then, watched an hour's documentary of the Brian Johnson from AC DC has been doing this series life on the road where he interviews, people from other musicians basically have spent 3040 years on the road, and they're really good I really like them. And so we watch one with Mark Knopfler today, but yeah and then that's it now we're gonna have a nice early night. S
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Welcome to Episode 176 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest it is Monday 14th of December, 2020, and today a new new day of the week, it's time to get my ass in gear and get stuff happening and I just didn't get my ass in gear. If you've listened to podcasts in the last like four or five days, then you'll know that I'm, I'm struggling to get going. At the moment I'm struggling to just not even motivate myself I feel motivated, but I'm just struggling to get started to begin, and what didn't help in a very nice way but what didn't help today is, it was really after about a week of rain. It was really nice weather really warm sunshine so lunchtime sat outside and had lunch outside, you know, take advantage while you can. It's probably like 1618 degrees in the sun, and. And that was wonderful, but really I you know, didn't make me want to move from Little suntrap. And then, the kids were playing very happily together inside the house sim was sat with me outside we were talking. It was nice to have quiet time to talk. So as a consequence, it just took me a while to kind of really force physically force myself to get up and go and try and do some work. And then when I did, I found that I started on the next song for the album a blind eye to love this particular song is called. One is a song called I'm so grateful for you. And it's a really simple. It's a really simple track, and it's starts with just a simple piano vocal and then bit by bit a couple of extra instruments come in but not very much, and I was playing around like to add strings in it you could definitely have orchestral it's kind of a bit of a bait it's a ballad so you know, you could definitely have. And in the end I thought, you know what, just simple really simple is, is I think probably going to be right for that song and I'll probably stick it in the middle of the album so it's like a, you know, like almost like when you had the old finals and then you turn over to the other side, and you'd have a track that ends the first side kind of thing. That's what I think I'll do. But when I went to export it or do stuff with it, Cubase my music recording software crashed. And it's been happening a lot in the last month or so and it's basically down to a plugin I use for guitar sounds, and I use it a lot, and I don't want to not use it because it's really good but it seems to be crashing Cubase it's really doing my record not in. So basically, I spend, however long I spent, not being able to actually do anything because of this dam plugin conflict, whatever. And then after that, I don't even know why I did my day just seem to go I then did some work for a client for audience ninja. You know, dealt with a few emails a few little admin bits. But basically, that was my working afternoon God I guess I must have started late and then that's that and obviously if I want to actually get anywhere and achieve anything again a few days ago on the podcast I was talking about how I'm feeling like I'm in a groundhog day, and I'm operating in a vacuum. And it's just me and I'm not really getting anywhere and I'm not making an impact and it's not satisfying because I'm not seeing any kind of real momentum real movement, and of course about days like today which is entirely my own fault that I'm not gonna see any improvement, you know momentum or whatever. So, I need to kind of get myself, my head around that and move on and it's easy to go, our you know it's December it's Christmas and I'm gearing down for Christmas. And maybe that's the truth, maybe I should be gearing down for Christmas I don't know maybe I should be taking my foot off the gas but I never feel like I've had my foot enough on the gas. So, to take my foot off the gas seems like a cop out. Maybe that's an accurate reflection or maybe that's totally inaccurate. And I can't see the wood for the trees, I don't know, but that's, that's kind of where I'm at. So, on a work in flex. You know that was that outside of the wo
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Welcome to Episode 175 of my podcast view from the crow's nest. It is Sunday the 13th of December 2020. The eagle eyed amongst you which is probably no one may have noticed I didn't do a podcast yesterday I just couldn't be bothered basically so long and short of it. I hadn't I literally had nothing to report so you know, I didn't really do any work yesterday I struggled the last few days I've struggled to get myself going. I was in a good rhythm last week up until I think Thursday or something like that. Maybe Wednesday and then it's been two or three days and I've just really struggled to to get my ass in gear and get working basically simple as today. I did eventually managed to get cracking on some music again back onto my album blind eye to love and I nearly finished again nearly finished another track I think that's the fifth and the vocals need completely redoing there's only a guide vocal on there and then they'll need backing vocals but aside from that, I think it's basically done so that's really positive. So I'm making progress through it. And I guess I don't know if I said this on previous podcasts or I was just thinking it but I'm feeling very much or had been feeling like I'm in a bit of a vacuum at the moment like I'm just not really achieving anything and it's a bit Groundhog Day effect. I think I do go into this couple days go so I'm going to again, but equally, I know that you know this is the slog. This is the mountainous false summits. You know I need to go through this. I need to keep pushing away. Keep plugging away, finish this album. And, you know, then I'll have the next project, whatever that may be, whether it's a writing project or what have you, but it just got to persevere basically. So it is so persevered a little today. And that's basically so I've got to report and yeah, short and sweet today I think. So. That is the view from the crow's nest. And tomorrow's a new week. I Oh, what I did what I did do. I think I said this, but on Saturday, yeah, yesterday, I moved the furniture. This was my plan for Saturday morning. I chose my plan Friday money bills postponed. I got rid of the furniture in the lounge that was just the big dining table and the chairs and Just all the stuff that was kind of basically being stored in the lounge and put it in the music room which is more of a storage room. And conversely, the drum kit and the piano out of the music room, put them in the lounge, and you can see this if it hasn't disappeared on my story on Instagram or Facebook. The transformation the room But it has made a huge difference. First of all, I'm there I'm standing in the lounge now, the you know, the room just looks so much bigger, there's more space, there's much less clutter, which I am a big fan of less clutter. So that's, that's really cool. And, you know, I believe in Fung Shui I believe in that you can go into a room and the way it's the furniture is set up the flow of the room impacts you, you know impacts your subconscious impacts your energy. And when you walk into a room that's more open and more flowing, and things are better arranged, etc. It's just better for you. So that's the first. The second thing is no one's touched that drum kit in the month and a half or two months has been set up and in the two days has been set up. The kids have been on and off it pretty much all day long. Or for a couple of days and the piano As well Mina is really tough with having a PMS, she started learning. I had a little drum and a little piano, bass yesterday and long the short of it is it's been a really successful move for these last two days and I suspect it will prove to be a very successful move. So really chuffed about that the rooms looking better. It's, you know, it draws creativity from you. You walk into it, and you see the junkets helped me see the piano and you just want to sit and play. And that's the whole point with having them to hand and it just shows that you know, having something convenie
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Welcome to Episode 174 of my podcast interview from the crow's nest, and it is Friday. 11th of December 2020, and she is so I forgot to do basically yeah forgot to my podcast yesterday, but I can sum it up as yesterday I was feeling a little bit low because I felt like I feel like moment, I'm in a kind of combination of Groundhog Day, and I'm not making any impact with everything that I'm doing. Like, I know that I'm working I know that I'm progressing with stuff, but they're not having. They're not seeming to have any impact and, you know, kind of feel like the I'm talking workwise you know the things that I'm doing I could just basically give up and do nothing and just watch Netflix for six months, and basically no one really notice and nothing would really change. You know when there won't be anything lost, and it's probably a bit overly, you know overly critical, but I just feel that the last few projects I've done have been real kind of non starters. You know, for example, grip this guy, the grip this guy experience a lot of time into that kind of a lot of hours into that. And it basically just kind of came and went and I really think anybody really either went through it properly or did all the things that I had set up for it. Certainly not. You know, I didn't really seem to get that feedback. I did ask people what they thought of it and I got a lot of people saying, I loved it. But the actions of people actually doing stuff doesn't by the status doesn't matter like people did take much action. So again, a lot of effort, very little impact of the back of it, my calendar was another project. It wasn't anywhere near as much effort certain certainly not as much effort as I put in last year last year I put in a lot of effort into the calendar with extra staff and blah blah, and the impact was about equal from this year to last year. But just, I haven't received the calendar I'm not going to get a copy for myself. You know the basically I ordered what was necessary wasn't going to ship it to Italy. And so, so there's kind of nothing tangible there you know it was kind of like Well, again, grip this guy experience, yes it lives, great this guy calm but it's not exactly tangible. My calendars know exactly, yeah. The big impact tangible audience ninja. Yeah, we got a few clients, but it's, again it's not really want to want to do, number one and number two. Just. Yes, not much impact worldschooling habits, again it's a that probably will have a fair amount of impact when I finish it, but it's again another project that's half done not finished, you know, and a blind eye to love my album, you know I'm getting through it, I'm putting in the work, and it's progressing and you know it's sounding good, but um, you know, it's not finished it's another project that's kind of half baked, and hopefully when I finish it you know I can release and hopefully get a bit of impact with it, we'll see. But I just feel at the moment you know I'm putting in time and putting in effort, but it's not really, it's not really seeming to to get me anywhere or move any anything. Notice that before. And again, I might be doing myself a bit of a disservice and equally have to so you know before you can reap anything. So, you know, this is all fair enough. But there's just how affiliate moment and Groundhog Day because you know I'm at home. I just go through the same routine every morning is doing kind of chores around the house or store working, you know, training, and you know try and do some stuff with the kids afternoons working and then it's evening it's dinner and then it's, you know, get the kids to bed and tidy up and do the washing up and then plan it to bed. So, Also I think you know the the COVID situation not having any real outdoor social life or outdoor life, it now being winter, and around here there's nothing doing in the winter and it's kind of semi locked out. So I think that that's you know that's all having an impact. Fast forward to tod
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Welcome to Episode 173 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and it is Wednesday ninth of December 2020. I had a really good sleep last night. And yet, was knackered this morning, and I'm not good now. But the net result of everything was dude training with personal trainer late, like 10 o'clock star. By the time he finished that blahdy blahdy blah it's lunchtime yadda yadda. Yeah. And then I had the same problem that I had last few days, I could not export, my song from Cubase, which in non technical terms means I finished the song, more or less in Cubase the software I used to record my music, and I can save it, like as an mp3, which is right pain in the bum. Because this is I think the fourth yeah the fourth song that's basically now done from the album, still need to do backing tracks, backing vocals for all of them, and they still need mixing, but the work that it's basically done. So, I'm a third of the way there except for the backing vocals. And so I thought you know what if there's one option which is upgrade Cubase to the latest version which is another 100 well I thought 100 quid turns out 85 quid. So I did that but by the time. I then downloaded it, and had to download it and I took hours to download everything so the long the short of it is my whole frickin day was buying the upgrade Cubase downloading it, finding out thankfully that it then would export the track, and able to work again on music, and then that was basically my whole day. It was like dinner time. That's a fast rating. So, that's it, that that was a V for the craziest. However, on the fabulous note. My dad went to hospital today had the, the checks that were needed and got, he has a. He has a problem, but it's a very treatable problem, and is not the, the big see that we thought it might be. So that, you know, obviously trumps everything, so that's that's very good. So yeah, I, I had a good session this morning with Abdel. And then this afternoon. After I think two weeks I haven't left the house. My legs would have been the last few days have been telling me and I've been tingling, and they basically said look, dude, get out and walk somewhere we need to be used. So went out for a kind of half hour 40 minute walk. And it was raining but it was beautiful so nice to walk. And then when I got to the top of my walk I turn around come home and I did some Tai Chi some 24 forms, I kind of rushed it a bit. But it was great movement, it was a lovely waist turn and opening up the hips and growing the quad, as I call it, and stretching the legs out. So, that made me feel really good. So, despite the fact that I didn't basically do pretty much I felt I couldn't do anything today. At least it was some good news and some good things so that was, that's good. And now, this evening we had a video call with some friends of ours. In the UK, and we just finished. It's 20 past midnight. I'm super tired sumana super tired. And I know that tomorrow. It's gonna be like a copy of this morning and last night and today you're going to get out late and blardy blar. But, you know, at least we did a bit of socialising, so I'm looking forward to tomorrow. I've got my plan for tomorrow. In the morning, I'm going to rearrange furniture. So we've got a table in the lounge, which it just becomes a dumping ground is a big like circular dining table which we don't use as a dining table it is literally just dumping ground. We've tried to sell it, it's I mean new there it's about 100 quid I think it's a very nice table but it's pretty much worthless here we saw an identical one on Facebook marketplace for about 70 euros now wants to buy and. So I'm going to take it apart. And then some of the other stuff that we still need to get rid of, and that all the six chairs from the table, I'm going to put it in the storage room which is currently the music room, and instead I'm going to take out from the music run the piano and the drum kit and I'm going to set them up in the lounge, an
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Welcome to Episode 173 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. It is Tuesday the eighth of December 2020. Today, today Today Today, I, I want to do so. I basically spent the day, very happily. Working on music on one of my songs from my album. The song is called it blows your way. And I nearly finished basically nearly finished it. As with all the songs that I've nearly finished, they all need backing vocals added to them. But I'm going to do all the vocals in kind of one or, you know, one week or something I'll do all the vocals together for the backing vocals, but the rest of it. Basically nearly there. The only problem was I wasn't able to export it. That means basically save a copy of it I don't know why software just keeps crashing every time we're trying to export. And so now I've got to get to the root of that, it may be, you know, maybe I've got maybe upgrading the software to the latest version might help, but that cost me another $100, so I'm less inclined to do that if I can avoid it, but we shall see. But weirdly enough for though I did do that I felt like I hadn't really done much today and they went back I nearly finished that tracks, is probably really important. And I think part of that is this morning. Once I got up I did the washing up when I did the washing up I listened to. Tim Ferriss show which is a podcast, from a guy really like Tim Ferriss where he interviews, world class performers basically and today, or not today but the episode I listened to today a recent one. He was interviewing Matthew McConaughey, the actor, and one is a very funny guy is very interesting guy, and he's got very quite profound views on things on life and whatnot. And he was just talking about his life and going for things. And one of the things he said was something his father had said to him. When he decided to drop out law school and try and pursue film, go to film school, and his dad said okay but don't half asset. And that's kind of been in my head today cuz resonated with I've been feeling a bit recently, you know about half assing stuff not necessarily half RC in the sense of not putting in the effort, but half arcing in the sense of only doing things by halves, you know only half doing this only half doing that only. And I always say that you know you do one thing it's to the detriment of everything else, you know, wherever you're putting your focus or your energy nothing else is getting your focus and energy so if you focus on something. Everything else by necessity isn't may have focused on. And the difficulty is focusing on enough things that you have the complete and rounded life, versus not focus, focusing on too much where you're too scattered and your energy is not, you know, not leading you in a more in a direct route to where you want to go. And on that note, you know, knowing where you want to go, et cetera, et cetera. And that has been kind of on my mind a bit today. In fact, it's been on my mind for a few days so it's just something to ponder it, I guess there's nothing really no major takeaways or specifics on that. I think also, I'm feeling. And it's rare that I get this but I think I'm feeling a bit stuck rabid Cabin Fever because I'm not sure I've left the house for about two weeks. And my legs are, I think, aching because they literally want to be walked. I think I need to get our mark. I can't blame it on the lockdowns is not locked down even if there was or there might be a lockdown but even when there was we still get out. I just haven't left the house I just, you know, I mean this routine I mean this kind of Groundhog Day esque routine. Every day is basically the same. And, you know that's on the one hand, it's good because I can focus on the other hand, maybe my focus is too narrow. Equally what I'm focusing on. Am I focusing on when I am focused Here am I, focusing on too many things, or just the right things are not enough things. So, again, last few days. That's what I've been talking about i
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Welcome to Episode 172 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. It is Monday the seventh of December 2020. Today, I didn't have good sleep. I was feeling. I was, I was feeling a bit blue. After recording yesterday's podcast. So because I'd spent the last two days basically watching these music documentaries about all these old. Well, the singers but from these rock bands I really admire that have been going kind of 3040 years. And that already makes me feel slightly blue potentially, and then add a great question from Roy. If you're listening Thank you Roy yesterday which I answered about my own musical career and background and blah blah blah. And that basically made me feel blue, maybe feel a bit low. So, I went to bed, and then just when I was feeling a bit blue Simona said a couple of things to me regarding the kids, which wasn't exactly what she was saying but I didn't take it the wrong way but it just reminded me that. Basically, it's very difficult to balance everything you know what you need to do what you want to do what you have to do your dreams, etc. And to get them to pay out so I went to bed feeling a little bit. And we had a chat similar and I, and also she was feeling a bit office yesterday, and so we discussed stuff and. Long story short, by the time I fell asleep I was feeling a lot better but it was a lot later. And then I can see it for a bit. Ironically, I went I did get save I was actually feeling really excited and really positive and focused on 2021 2021, because I'm really, really focused next year, not just on music but on performing again on. Yeah, gigging on being a being a performer, not just somebody who kind of writes few songs occasionally and records a few things occasionally but really, you know, upping the gears to the detriment of a lot of other things. And for the last month six weeks something like that I've been pretty month. I've been practising a set and about a month ago, I felt I couldn't even if somebody asked me to play one song I couldn't I was too embarrassed or too shy and. Fast forward to today and I'm feeling good mouth like I've got the best vocal control range and tone that I think I've ever had. Best pitching. And it's not saying that I'm great, just saying, best that I've had. And I just feel like I'm moved up a gear, you know, literally. So I'm putting together a set of my songs and it's inspired me to start writing a bit more I feel like I want to write a bit more. So I came up with a bit of a plan for next year to go back to one of my classic stock phrases Do what you can with what you have right now. I could look at it as, Oh, I'm in the south of Italy, there's nothing going on here. I'm on the opposite end of the world there's no chance of doing anything with music. Or I could look at it as I'm in this place where there's no competition, they're starved of music, apparently according to sumana. You know, I'm exotic because I'm from London. Never thought that would be the case. And being a rock, blues type of guy from London. That in itself will be a bit of a draw for especially for people in this far south of Italy where we are. And we have a plan to have lots of days out especially when we're allowed to and when you know probably the other side of Christmas in the new year. Last this time last year we got into really good habit of once a week we're going for a brilliant day out. And we'd go to a village, or a tourist attraction and then in the morning and then we would have lunch in a local restaurant and it was just glorious and then in the afternoon go visit something else and the whole family thoroughly enjoyed it. In fact, I don't know if I've shared them yet but I've been putting together over the bit of time some videos, these days are on education by travel on our YouTube I think, which is our much neglected kind of Family Education stroke travel blog. Anyhow, We've done really well and then coronavirus hit, and that was it, then pay to them. So we want to
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Welcome to Episode 171 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. It is Sunday sick, sick. Yes, of December 2020. And today, full day off, like give myself permission full day off. My only desire today was to watch the final of the autumn nations rugby, which England was in playing France at Twickenham in London, and it was a very dramatic final, which, England, have emerged victorious, they actually were trailing and the last kick of the game, put them level, which took into extra time. And then, England managed to win in second part of extra time. I'm not a big rugby fan. I've only. I'm only really watching it because it was been on amazon prime, and I've got prime i thought you know what haven't watched for a long time. I've really enjoyed it and I will, I may have watched rugby a bit in the past but now I shall be watching a lot more I think I watched all England's games and sounds very good. I also had a few beers that pretty much, that was my day right there, but also, and this is going to tie in very nicely with what's coming up on the rest of this podcast tonight. And I have discovered a TV series with Brian Johnson of AC DC, it's called a life on the road and Brian Johnson goes and interviews. Other very successful musicians in season one. It was five singers and one drummer. So the singers though, you know, small people like Robert Plant sting Roger Daltrey Joe Elliott of Def Leppard on Nirvana two drummers Nick Mason Pink Floyd and Lars Ulrich of Metallica, so you know, just some guys who maybe have had a little bit of success. Actually, I started watching them I think like yesterday or the day before and now I've watched all six of them getting the second season, and I'm very much looking forward to that, really, really good. Like, I highly recommend to see this series. And I really love Brian Johnson he's just like the most down to earth, dude. So no really really cool. And it works. It runs well because I have another question from the wonderful Roy, and I love it when people ask questions. That said, Roy zoster a big question. So I'm going to pass you on to Roy, for his question, and then I'll come back and how that relates to what I've just been talking about regarding Brian Johnson's life on the road.
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Welcome to Episode 170 of my podcasts, the view from the crow's nest. It is Saturday fifth of December 2020. Yeah. Today is a bit of a day off on account of being a Saturday. I decided to take it in little bit easy. So that meant. Personal Training, this morning was pushed back to your town. So it was meant to be 30, push back to 10. And that basically means my entire morning gone so I thought when that happened I thought, you know what I'm not gonna stress about it. I had a good session. So that was all good. And then after that, I, I found this programme. I mean, I've seen this programme or seen of this programme a couple years ago forgot all about it. And it's Brian Johnson of AC DC it's called a life on the road, where he interviews. Basically, other people from very successful bands. So in the first season, there was six episodes I think he interviewed sting Roger Daltrey Robert Plant, Nick Mason, Lars Ulrich, and Joe Elliott. And if I watch music related stuff like documentaries or whatever in the evening that I can never sleep, and often feel bad about it. I can't they kind of put me in a blue mood because I think I've not done. You know what I wanted to do music, etc. So I thought, you know what, let me watch it during the day. So seminar set to watch it over lunch. And we watched the Robert plan and then then it makes another really good, really, really enjoyed that. So it was a good way to start there or to start the day to do it by that point it was like three o'clock and then as I write. I, I'm going to do music house inspired. So I came into the room fired up the computer thought I was gonna actually work on the album, and they're flashy, you know what, I kinda don't really fancy that, let me, practice my songs. So, I practice the seven songs that I've been practising and started learning and eighth and the eighth is a song called Mary, that I wrote a month ago something like that. And I don't have a proper recording of it I don't want to record a religious lease just a video of it that I can put in the lab. Mr cool is kind of reminds me a little bit of a kind of 80s Stadium anthem track. Yeah, okay, big hair rock track singalong type thing. And this nice little song. So I did that by the time I finished that it's basically like whatever four or five o'clock I did. I recorded all six of the, all the songs that I. It's all seven of the songs, because I was learning the eighth that I did I'm going to watch them off this podcast actually uh see if I've made any improvements, but I feel that I have improving my, my vocal technique. My pitching because I tend to sing flat and I feel that I'm starting to sing a bit more closer to the centre, the note I'm trying to get to. And my vocal control is better my ranges. Arrange is pretty good now. But more importantly is pretty good in a controlled way whereas previously I could hit notes occasionally but I blocked my voice too quick. Maybe it's because I'm doing things, relatively quietly, because I'm in the flat. And I'm not you know with a band and therefore it's easier not to blow up my voice, maybe it's not performing in front of people, so it's easier not to push myself that much I don't know but hopefully I'm building a good foundation to start gigging next year which has the plan, you know, twofold one to get out in public, and well three photos at once, get out in public and kick to, to make some live music videos that I can use for marketing. And for my for my fans. And the third is because I want to try and do maybe a monthly probably live stream eventually concert. Something I've never done shied away from, and I got to put on my big boy pants and start doing it. And so, that's part of my 2021 really focusing on the music. So, yeah, I feel good about that. Then, basically. How's the day, more or less. It's quite early now half nine I'll go into bed and watch those videos and then try and get an early night and wake up tomorrow energised and having had a good sleep
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Welcome to Episode 169 of my podcast, have you from the crow's nest. It is Friday the fourth of December, 2020, and so yeah today it's day was good day and another. You know, I feel good today after, same as I did yesterday and I got up I did the washing up, and then I started tidying the kid's room space got chores in the morning and then it was lunchtime had lunch again weather was nice enough the sun just came out just before lunch so we're able to sit outside and have lunch, which was glorious sumana made. Someone made this green bread. It was as bizarre looking thing and if you want to see it gone to my Instagram or Facebook story for today. But it was really tasty and hip, it was like a green sandwich, it was. I'm sure it was healthy I hope it was healthy it looked like it should be healthy. And so it was nice lunch and then the afternoon I, you know, went to work. I did some stuff for client of audience ninja one of the clients. And then, then I worked. I did a bit of admin stuff, then I worked on my own music, which was great, a track called it blows you away, and I from the album a blind eye to love and I replaced the drums and found exactly the beats I was after so that's really good stocks that can sometimes take me quite a while, and then I started playing around with some orchestral sounds over the top of it. Not sure if they're really needed but by that point it was already sort of getting on a bit late, so I had a few other bits to do. I then did a very quick vocal warmup, and practice my seven song set. And it's not sounding too bad I actually feel like, you know what, I might even be improving my pitching and my range which is my control which is really really positive. And I'm feeling pretty comfortable with those songs now so I've actually had to play a gig I think I could, you know, I could do without panicking too much. And, which is the whole kind of point of this. And so, I think, you know, I will be doing my first performances, certainly in the new year. But, you know, I will start you know small start with the stuff that I upload or share with the lab and then probably in my facebook group, and then eventually, more publicly so I'm definitely working towards it, so that feels really good. I uploaded yesterday it was a little more stone uploading my tracks to BBC introducing. If you want to know more about that then listen to yesterday's podcast. And amazingly I had emails today to say your tracks have been listened to, if we're going to play them. We will be in touch. So, that I mean it's good because they say that it can take six months even longer to listen to your tracks so that's really positive 24 hours is brilliant. But now I wait and see whether they think they're any good or good enough to play or not. If they do, that will be awesome. I will feel very very good I'm sure if they don't, that's fine. I made more songs and I get them out there again. So the excuse me one second. Sorry about that. So, The two songs I shared the two songs from my EP grip the sky, and I'm currently in the process of uploading that EP to no sorry, not true at all. I'm going to be uploading that EP to Spotify and doing what's called a windowed release or release one track and then maybe every other month or every two months release another track from it. And what I intend to do is with each release, try and get some interest from blogs or, you know, radio stations or whatnot. And so I feel like I'm starting to, you know, starting to between the recording between the practising and performing the music between the marketing and the music I feel like I'm actually starting to get some momentum get some steam it's, again you know it's early days is such a huge amount of work to do. And it's not that I'm working eight hours a day on it you know I'm just putting in a few hours a day. In between other things and trying to balance out spending time with the kids and the family hence why each morning. You know I'm doing bit of
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Welcome to Episode 168 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. It is Thursday third of December 2020 welcome welcome welcome. So further to yesterday's podcast yesterday's thinking about the situation in the house and whatnot. If you want to know more about what I was banging on about then feel free to listen to yesterday, I decided this morning when I woke up after doing the washing up that I was going to. So, bit saw the house a little bit, because we still have remnants of the when we moved in and we put stuff in certain places that really doesn't need to stay there. So, mostly what I did today is just shuffling stuff around, rather than actually getting rid of stuff, which is the next stage, but at least in the shuffling around. We, the Fung Shui of the place is better. There's a bit more space. And just things are a bit more. One organised and or two more ready to get rid of, you know, they're more at a point where psycho got to do this. So, I think that will you know we've had six weeks or so where we haven't really done anything with ours and I think a little boost of getting some stuff done will make us all feel a fair bit better. So that was my morning and very productive when it was and then lunch came around, as it does which is fun, which is nice. And I'm attempting to eat less because I'm doing these training sessions three times a week, but my belly doesn't seem to be contracting our muscles are growing but my belly is not my belly staying the same so I figured out maybe eating a bit too much and I'm also trying to be a bit healthier so this evening was, you know, steamed vegetables first and then something else which I can't remember what it was. But nonetheless, it's a good start, you know that way. And then in the afternoon. I then worked got a client's website up and ready and out to them so that at least we're moving forward with that for audience ninja. And then I focus really the rest of the afternoon was on kind of admin II stuff but admin II stuff with regards to my music so I got a sheduled, a release on Spotify side, years ago I'd released my first EP six songs on Spotify. Then I took them down. Then I released them, bit by bit as singles. The idea being I was gonna release one basic I think one a month, and then start coming into my next tip and then releasing that etc. And then eventually getting to my album a blind eye to love. So that first EP is called they come and go like rain, and I'd released five of those songs and then realise today the last one I released was a year ago in November. So I was like god there's only one more song to release and that's kind of bottlenecking, then releasing grip the sky. The, the last EP I did. So I set that up for release, so they come and go, rain, the full EP will be on Spotify, in a couple of weeks time. And in doing that I also started looking at prs prs is the UK is music copyright collection society. So in theory, if you're owed anything for having your works performed then so long as you've got those works registered with prs which is as a songwriter, not as a performer, Then you get your songwriting royalties which, you know, I probably not do anything, but nonetheless I put, you know, kind of, because I've now got they come and go like rain coming out I wanted to make sure that the, that is connected to my prs works thing. And then I registered. Another 12 or so songs from the blind eye to love. And, and then got six more of them are in grip the sky, kind of ready so that when I release grip the sky that they're connected. And that was just a whole bunch of back and forwards. Yeah, pretty slow system but crossing my T's and dotting my eyes and whatnot. And then there's another society called PP L, which is for performance so if you performed on a recording, or you perform live, then you again might be do some kind of royalty. So I started the process of registering for them, which is just a complete bootleg because it's like the end of it, they're
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Welcome to Episode 167 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest. It is Wednesday the second of December 2020. And to date though no not day that's not the right word, but a glorious morning that I did a training with Abdel personal training and we were using weights. A lot of shoulders and arms stuff. And that was cool that I had a lovely shower. Then we got the Christmas tree ready the kids were super excited, the place became a complete mess. And then I did some homeschooling I mean, this more math is really coming along with our math, really, really proud of there and that's really cool and then we, you know, we were having lunch, and the weather. When the sun came out it was so nice I said, Look, I'm sorry. I want to say outside, and then I was outside in a T shirt. In December, having lunch. Almost sweating because it was so warm in the sun, it was so beautiful. And then when lunch had finished sim wanted to go for a lie down she was tired said the kids could watch for a bit, and I thought you know what she's gonna go for lie down in the bedroom where I've got my desk and I work I thought, instead of later in the day, almost as an afterthought doing my song practice. I would do it earlier on the balcony in the sun, and I read well actually first I read and I had a cup of tea. And I thought I know I should be working, I know I should be working. It's already like one o'clock, but it's not often, and it won't be too much longer, they'll be able to sit outside and read a book in the sun with a nice view and whatnot. And after all. Isn't that what life's about you know taking pleasure in simple things and just daily things mundane things even but it's so easy to be overlooked and I certainly have been guilty in the past of just working working working and not, you know, taking time to smell the roses, so to speak. So, I enjoyed reading a book had my cup of tea then I played guitar I went through my songs. And that was a, you know, a nice step up for me because there are there's a shop below our building. And it's pretty busy shop so people always coming and going in the car park. And so I'm on the balcony and I know the town is so Silas acquire that you know my guitar and I'm not playing loud but my guitar and voice even if someone's just talking you can hear them, you know, quite a way away, and the sound really carries, so I knew that people could hear me, and, you know, that kind of psychological. I guess embarrassment, I don't know that I'm trying to get myself out of and get myself back into the, the brain that I can perform and you know it's valid for me to play my music. This was the first test because it was almost like a you know a balcony concert. And I was really pleased because the very first day I was very pleased because very first thing I was playing, I sort of this old guy driver must have been in his says probably in the 70s, and I thought, probably should start I was feeling very self conscious and he got his car looked at he looked up he saw me. He was like tracking the sound and then he started applauding. And I was like, Yes. So how was yes it's funny how those little things can give you such a boost. And so I played my set and, yeah, a few, he was the only one who applauded but a few people kind of looked up and glanced up but instead of it putting me off I was like this is cool, I just this is what I should be doing. So, that was very cool. And then, similar cup. And so as a character back to work, or go to work in fact by this time it's three o'clock in the afternoon. So, you know, I've already basically spent my day. And then I wonder why I don't get stuff done you know. The Balancing Act is you know either work too much. And don't see the kids in danger other things or I do other things and maybe see the kids a bit more and then work doesn't get done. You know, it's an unwinnable situation. But, nonetheless, so I tried to, you know, focus down and get them, get some things done for the client for
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Welcome to Episode 166 of my podcast. Have you from the crow's nest and it is Tuesday. Yes, the first December 2020. It's the new month. It's the last month of the year. And what I am sure you probably would agree with has been a pretty poor year for everybody concerned. I for one I'm looking forward to 2021 I don't know about you, but today, today is one of those days where I worked, but I don't feel like I've got anywhere, although I know deep down that I did make progress. It was just all very slow going. So it was a bit of a programmatic or day to day and what I mean by that is, I was learning how to use an implement stuff with Google Analytics, which is a tool that measures analytic stuff on your website, so I had to work out how to track when someone clicks on buttons on a website for a client, so that we could see if people are taking the action that we want them to. And that was something I needed to learn so you know it takes a bit of time to go through tutorials or find videos or help documents, etc. And then I then worked on worldschooling hub the API the appy side of stuff and API is basically just means where two computer programmes can talk to each other even if they're written by different people and companies. And it's something I've never dealt with before but I know is very powerful as you can imagine it means a one piece of software can share data with the other piece of software. In my case, I need to configure the worldschooling hub website so that when people register, they get taken to do a, an ID check, so the data needs to go to the Id check and then it needs to be validated and they need to be the right people, and then that data needs to be sent back to the membership plugin on the website so that they can then have their membership and get access to the website. And I was close to, giving up again, because it's, it's not hard but it's one of those things where until you understand the language. You know, it's just a jumble, but as soon as you understand it's like, oh okay now I get it, etc etc. Like anything I guess. So I think it's a little bit hard in the beginning but then it'll be pretty easy after that because it can't be too complex, and I did have some breakthroughs in it I did start finding okay but a trial and error but working out. Okay so this does that that does this okay this means that blah blah blah. So, progress, and, you know, definitely. move forward but I didn't get anywhere near finishing it. And, you know, getting my head around it entirely is not quite there so it's still going to be a while left yet. So again I feel like I did work but I didn't, I didn't have anything to show for it, I guess. Then I had a call for an hour with a guy I know who we might be doing some business together so that's, that's good. But again, it's an hour out of the day, I did do my song practice again I've added a seventh song into the sets and other seven songs I'm practising, and I gotta say I think well you know I'm feeling much more confident about singing now and about, you know, delivering these songs, I could definitely improve, particularly on the actual way I'm playing the songs on the guitar, but at least um you know that's the initial focus is not on the guitar it's on the vocal and being able to remember the lyrics initially and then be able to put them across and, and I feel like I'm making progress. So, again, nothing major to show for it, but at the same time, you know another kind of little continual baby step forward. And then I did a half an hour's work on one of the songs from a blind eye to love. And, in fact, I think it was a blind eye to love the actual song title song from the album, and I didn't make again I didn't make major progress but is it maybe a couple of little steps forward I'm finding that song a bit tricky is not coming to me the first three songs I did, they just kind of came out, you know, interesting ideas just develop straightaway and they sound cool. This one I
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Welcome to Episode 165 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. It is Monday 30th of this December, November, 2020. Today what is today. Kathimerini much train this morning was hard going used weights the first time kind of hurt my shoulder a bit achy now, hamstrings killing me. But aside from that, I was doing stuff for clients today so not really so much stuff myself what I did manage to do is another one of my practices of my set. Because, have you been listening I recently then you know I've been trying to get myself back into a performing mode. And so I've been practising the same six songs for about the last two or three weeks and it's really really made a difference. You know vocally I feel much better and more confident and knowing the songs, etc. Today I added a seventh song to it, and I'll probably just stick with those seven now for at least a week or maybe two weeks, maybe just the week and then I'll add an eighth to it the week after and really try and cement these songs and work out how to play them. So, that's a positive and. Outside of that, that's basically my day. I don't really feel once again I don't really feel like I got anywhere today. I mean, apart from that, you know, and I definitely need to speed up my moving through of projects, because once again I'm feeling like I'm getting into a state that I've been in before where I'm basically just busy but not really getting anything really truly important done. I did kind of write a song today I guess it just came out. And I stuck with it, it wasn't that great. Probably won't keep the course that I've bought it might not even have a course at all. So at least there's some creativity there but I just, I feel like I'm going back into this routine of, you know, just being busy but not really doing too much. I did do some, again has spent some good time with meaner again today in terms of homeschooling terms of, you know, going through schooling stuff, and we will focus today on, we did some music before lunch, which was called just trying to work on getting a feel for the feeling of rhythm into the body which is something that they don't really teach, or they don't really teach something that I wasn't taught and I don't think is often expressly taught but is so fundamental to music. And the way that it sort of came to me was playing. When I started getting into and was introduced to funk and blues and the funk and blues players. They're all feeling it's all about feeling the music, and it's kind of different to classical players that a lot of classical players I met you put up some sheet music in front of them, they can play fine. You take it away and they've kind of got no feeling. You know they don't really feel what they're doing, they read it, and rockers are a bit can be a bit like that as well. They don't read but equally, they often don't feel as much because I'm generalising but you know they make. Everything's turned up too loud so it's all about being rocking and rolling out loud but actually you can lose the, the feeling and it's kind of an odd thing but a lot of musicians even guys who've been playing for 20 plus years haven't developed that sense of feeling and I'm not saying, I've developed it particularly strongly, but I realise how Paramount it is to really anything in a music so I really want to try and take that approach and instil that in the kids if they want to learn music so with Mina we were just, we were talking about rhythm and, you know, trying to clap, on the one or clap on the to the bar or the three etc. And then, to help kind of illustrate it and take it out of the theory zone, we would just played random songs on Spotify, and then we were trying to clap on the beat, clap on the, the two or three and sort of getting a try feel in the body in a very physical thing, it should be. Even if you're not moving, you should still feel it in the side. So that was before lunch and then after lunch we're working on maths, and she's really
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Welcome to Episode 164 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest, and it is Sunday, the 29th of November 2020. It makes me laugh how you can have almost carbon copies of one day to the next and because of one quote unquote small change, you feel completely different about. So yesterday I was very frustrated because I didn't, you know, managed to get anything done, particularly, I start, I woke up lay trained in the morning and shower and then got to work in the afternoon couldn't get anywhere blah blah blah. This morning I woke up earlier. I think I woke up at eight o'clock rather than like nine 930, because I'd had I'd gone to sleep at one but I'd actually fall asleep at one and for the first time in a while. I didn't wake up during the night so I had like a full on sleep all the way through so I woke up after seven hours and then had a nice pleasure the kind of getting up and then it's beautiful. There's nice bit of sunshine, and I sat outside had breakfast outside, and then did some stuff like some homeschooling stuff with Mina for a bit and then Leonardo came and sat on my lap and we read some stories. And it was such a leisure early morning. And then, I think I tried to do a bit of work before lunchtime but then oh that was it then we decided to get our shopping done for Christmas, because we are very generally late in all of our stuff like organising shopping and stuff so we wanted to get stuff for the kids because this will be the first Christmas that we'll have it just us, in fact, it'll be my first Christmas without either being my mom's or, conversely being at my mother in law's for pretty much ever I can remember I think it'd be the first Christmas on our own. And we really want to make it so that it's really nice for the kids because my mom always doesn't really. My mom always does a really nice cosy Christmas, you know, and there's always every year says oh we don't have much money for presence yes there's not going to be anything much, and then every year there's just tonnes of presence, and she means it as well that's what makes me laugh. And so we want to make an ice cream so we did a bit of shopping and so that was really nice you know getting stuff for the kids. And also feel like we're getting ahead of ourselves and it was lunchtime came and had lunch and then I went to do some work. I didn't have. I didn't try to do anything for myself I did stuff for clients, and I didn't get hardly any of that stuff done. But I did get some important parts of it done. And that was, that was that my day you know I didn't do any training this morning like I did yesterday I didn't do any focal practice or song practice like I did yesterday I went through my six song set yesterday I didn't do it today, and so on the, on paper I kind of did more for myself yesterday. And yet, today I feel so much better than I did yesterday. And it just basically goes to show that you have a decent night's sleep of seven hours on, you know, straight and you just feel a hell of a lot better the next day so I must remind myself when I am feeling stressed or, you know, like, not achieving or not doing stuff etc etc. to consider how much sleep I've had. And I would urge you, when you're feeling blue or down or whatever about anything to consider how much sleep you've had, because it may well be a simple case of you haven't had enough sleep, which is, you know, not exactly news to anybody ever. But nonetheless, he always, you know when you have these revelations, they still seem like news even though they're as old as the hills. And so, yeah. And now, just finishing watching a film watching Resident Evil. I've been wanting to watch it for years and never got around to it. And there's like six of the films now and just tonight follow stop. So, nearly finished the first one. I really enjoyed it I love the computer game, all those years ago. And I think the film's not too bad. And after this, I'm going to go to bed, hopefully, kind of be asleep by
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Welcome to Episode 163 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest, and it is Saturday the 28th of November 2020 frustrating day today, very frustrating day. Once again I couldn't sleep till after two o'clock. And by the time I woke up, it was basically time for me to do my training session with a personal trainer, because I skipped yesterday's one because I postponed it because I've woken up late because I've gone to bed so late again. And by the time I did that training session, and then recovered from it, and then spoke to my mother, and had a, you know, a shower and then it was kind of lunchtime and then by the time I got going. It was once against the same pattern. It was like two o'clock, I just could not just couldn't get anything going today. I tried to start with music. I didn't really make any inroads into the song I was working on a lot of pressing buttons, but not getting anything says literally in the same place, it was when, when I started, and then I had a couple of lad many things to do just bitty crappy day and yeah really frustrated waking up too late. You know, getting started too late. And just not getting anywhere. So, it's just nothing today that's that's basically it. That's all I got for today. frustrating. On the plus side. My, my chest of drawers, or my drawer filing system for my under my desk arrived, but it's the drawers are so shallow, I can't actually fit my headphones in there so the idea is I can take stuff off my desk like cables and stuff and in there can't do that. But at least the Wi Fi extender arrives I plugged it in and now I've got a full Wi Fi signal in my bedroom, which is where my desk is where the office is, so to speak. So, at least that's positive that pretty much nearly puts to bed, Bob basically puts to bed finally my, my broadband internet woes of the last few months I guess that's a positive. Yeah, that's, that's it, nothing, nothing to report today should have been working on my progress with some client stuff I haven't for audience ninja so tomorrow, I really must get on that flex. And that's it really so yeah nothing day is probably, you know, how was your day. Tell me on twitter at Romeo crow. Other than that I will speak to you tomorrow short and sweet. Take care of yourself Toodle Pip. Bye.
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Welcome to Episode 162 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest and it is Friday the 27th of November 2020 Black Friday. In fact, how many deals Have you got. Have you got any. This year, due to the financial situation imposed upon myself and my family by the covid 19 business. I've been rather light in my black friday shopping. Last year I seem to remember rinsing loads of stuff. And the only thing I've bought thus far is curiosity stream, which was meant to be $12, but somehow they billed me 14 and a half dollars for it, which is thousands apparently thousands of award winning documentaries, literally just bought it about an hour ago, and put it on TV on the fire stick camela today at all yet, because I'm going to bed, but I did think that it might be useful as part of the homeschooling stuff if there's documentaries on there that we can watch or that Mina can watch particularly because she is really curious, no pun intended. And, you know, I think it's easy to have Netflix and Disney plus and Amazon Prime and all of that, and they have great entertainment and also some really good documentaries, but it'll be better or not better but it could be excellent if we've got a whole load of documentaries that she can watch so that's all the shopping that I have done thus far. However, what I did do today, partially inspired by yesterday's podcast. After the question from Roy regarding the lab is my first ever Black Friday offer. So I decided to put the lab up for half price 50% off just 15 pounds for the entire year. That's like, you know, one pound something, a month, nothing for yes for the lab, and a couple of reasons for that one because I've been flooded with black friday offers from every man and his dog in the last week or two. And today in particular, so it's very much on my mind that that is what people do at this time, but to really because I've got, you know music that I really want to share with more people. And I want to give it to my the fans the guys in my, in the lab first for sure. But I'd like to have more people in there so I can share more stuff, particularly the work I'm doing on. More recently, you know, as I won't go into it but the production my production games improved the couple of songs I've nearly done for blind eye to love. And you have that album and a few other songs coming from that album and I just think they're sounding really good and I just want more people to that. So, until the first of December, if you're interested in you're not already a member of the lab, just head over to Romeo crow calm, and you'll see it front and centre, and it'll cost you all of 15 whole pounds which is about $18 or something like that, maybe, $19, or so. Yes, so that's kind of part my day, my calendar, my 2021 calendar which I should have received from the printers today hasn't even been printed yet because for the last three or four days. They've just been pestering me with telling me that the files aren't, right, or this problem or that problem or they're too big or, and I've printed my calendar with them for the last four years, I think this is the fifth year, and I've never had a problem. So, and they've changed their systems. So all I'm saying is I think their systems suck ass. Then new systems obviously not working but nonetheless. I've wasted so much time, honestly, like redoing stuff in Photoshop and re sending it and then they can't open this link their website doesn't receive the files properly send it through this thing that didn't the writer, ah, do, and I put them all in a folder, send them a link to the folder and they're there like it policy means we learn how to open External links slack for goodness sake guys sort your bloody selves out. Anyhow, so that's taken up a large portion of my in stupidly large proportion of my day. I did manage to continue to do my kind of vocal practice stroke. song practice so again the same set of six songs. And I felt today that vocally I'm starting to get a bit of
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Welcome to Episode 161 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and it is Thursday the 26th of November 2020. And so, today was my first day off, that's just not true to actually Saturday. I had basically a day off and Sunday I had a forced day offset such a huge hangover from Saturday. So, I just lied through my teeth, but this was the first day that I basically left the house properly for a day or for any period of time in weeks. And the reason being, because I had to exchange my English driver's licence for an Italian one, or get the process done. And so, we are in a town called Castro victory it's the main town of this part of the region, but it's not the, the main kind of city of the region there is a bigger place that an hour south called Cosenza, which is one of the two basically main cities of the whole region of Calabria, and slightly regional head office, so we had to go to Cosenza. And of course, being a typical Englishman though. I'm like well Can't we just post stuff to them that why do we have to go there, assuming therefore that there must be good reason why we have to show our faces maybe they have to see me etc etc. So, nonetheless, we, we got up and we went down there had a terrible sleep again last night I don't know why, but, so we get down there. I'm basically not needed at all. So, there was no point in me being there really but the. The next part that is, there's no real point in. Anybody being there because we could have just posted the stuff because, you know, who is similar in the sense of, you know, oh, who am I compared to some I don't even have the same name. So it was a bit of a bit of a long way to go for no real reason but you know because it's. And then they took my licence and they gave me a piece of paper that said, you can drive with this piece of paper it's temporary licence for two months. And, and this is my favourite part of the whole thing, then they're like okay and then you, you know, you come back in a couple of months, and come back in January and we see if we've received your licence yet. Right. And what happens if you don't we just give you another piece of paper for another month and then you come back a month later. Alright, how about you just tell me when you received the licence. I know we can't do that. We don't know when we're realist receive it. Right. Well, when you receive it, why don't you just give us a call. Now, we don't do that, or better still, why don't you just post it to me, send it to me like, you know, normal people might do NAD don't do that. Alrighty then. So because Italy. So, that is the, the wonderful, you know, entirely sensible way of dealing with these kind of things so basically I got away, two months if then just head down there, just on the off chance I've got it and if not, no worries. I just pick up another piece of paper and I've got to go there for another month. Anyway, so we went down there we've got that sorted. And then it was like it's basically nearly lunchtime time to come back so monterde packed a picnic, which is very nice. And I thought we all thought maybe it'd be good since we're out to try and find a place to run around you know get the kids out because they haven't really been out three weeks because it's lockdown. And in the infinite wisdom of the authorities around here. There's a big park in Castroville area, and the park is closed, because of the coronavirus lockdown. However, it's no problem to be in a supermarket with other people. So, just to get this right, you can't be outside in a park, but you can be in a supermarket. Fine. So we left Cosenza, and then we took a wrong turning and fortuitously as we were going around around about coming back to go back to right turning I spotted a park with a playground. That was clearly open because there are people everywhere. Wherever there are a lot of people there. Quite a few. And so we stopped there, and we had a good hours play with the kids they were really happy to play back
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Welcome to Episode 160 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. And it is Wednesday 25th of November 2020. I have been lost three nights I mean having bad sleep in the sense I've been waking somewhere 20 to 30 times which is really not like me. And every time I've woken up I only just realised this evening I think maybe it's because I injured myself slightly in my back on Monday training. And every time I've woken up. I've been very aware that my back's quite sore and hurting, and it hurts now if I kind of turn my head to the side I get a pain, sort of down off to the shoulder blade kind of below there blah blah blah. So I'm wondering whether lying on my front in bed got my arms up, turn my head to the side but Allah, maybe that's triggering the back pains and that's what's waking me up. So, we should find out tonight that there's a big revelation for you. But today is kind of continued my, my theme this week of really not. You know, really not getting much done or feeling like I'm doing, you know making much progress. I spy. I woke up late because of this, there's not sleeping. And then I did training today. And thankfully I didn't kill me. By the time I'd had a shower after that and it was basically lunchtime then had lunch then I was like right I'm gonna get cracking with work I've got the whole afternoon. And I got a video call client wanted to speak to me, which was fine, but I find it very frustrating when people want to speak to you either on the phone or video calls in in a kind of business context, because by and large, it's just a lot easier quicker just to email and be done with it. And so I had to walk him through a couple of things which he was holding his phone up to his computer so I could see this at the other and it's just like, ah, in the end, that was about an hour, an hour and a half, and then had another client who called a couple of times. One to inform me of their business strategy which was, again, fine, but I didn't really need to know because there was no action points for me off the back of it. And then again later to ask me to do some stuff which I did. While I was on the phone with them. And all told those two or three calls, basically took about four hours of my day. And I find it really frustrating because it's like, Oh, come on, come on, we could have just send me a list of things and they do, or email and I just get it done. So that was basically my there my afternoon. Then I thought right come on I want to get this worldschooling hub I started yesterday with the learning how to use API's, and I thought let me get on that, but I had a problem yesterday so I had messaged the developer and said, You know, I'm struggling to follow the documentation, your API documentation blah blah, they email back today to say, oh sorry it's because the documentation is wrong. So, great that's no help. You need to use this and send another link, but I wasn't sure whether the link was what I was meant to use or whether the link took me to something to use either way I tried both and neither of them worked. So, I'm like, Come on guys let's make it easier, and I had said in my first email. You know, I don't know what I'm doing so please make it clear for me. And that's something which again go back to emails going back to business. I find immensely frustrating when people. Short shortcut, a response because they think, I don't know what they think but if you're ever responding to somebody asked a question, or if you're ever sending something to somebody because you want them to do something. Make it crystal bloody clear what or how to do it and assume, unless you know otherwise assume no knowledge or the minimum or knowledge and really spell it out. Because all that happens is they send this back now I've got to send another email to them to say this isn't good enough I can't follow it or it doesn't work or I'm doing something wrong you need spelled out. So we're just gonna go back and forth wasting each other's
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Welcome to my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. It is Episode 159, and it is Tuesday 24th of November 2020. And, yeah, so, today, just didn't feel like a good day today, but I feel like, also, I should probably measure my, my, my day and not in terms of how productive it is but how much progress or maybe stuff that's important. So, my morning just seem to disappear just Bosh. And then the afternoon I literally don't even know what I was doing. I was working. My most of it. I don't know what I did. And, but what I did manage to do is send off to print my 2021 calendar. So you know that's the closing of one nearly closing on a project, but you know that was, I guess significant. I also started to try and get my head around something for worldschooling hub so without boring you senseless. The thing that we're waiting on is May, and that's to connect the membership plugin that deals with all the membership levels with an external ID checking service. So that basically when people join the site. They have to do like an ID and visual check and, you know, like a live video chat with them holding up their ID and stuff before they can join the site so that it's obviously a bit more secure. And so the last bit of that puzzle is, I need to connect to those two pieces of software using an API code which shouldn't be too difficult, but I've never done it before. So it's a new world for me, and I've kind of put it off for a few weeks because I just know it's going to be one of those painful pro grammatical rabbit holes, but finally today I kind of bit the bullet and started working my way through the documentation and understanding and blah blah blah. And of course that takes a bit of time. The net result would be a will be that once it's ready. Then we can bring the platform online properly, and we'll be charging for membership so it's potentially an income source. So, which is very unnecessary at the moment. So, you know, I guess that's important. You know, it's a step, it wasn't done by any stretch but it's a step in the right direction. I did my vocal practice stroke song practice while some practice so I went through the six songs that I've been going through quite a bit recently and so you know I'm getting myself up to up to speed, to be able to start performing again so that's going to be hopefully Good, that's gonna be fun. Outside of that, I just I don't know what else I did already. I'm not too sure. So, that was, that was kind of really my. That's pretty today. I feel like it just disappeared, but I don't know what that's what else I did. And, And, you know, a bit disappointed. Ironically, Bitcoin is on the ascendancy is at about $19,000 per Bitcoin. And if you've followed my podcast recently you'll know that I basically had my Bitcoin stolen from me effectively via two different platforms. One through negligence and for internal fraud and the other because it's kind of dodgy. And the more that Bitcoin goes up in value, the more painful it is to, to know that my bitcoins have been stolen, and I'm trying to keep it as a motivating factor to say okay well that's why you really need to get business up and running, even more so worldschooling hub audience ninja next year when coronavirus has hopefully gone over UK PR Mike up and running again and expanding. And also, Romeo crow stuff my music, my photography and my writing screenplays and novels. So that's what I'm trying to do with it, and Fingers crossed. I can focus on it. Outside of that, and that was, that was the day. I just feel like it wasn't in I didn't really, I didn't achieve what, what should be achieving from days. If I want to actually make any kind of impact in those projects or plans that I've just highlighted. So, yeah, frustrating. I feel a bit frustrated at the minute. But that's it that's all I got. That is the roof of the crow's nest today. How are you, how is your day frustrated or not, hit me up hit me up on Twitter at Romeo crow cuz I do love to hear fro
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Welcome to Episode 158 of my podcast, and it is Monday the 23rd of November 2020. And I missed a couple of days of the podcast I confess, and this time it wasn't any good excuse like oh I didn't have internet I couldn't do anything about it, blah, blah. It was I got drunk. And then I had a hangover. So, Saturday yes it was Saturday I think the last one, it was Friday. So, Saturday I decided to have a bit of a bit of a day out day out day off. And there was the rugby, which shot I'm not a massive fan of rugby but I occasionally watch it, and it was showing on amazon prime and England were playing, and I thought you know what this afternoon I just fancy doing something I haven't done in a long time sitting down just watching some sport. And so, I sat down to watch the roughly at whatever time mid afternoon, and you know after lunch or whatever. And then some want to sit down and get your beer so happy lovely Thank you. And then in the evening we had a video call now that we've got broadband give me a, we started video calls going with friends so we were gonna have a call and a few drinks with a couple of friends. And, of course, because I started losing in the afternoon with the rugby. By the time we had a very enjoyable video call and I went to bed. I don't know exactly what time went to bed but the last message that I'd sent to the guys were video calling with was at about four in the morning, and I have no memory of going to bed. But I do have a memory of waking up midday in fact actually semana no that was it the kids that I brought up first on Saturday, the kids got off but anyway one of the rarest things ever. We managed to let him on asleep until midday she actually managed to sleep for 12 hours. She hasn't done in years and years. So I was with the kids in the morning we went out for a walk. We went out to get a breakfast at the supermarket is everything sharp, but they were very happy to go and we had a lovely morning and then yes then she got up and now it's lunchtime and then I watch the rugby. So I thought you know I'll take Saturday off, then I've got very drunk, had a lovely video call, and then I slept in till midday on Sunday, and had quite a hangover. And so yesterday, I did something else that I've not done a long time I vegetated in front of the TV for. Can't wait for the whole day basically fight between the rugby and the video Queen evening we watched The Hobbit family movie. And then, like, three hours old. And then, on Sunday afternoon I watched a few other programmes we watched the second Hobbit movie. So it was just like pure vegetation and then that was basically my weekend and then it got to last night I still feeling grim and I was like, No, do the podcast because I just haven't done anything useful so go to bed, and strapless that's, that's the long and the short of why I didn't do the podcast last couple of nights. Today, tried to get my ass in gear and get on with work had a bit of a frustrating day in the sense of everything that I was doing took far longer than it should have done, and mostly didn't get me any kind of result, like, you know, I don't know, I'm doing some stuff around the house, putting up a poster. And then I put it in what I took everything down suck put on one wall and then realise it's too big then took everything down on another wall put it on there then it was too big for that and then eventually I've got another wall so at least I did eventually do it but what should have taken five minutes to put up a world map ended up taking kind of like 20 minutes, half hour and then had to get a cable for something and it should have been a two minute trip downstairs to the shop that ended up being like 15 minutes because payment won't work and, and it was just one of those days where everything was like that like everything that should have been quick wasn't and didn't work in the end, a lot of them, so kind of bit frustrating, but I did manage to do is put a my post up in the lab. Sou
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Welcome to Episode 157 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and it is Friday 20th of November 2020. There we go. Got the formalities out of the way. Today it was a really good day in the sense of a balanced my day very well, I got up, expecting to be training at 830 but there was a misunderstanding and he had a split Tim for 930. So, Simona and I had actually gotten up before the kids amazingly they'd slept in. And because the United had a good you know good light and when he woke up, he was in a really good mood, which translates to not the regular grumpy necessarily but he had a good sleep, and that translates basically to him being more receptive to play with me and not to stick to his mother. And so, I actually because I was kind of ready, I took him out for a walk and we went out for a nice walk for about 45 minutes which he really enjoyed and I certainly enjoyed because he was holding my hand in the hallway of his own volition, and it was lovely. And then I came back. And so having spent time with him then did, training, and it was a it was a good session, it wasn't so hard for me as Wednesday's wiping out. Plus, I had a good sleep I had a good breakfast, like eight o'clock so I had good time to digest it, so I was energised and energetic. So it was good I got a good sweat on but I wasn't totally dead. So it was a nice way to start you know having spent time and Leonardo and then that. And then I had a shower and then we had an early lunch and then I got cracking with work. I tried to sort of get on with the next song on the album so I've kind of nearly pretty close to done the first three songs on a blind diet to love So kick it off with the fourth song today. And that was the title track a blind eye to love which is also really good tracks for good potential, and I can definitely envisage stirring strings and horns and stuff at the end of it, which yeah I'm really looking forward to putting down but today was just looking for trying to find the right drum beats which didn't quite get so, you know, some progress but not as much as I'd liked. And then I thought I'd better do some work on. Well actually I had on the downside. A couple of investments that I made a few years ago had been performing extremely well. So much so that they probably will as of today because they're basically in Bitcoin were worth about 60% of all of the investments we've done, and a significant amount of money, especially from where we are right now. And long story short, there were two different companies, and one, threw in fraud on one of their employees and the other because it might have been dodgy To start with, basically both disappeared well having disappeared once filed bankruptcy and frozen all accounts and the other one is basically frozen all accounts and is just dodging. And so, because it's Bitcoin. The price of bitcoin has been rising astronomically in the last few weeks and it's soul crushing because I was like, I'm getting in relatively early on this Bitcoin I'm gonna be in there for the long term. I'm really looking forward to this. It's gonna be great investment blah blah blah. it's grown, 10 times in the last three years since what I put in, and now it's disappeared, basically, which is just like, oh, and it's not the money per se, it's the fact that I've lost my Bitcoin. So, I had, I've been looking at emails and stuff regarding joining a class action suit but it's in Spain. And I don't know if I've got the money to basically get embroiled in all of that, and start that lengthy process. And I've never done anything like that and I don't really want the hassle and the stress of it and so I had to read through all these legal documents and I did my knotting but there's a deadline of Monday to either get involved or not and so that was rather stressful and then I thought, right. Well, I also on the plus side, I do have a new client for audience ninja. So, let me get cracking on their, their stuff so I got started on that
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Welcome to Episode 156 of my podcasts that hear from the crow's nest, and it is Thursday 20 19th of November 2020. And so I'm very happy to say like I felt much better today than I did yesterday. Yes, there's a bit of a Wipeout day. Woke with a sore throat had a headache, basically spent they doing something I haven't done in years which is sat on the couch watching TV, which is really pleasant for what it was but I felt bad because I like working. But today, I had a, I still couldn't sleep last night. I made a talks about yes done podcasts made a huge error of watching a music documentary about Coldplay, and I should have done that towards evening because then I can't sleep. Watch stuff like that. Because I start thinking about what I'm doing with music Anywho, I didn't sleep till about half. About half one in the morning, but thankfully Simona and the kids let me sleep in till kind of half nine so that I dose for the last few hours because various noises nonetheless. I've got a decent enough night's sleep so I felt energetic today so long winded way of saying I felt better today so I spent the day working on music, my album, a blind eye to love, I was working on the third track that I've worked on in the last couple of weeks. Last week it's called called close to midnight. It's actually a really old song that I wrote back 20 years ago. Yeah, that's how long it takes me to finish things sometimes. But it sound a chord it's kinda like a Santana risk. Very kind of simple tune. And yeah and it's it's sounding cool I haven't put orchestral strings on this one because he really doesn't want them. So it's a pretty simple arrangement. And what I'm happy to say is like I've gone through it pretty quickly. So, hopefully tomorrow I'll finish off if there are anything that's kind of thick they're actually to finish off for it. And then I'll move on to the next song who can't and what that will be but that will be the fourth song of the 12 that need to get through I have a feeling that I, the latter songs will need more work so maybe I won't get through them so quickly, but at the moment I'm really pleased with my progress because I'm making you know making strides towards completing this album, this year and getting it done which will be huge because then I can start working on other songs on basically straightaway on the next album, which I don't know what it will be. I don't know what will be on it. But, you know, it will be newer music songs that I've written more recently, probably. And so I'm looking forward to that. I also managed to do. I've kind of made a another resolution and who knows when I'll stick to it. But um, you know, the idea, one of my stop phrases do what you have with what you can right now, you know, and having moved from London which is pretty good place in Europe to be playing original music, kind of, in theory, I mean moved to the south of Italy where it's really not, I don't even know if there are any places around here that have live music. You know it could be seen as being a challenging time to start playing gigs again. Now I last played a gig I think about three years ago. And before that was about two years I think I've played one gig in five years, which is just terrible. Basically I've really lost my confidence for performing, certainly for performing original music. And, yeah, I want to get that back, and although you know I'm getting older down, you know, 40. I want to kind of be able to play again, because it's, it's great fun it's there half the fun of playing music, although I do love writing and the recording process of making songs. So, what I thought I would do is use what I can what I have right now what I do have is lockdown aside, beautiful landscape on my doorstep. And conversely, or alongside that the ability to go to get in the car. And now I've got cars oh you know, and get in the car, go to a place where there's nobody about that makes much noise so one with some really nice VISTAs. So m
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Welcome to Episode 155 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. It is Wednesday, the 18th, I believe, of November 2020. And today was a bit of a write off for me, I woke up with a really sore throat than where it came from, and then had training. And the training just smashed me basically just destroyed. By the time I'd had a shower after that, recovered and had a shower after that, I managed to do a few emails before lunch. And then it was lunchtime. And then I just hit me after that I basically just was just destroyed. And so all I did was something which I haven't done in a long, long time is lay on the couch and watch TV all afternoon, and then into the evening. So that was my day, basically like a complete write off. The one thing I did watch was an interesting documentary about Coldplay, and not one of my favourite bands that I do like, quite a lot of music. But I'm the documentary maker. And I didn't know their story or their backstory, but he knew them when they're at uni before they're a band. And he was making taking footage of them from literally the very beginning their very first gig even before and it's been with them ever since. So it was a really interesting, you know, documentary film interspersed with live performance or some of the stuff that you know, really showed them for the last 20 years. But the thing that really gets me when I see stuff like that Is it just makes me feel quite low because I feel like I haven't done Why should have been doing and, you know, sending out with music and you know, yeah, so on the one hand, I enjoyed it. On the other hand, now I feel like I'm really not doing anything and have wasted 2025 years that, you know, I could have been doing, I should have been doing music stuff. So that is the view from the crow's nest today. And that's all I got for you. If you got any feedback on that, feel free to hit me up on Twitter. Otherwise I will speak to you tomorrow. So Toodle PIP goodbye.
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Welcome to Episode 154 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest, and it is Tuesday the 17th of November 2020. If you hear noise in the background, it's because I'm making a cup of tea rock and roll. And so yeah, still fully join us over getting the internet, getting broadband connected yesterday and I'm now not taking it for granted, it's, it's wonderful. What I did do this morning is, you may guess I think I was talking about it before the last podcasts, died because the internet. We had all our stuff shipped over from the UK, which means I had my desktop computer, my bad boy, which is seven years old and is still a beast and I had it specked out when I bought it, so that I could do video production and audio production so it's a really good machine. And the problem is, for some reason, since I've got it here. The two monitors that are normally had it plugged into back at home in London. It doesn't work with the two of them the monitors work the cables work, but the graphics card doesn't seem to be working with two monitors Anyhow, I spent the whole morning faffing with it. Now that I got broadband I reinstalled windows so I lost all of my apps and programmes on it. I did all sorts of reinstalling no dice, I took it apart. I dusted it out, put it back together. Still no dice. So that's thoroughly disappointing because at the moment. I've got two screens on my desk and I can only use one of them. So I'm using my laptop with one of the screens, I ordered today this is very interesting story I know I ordered today to cable so now in a few days or by Monday when Amazon delivers it. I will be able to connect my laptop to the two monitors, so at least I'll be able to do that, and then maybe I workout way of doing the same thing with the computer eventually but it's just frustrating, but more frustrating as I spent the whole morning on it. You know, which is time that I could spend on other things. But, you know, there we go that's that's rock and roll. So this afternoon once I'd done that, I focused on music, again, yes, yes, yes. And so, principally, I was just tying up the current versions of a hole in my heart, and I'm not a jealous guy two songs from my upcoming album, a blind eye to love, so that I can put them in the lab, which is my member's club. This week, or this next week. So, if you want to support me if you want to hear. I think currently has about 30 weeks worth of music in there, then please do come and join the lab because that'd be awesome and then I could share these with you. But, yeah, so, I'm working my way and I'm really determined to, you know, bit by bit worked through that album and get it finished get it finished and get it out. And, you know, move on with other songs is not so much music they want to get through and I'm. As I said yesterday, I'm really so determined to focus on my own music my own art something I've kind of done a little bit of but I feel I've really neglected for the last bunch of years and now it's time to to resurrect that and really kind of fulfil my passion, you know what I really wanted to do and I've been sidetracked by other things. So to that end, I'm also, and this is also part of a business things which I'll come to in a minute, but To that end, I am going to start promoting my music again something I haven't really done. So, I've decided that I'm going to use a sort of three pronged approach. Number one, I'm going to do Facebook ads because I do swear by Facebook ads as a way of getting people to listen to your music, and also, principally sign up to your mailing list, so I can start growing that again. And the second thing is I'm going to have a crack I've never tried this before but getting my songs on radios, but particularly college radio. So I've got a list of radio stations from all over the world, college radio University radios and I'm going to work my way through the stations and see if I can get some play. We'll see. But for that I'm going to focus on my EP grip
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Welcome to Episode 153 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and it is Monday the 16th of November 2020. Now the eagle eyed among you may notice that it's about 10 days later 11 days later than my previous episode, and the even more eagle eyed amongst you will notice that my previous episode The fifth of November was uploaded about two minutes ago. So, in short, I've had no internet for 11 days. And the last episode talks about that but it just would not bloody upload, because I was in the process of uploading it when the internet died, basically, and subsequent to that we've not been able to get internet sorted. We've had fun we've had gains we've had trials we've had pedals. I spent about close to 100 euros on mobile phone cards to get Internet, and it all ran out, and we've been meant to be getting this broadband. And after 10 weeks of waiting. We finally I'm looking right now at a modem is plugged into the wall, they put the socket thing in, and it's connected, and we have broadband. So there's been a long old Wait, but now What it does mean is, I can actually upload episodes again. So if you wonder where I've been if you've been thinking, you know that I've given up with these not true. I just haven't been able to upload them. So what has life been like for the last 11 days. Well, aside from the frustrations of obviously not having a stable Internet, and we there's this public Wi Fi spot in the street somewhere, and we're in lockdown now in Italy setia we're gonna be going out and I managed to find a little spot on the balcony where I can kind of hang over the edge with my phone, connect to this thing, but you get 15 minutes free per week. And so I paid my 30, euros to get one month connection thinking here we go. But it basically just keeps kicking you out so you get a few minutes and then it just disconnects itself. You cannot load anything is dicey whether it lets you use email or whether less use WhatsApp etc So, I've had the tiniest bit of connection, but it hasn't been stable enough to do anything particularly useful with. I mean it's got us by so that's that's the main thing. What I have done is get back to working on music because you know if you can't really do sort of quote unquote proper deep work, using internet. I have Cubase on my computer so I can record music and stuff so I got back to the calendar, my 2021 calendar is basically finished. And so that was the last bit of that project and my plan was, regardless of whether I had internet or not my plan was to then work on my shelved album which is my first my debut full length album which I started probably about four years ago, thinking yeah finishes in a few months, and then for one reason or another. It's basically just been on the shelf and found other things that needed my attention first and blah blah but I really am determined to get back to music as pretty much as my primary focus, which I haven't done, I mean I've wanted to get back to music for a while and I've dabbled a bit, but I haven't made it my primary focus for really some years. So, I am dusted off there's 12 songs in the album's called a blind eye to love, and there are 12 songs. And I started working on one and then second one, so two of them. And when I recorded the album. You know when I recorded all these songs Originally, it was a bunch of years ago and I had certain experiences skill set. But since then, if you've, particularly if you've been if you're in the lab, my private member's club where I share new music every week. You'll have noticed this quite a lot those tracks have got more of an electronic content to them. And I've really been trying to expand my palate, expand my choice of flavours and colours that I can use by embracing a bit more electronic stuff so not just being all bass drums and guitar and vocals. It's quite Classic Rock Band setup, but I'm actually bringing in keyboards and trying to find interesting sounds and basically fill it out a bit. And the beautif
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Welcome to episode one. Hundred and 52 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest, and it is Thursday, the fifth of November 2020. Remember, remember the fifth of November gunpowder treason and lockdown without internet. Yep, you heard that right. So yesterday evening I discovered just in fact, as I was uploading my pot cost that I ran out of internet Because it's locked down now all the phone shops are shot. So we have no mobile internet, and we can't buy anymore from get any more SIM cards which would have been the fourth SIM card this month. To get internet, we did this morning have a text message from fast web to say, we're going to instal your broadband Please click this link to, to sort out which I thought was massively ironic that in order to get broadband, you have to click a link on a text message. Thus you need internet. Ironically. So apparently now there, we did that. And we did find that there's a Wi Fi hotspot, that I've paid 30 euros to be able to access. But it's it's close enough to a house that the signal sometimes gets here, but it's ropey that it disappears and that it kicks us out. And so that's how we managed to get very sketchy internet, the internet saga continues. very sketchy internet. I can't connect to it from my phone or anything like that. It has to be from an extending Wi Fi dongle with an arrow antenna attached to my laptop in a certain part of the flat. And then it's just like old school television reception where you have to call or hang out the window and wave that you know antenna in different directions. I nearly got a picture. So internet is just painfully nearly out of the picture. But fastweb claim that they're going to send us another text message, to then organise to come in and fix a thing or send us a modem and then we fit ourselves, which is probably likely, but I'm guessing we'll take another five or six working days, minimum. So this is Have any bad and kind of good kind of bad because I can't really do the work. I was planning on doing kind of good because I can't really do the work I was planning on doing and therefore, what did I do today? Well, I kind of gave myself permission to kind of do something I wanted to do, which was watch some courses on music production, different tools that I bought recently, plugin software plugins, and these were courses on how to use those that I've been meaning to do for wanting to do for a while. And basically, I'm just gearing myself up to do music production and get back focused on music, maybe do some fiction writing as well or screenplays. So I don't know whether that's what I'll be able to do. That's what I can do whether to get back to internet I sent a proposal to a new client yesterday. I'm saying yeah, let's get started once you are okay with this proposal, and obviously I can't really do anything about that even if they do So it's gonna be an interesting week or so. To see what happens so that is the view from the crow's nest today. I don't know whether I'm going to be able to even get this podcast uploaded. Certainly not tonight, but maybe we'll be able to do it tomorrow. So yeah, if you've got any thoughts on that, hit me up on Twitter at Romeo Crow. Otherwise bear with because that is the view from the crow's nest today. Oh, what Joyce speak to you tomorrow. I hope Toodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 151 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and it is Wednesday the fourth of November 2020, and quite possibly an historic day because it may see the end of Trump's President Trump's reign in America. We can only hope. Anywho, so yeah, today is say things are feeling more positive. Oh, big news as well today. sumana got my, my, my residency. I'm now an official resident of Castro victory and official resident in in Italy, therefore an official resident of the European Union. Therefore, once Brexit happens at the end of the year. I won't have to worry about coming and going in Italy, I should be allowed in so long as I don't live out the country I think for anything more than six months in one go or something like that. So that's excellent. That's really cool and then on Friday, we get, we can get a certificate and with a certificate, we can use that with my British passport my British driver's licence to exchange it for an Italian driver's licence. And then, I think that's all of the admin stuff done except for the broadband. Yes, the internet saga continues. We haven't heard anything from any engineers. So we are still waiting with bated breath for the ironically named fast web to get us connected. I believe there's some sort of lockdown happening and coming I'm not sure what the details are, but hopefully that won't stop fastweb from fastly putting a weapon. We should find out. So that's the, that's the big news. Outside of that, I too cheeky. I bought a couple more software, music software things I bought an upgrade for one piece of software, and I bought another piece of software. Did I need it, possibly not, is it cool Yes it is. And I'm so excited to start using all the software that I've bought recently and everything and basically just getting focused on music. So to that end, I started getting my brain back into it a little bit this morning, Adam training this morning. First thing, damn near killed me. I say first thing I was trying to think quarter past nine was my time. In the end, and by the time I finished that an hour later or circuit training, and he really took out on me and then I had to lie down for 20 minutes on the yoga mat, and then had a shower. And by the time I do that it's pretty much midday anyway, close to it. But then I started focusing a little bit more music this morning kind of trying to get my brain back into that kind of idea. And then in the afternoon, I spend more time doing more, let's say work related stuff so principally I sent a proposal to a new client for audience ninja and new musician. Who should we should be going ahead with pretty much this week, that'd be really cool. That's really positive and that's exactly what we need and hopefully get there man our existing clients, some really good results and that'll help us to bring onboard more clients. So that's positive. And that's, that's pretty much the view from the crow's nest I didn't really wasn't the most dynamic of days. But, you know, you can't win them all, I guess, but it was still not a bad day. And, yeah, just looking forward to get my finger with the music really and locked down and broadband might be perfect partnership to do that with, so we shall see. That's it. If you got anything to feed back any thoughts. If you want to let me know what's happening with you which I like to know, then hit me up on Twitter at Romeo crow. Otherwise I will speak to you tomorrow. Take care of yourself Toodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 150 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest. And today is the third of November, 2020, and it is in was mean his birthday and Simone is birthday, such as the birthday present I care for my wife ego it's a child. And it was a lovely day we had a day off both of us and it was really nice to not stress about the things we need to do the things we should be doing things we want to be doing etc. All of the admin to do with moving here was on hold all of my work was on hold, everything was on hold. And we, we got some new shoes for Leonardo. Yeah, it was mean as birth and some on his birthday but we got new shoes for Leonardo, because he pretty much refused to leave his sandals and his toes have grown over the edge of them and it's I mean it's still 20 degrees here but it's November, and he's still wearing sandals and when we went out a couple of days ago, he got spiked in the foot pipe plan, which drew blood and he still refused to put on proper shoes and we're like right that's it. Now you're going to get shoes. And amazingly, he protested but he eventually wore them, and then he found his sandals again and put them back on but still it was a step forward. That wasn't the highlight of the day. That was just the starting point. And we went to my father in law's for lunch. And yesterday Simona met up with a couple who had contacted us through kind of worldschooling hub basically and they were a German Hungarian couple who were driving with their young children two and a half and 10 months in a camper van, and they basically were driving in south of Italy and wanting to meet up with us. And they driven to 300 kilometres to be in the area that we were, which was very flattering because they really wanted to meet up and some met up with him yesterday and said actually they're really nice couple blah blah and basically invited them to the birthday so today it was a lunch, someone his father asked us for, and this German austro Hungarian couple with them. Their two kids, and they are really really nice couple, and you know when you. You know you had great sense of humour both of them they spoke good English, and you know when you kind of feel like Hang on a minute have we only just met each other because it feels like we've known each other for a long time. So it was really easy pleasant company and conversation. And it was also a lovely thing, you know, a lovely thing for us because certainly one of the things we have missed a lot is socialising. And one of the things that happens a lot I think as you become parents. Maybe not as you become parents but soon as you get older, to a degree, but you kind of stop meeting new people you stop having those kind of random encounters, you know, like for example when you're younger and you go travelling or backpacking or whatever you tend to encounter random people and, you know, bring with them and eat with them and chat with them and, you know, who are you going out to parties and you're meeting with random people. And you kind of lose that in quite a bit when you grow up, or you get a bit older. And so that was really nice to kind of have that again, you know us total random people let's, let's chat and don't know who you are and let's find out. We don't have an awesome way you don't have any mutual friend, you know, often if you do meet someone new, when you're older it's because there's a mutual friend who's introduced you. And so you've got some kind of shared connection there already, but when it's totally random It was really pleasant. It's got a lovely afternoon with him just chilling. The weather as I say was really nice so we ate outside with a beautiful view. If you want to see that it's on my Instagram or Facebook story. But in the old family. What is now. Not a town square but like a, you know, a public part of the civita, the village which is in the mountains. And there's these lovely picnic benches outside what used to be the old family home where the park t
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Welcome to Episode 149 of my podcast interview from the crow's nest. And it is Monday second of November, 2020. Today, today was it is Monday, so it's getting back to normal and trying to get back on with work and trying to sort things out some reason we were really tired this morning, maybe it was all the fresh air of yesterday, but took a little while to get going. And it's the beginning of the month. So, that means, the first thing to do is sort out financial stuff and, you know, Tally everything up and send out invoices and all of that business. That pretty much took up a good few hours of my morning, my desktop computers stopped downloading anything, and I can't get the second monitor to work and it's right pain so I went back to my laptop, and at least I've got a second monitor my laptop is working with a laptop just fine. So, that took me a while to reconfigure my desk and get everything ready for that. And then I spent a little bit of time learning which I haven't done in a while, which is always very enjoyable. Photography there's a programme called Adobe Lightroom, which is what I use to edit most of the photos, and then between Lightroom and also another programme called Adobe Bridge. They are like, often used by photographers because you can catalogue and put your photos in order and tag and geo locate and all that stuff, stuff that I've never done. So I thought today right let me get my head around Adobe Bridge and what I should be doing for my workflow, because I want to take it more seriously that Sofia wants to do more stuff. And, you know, release more photos. And so I thought it would probably be wise to start getting myself a bit more professionally minded with my workflow so I spent a bit of time doing that. And then, then I did all the other stuff financial stuff, checking out some stuff for clients, looks like we've got another client coming and war for audience ninja which is really excellent another musician, which is exactly what we want. So, that's cool and also much needed revenue as well so that's positive. And then I downloaded a couple of new tools, new toys musically, some software. So, I was they were given away free which is great and they're both really really good. One of them is a company that did a recording of the British, the BBC Symphony Orchestra. So it's like orchestral sounds basically and it sounds fantastic. And the other one is like, kind of keyboard sounds bass cures whole old keyboard stuff, but their idea was that straightaway you just get cool sounds which you kind of can feel inspired by. And so I thought, let me just see and True enough, I wrote a little short very short piece of music by taking a drum beat from my new little birthday present that I bought myself, which was various different drum beats and different styles. So this was a jazz beat, and then that new keyboard plugin I put this kind of like whirly keyboard thing which sounds really cool and kind of chilled and Jazzy, and then with the BBC Symphony Orchestra wrap. Let's try with that so I put a little. Some cellos in, and then a bit of horn. And it sounds really cool. So, that was a a successful test of these new toys and be good because it means I reset up my music stuff so I can write again and see, it's just a reminder okay how do I plug everything in how's it work okay yep. Now, um, you know that helps me to slowly get my head back into the music game which is what I really want to do so. Today we also bought my insurance my health insurance, which now opens up, me being able to get my residency. So hopefully I'll get my residency and possibly even this week, we found out about transferring my driver's licence to an Italian one that may well be able to do that a bit more easily than we thought. I mean still jumping through hoops they'll still be costs, but we might be able to go direct to the kind of like motor, Office of the region rather than going through driving schools and third parties and whatnot, whi
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Welcome to Episode 148 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and it is Sunday the first of November, and the eagle eyed amongst you will notice that I have missed not one, two episodes, and I haven't missed one episode in previous hundred and 47 episodes. So what gives. Well, two days ago Friday night, I was really low. I really low. And one of the reasons I was really close I had no internet, so I wasn't able to do an episode because literally I wasn't able to upload it at all. I guess I probably could have recorded it, but even then, the app that I use otter.ai requires an internet connection to record properly or at least to annotate properly. So, I couldn't even do that but yeah, no, I was I was feeling bad, like, really, really feeling bad drained beaten from every angle, and I was really struggling really really was. And as a consequence, I wasn't in the mood to do an episode and now internet and that really put me down. So that was that day. Then yesterday Saturday the 31st of October. I think I started the day feeling very low so I woke up again still feeling really low still without internet. And then, bit by bit Samana coaxed me back to life. It's amazing what a bit of TLC and cuddles will they. And then, around mid morning the internet started working because on Friday we bought a new internet card like yet another for my phone. And that started work, we bought it on Friday I started working around midday on Saturday and I started feeling amazingly much better with connectivity. So then I spent the rest of my Saturday, trying to get the second monitor working on my computer because I got two monitors they worked fine for seven years when I was in London. I gave my computer and my monitors to my parents they didn't work at all. And then when I've got them here they only one kind of works. Long story short, I think I need to reinstall Windows ball like but, so be it if that's if that brings both monitors back on line. The Monitors work the cables work. I just can't get them working at the same time. So, pitchy I spent like six hours on the monitors yesterday, which is overkill except it really speeds up my workflow to have two monitors. Really really does. So, it's worth it in the long run. Anyways, I kind of had to take my foot off the gas Friday. And I was very disappointed about that, then kind of needed to take my foot off the gas yesterday and it wasn't so disappointed about that and then in the evening. It was Halloween and Halloween This means favourite festival. And it was really dry because we can go out Trick or Treat him last year we did I did a whole treasure hunt thing at night in Jupiter and Jupiter's not spooky but it's like an old village in the mountains. It's a really ideal place to trick or treat and we had friends down from Ischia, and lots of kids and, yeah, it was really cool. And this year, we can do anything because there's basically locked down more or less and. So, game over. And we had this plan that we're going to do decorations and all of this and we were going to trick or treating in each room and none of that came to fruition the day just kind of came on when sim did wonders once again with organising stuff towards me getting my citizenship and my driver's licence and the insurance and all of that stuff and blah blah blah. But when it came around to the end you know like having stuff organised for Halloween we were just so behind the ball, and it got about 5pm and we hadn't done or started anything to like right. We must tidy. And if we tidy then we can do something. Long story short, we managed to get the kids involved in the tidying well mean it was easy enough Leonardo didn't really do too much, but we tidy it up a bit more we got rid of some stuff. And then some made some food and we simply mean lay the table instead of the table we decided we're going to watch and it was our first family meal, our family film on our TV for 14 plus months. And we watched the new Ghostbusters f
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Welcome to Episode 147 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest and it is Thursday, 29th of October 2020. Feeling better than I was yesterday and I don't really know why. So, bit of a strange one. And oddly enough, I didn't get working until late again today, but I chose to take it a bit easier this morning on myself I spent a bit more time with kids. I did some Tai Chi something I haven't done in quite some time. And, yeah, then I spend a bit of time with the kids and doing some homeschool II type stuff with Mina. And just in a better just in a better mood, basically. Then I tried to work in the afternoon I got some things done a lot. I guess Simona went out this morning she got my fiscal code my tax ID for Italy. So that's a really good step forward, she got quotes on insurance which we need in order to get my residency. So that's a really good step forward hopefully you're only here, a day or so away from getting the insurance and then I could get my residency maybe even on Monday and they'll give it to me same day in theory. We got her bank her Italian IRA ban which allows us to do something really important which is order broadband internet again and hopefully actually get it this time. And she also found out by exchanging my driver's licence and got that emotion of over, take a while and I need to get my residency first. So, actually a lot of a lot of moving forward with admony type stuff which is really important and has been weighing on us a bit. And then, yeah, workwise again and I'm still having trouble the internet I still can't download stuff I need to download which is just a bit of a pain, but had no I just allow myself to take it easier I guess today. And that's it, that's all I got nothing else really to report. Plus, I really need the toilet so I'm gonna end this now. So there's a view from the crow's nest today. If you've got anything on that then hit me up on Twitter at Romeo crow. Otherwise I will speech in tomorrow and see what happens in, who knows, doodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 146 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. And it is Wednesday the 28th of October 2020 challenging dates, they were challenging. I. We had a training this morning with our personal trainer and that was fine. But as is always the case by the time that finished you know Simona had her session that I had my session then had a shower. You know, it's like half 11 in the morning and the whole morning is gone. And then, mama went out with the kids. So theoretically I can really focus on work but instead, I had to our broken to our phone call, like over 20 different calls because the with, with my brother, because he was on a train, and it kept cutting. Whoops, I just dropped a guitar. And then someone was calling and then. And by the time all that happened and I tried to get anything done et cetera et cetera it's like 330, you know, and I hadn't even started working, and I just got into quite a bad mood. Because I'm just not getting anywhere with anything, at least it feels like a really I'm not. And then I had some bad news regarding an investment today or potentially bad news. About a month ago a bit longer. Actually, We had a news that one of our investments that had grown to be about 25% of what we've got. And that's probably gone, and then today I found another 20, another investment then grown to about 25% is also quite possibly gone as well. And it just comes at the same time that, you know, there's no business coming in, got my money but money streaming out. You know, I've got to get health insurance which is going to cost me a few hundred euros. Before I can get my residence here and then that will cost you know there's always like 2030 euros for this or 2030 euros for the stamp or this or the other and it will cost another hundred plus euros. And it's just, it's just never ending it's just constant at the minute from every angle. So, and then print chief above all of it I think I feel fine I feel generally quite optimistic or fine if I was getting anything creative and personal done you know any music any writing, you know anything about I'm really not so I'm feeling. I'm feeling. Yeah, no flow and like it's all happening from every angle and I'm struggling to to cope basically not cope massively strong but I'm struggling to keep positive. On top of everything and it will pass. The main thing is that we've all got our health. And, you know, we will always have a roof over our head and food on the table and eventually fucking internet. And then when that happens. I'm running water and electricity as well. And gas. But when that happens we finally get broadband and because the internet's ropey as well it's going to my phone and it's not working properly and it's gonna take another couple of weeks. Minimum before we can get broadband, this saga is going to take like two, two and a half months to get broadband into this place. So, you know, he'll happen they all come out here and next year will be different and blah blah but at the moment it's challenging it really is. So, yeah, I had a bit of a better afternoon for the last couple hours at least I was doing some stuff but not for me but for a client. You know, which is necessary and you know I want them to get good results, but again it's, it's not really where I'm wanting to be. So, that is the view from the crow's nest today, possibly even bleaker than yesterday's view. Tomorrow's another day. Let's see what happens tomorrow. That's all I got. How was your day. Let me know that Romeo crow on Twitter. Otherwise I'll speak to you tomorrow. Toodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 145 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. And it is Tuesday the 27th of October 2020. And, yeah, I'm frustrated today. I've been struggling the last couple of days struggling to focus. Struggling to be motivated but principally, I think I'm feeling overwhelmed again there's so many projects so many things I'm trying to do and I'm not, I don't feel like I'm achieving any of them and certainly I don't feel like I'm getting any creative stuff done. Which is frustrating I forgot to say in yesterday's podcast I woke up yesterday morning with a film idea in my head. And it's kind of like a cross between groundhog day and day after tomorrow like a romantic sci fi disaster film. And because I think it's quite good idea is quite cool. I won't go into more detail but um yeah we'll come with that and then of course, I found other things I needed to do with my day important things. And didn't get round to doing anything about it and won't get around to doing anything about it for a long time. So I'm feeling frustrated because ideas come songs come stuffs waiting for me to work on, and I'm just not making the time to do it, which would be okay if I was at the same time, you know, getting other things done or moving projects forward big time. But I don't feel that I am that at all. I think it's this particular period these last couple of months, there's just been a lot of upheaval. A lot of things that really were important took up, immediate time like moving house and all of the associated things with that and all the things about trying to get my residency transferred and blah blah blah. And so, yeah, of course valid, you know valid reasons. But it doesn't stop me feeling like I'm not getting anywhere like come, swimming, but just treading water effectively. So, yeah that's that's the view from the crow's nest today I didn't really feel like I did anything I mean, the day started late anyway and then I had a zoom call with a potential supplier for worldschooling hub. And then by the time that finished is basically lunchtime and then you know time does disappears and tomorrow morning I'll have training with Abdel my trainer. And by the time that's all done dusted it'll be kind of late morning close to lunch and in the day will seem to have disappeared again so I feel I want a bit of a groundhog day a bit of a treadmill and don't really feel like I'm making progress. Although sure I am making progress, but it just doesn't feel like it. So that's B. That's my day. Nothing more to add. If you're about on Twitter and you want to add something hit me up at Romeo Crow, otherwise I will be back tomorrow and who knows, maybe all things will be different than Toodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 144 of my podcasts that hear from the crow's nest, and it is Monday the 26th of October 2020. Today was a sort of semi day off or accidental semi day off. It was on a bit of a quest. So, we have a few admin hurdles and hoops to jump through so I need to transfer my residency to Castroville array to this part of it today, and I need to do it before the end of the year, because I need to make sure that I'm still able to come and go within the EU once UK leaves the EU once Brexit happens. And being a resident gives me that ability. And so, I will we were told that to become or we found out that to become a resident as a foreigner, I have to have private health insurance. And so, the council said you need this right you can go to the post office where they've got private health insurance and get it from there. Okay, great. So today we went to the post office, and after an hour there abouts. They didn't know what we were talking about but they were really helpful they did their best. The what they came up with was. You can't get private health insurance or this private health insurance because you don't have your tax code. But I can't get my tax code, until I have residency status. And I can't get residency status until I have health insurance. I can't get health insurance. So I've got a tax code, and you can see how the loop goes round and round it's because Italy. So, at least, to be fair, the ladies in the post office were really trying to help, and not be rude like you'd normally get in this kind of situation. But that was a good hour and a bit of basically wasted. So, then we went on to the next thing was just sort out the internet because on Saturday I ran out of internet 10 days into my 30 day plan. And I use some monitors now she's down to about 20 Meg's right nothing. And we really need broadband data and we ordered broadband six weeks ago, and they've been delivering and dicking around and now they're telling us the ninth of November is ridiculous. So we thought let's go elsewhere. So long story short, we spent another hour and a bit in Photoshop, looking at different broadband phone packages and the guy again was really helpful was really nice guy, and he actually gave me, I mean gave me for free a sim like a SIM card to get internet just as a temporary measure, which was really nice because he could have charged us. But, and so now I've got internet which is wonderful. I've got hundred gigs, which I imagine can't write will last me a few weeks. But now we've got we've decided on getting an unlimited mobile internet but now I'm thinking actually is to slow the downloads and upgrades about 23 Meg's and the uploads only about one Meg of what I need is too slow. So we still need to get broadband put in, and there are only two players including the one who are dicking around so now he might need to go to the ones who dicking around, But we read, we think the reason that wasn't working is because we didn't have an Italian I ban. Listen to my podcast of a couple of days ago but now we've sorted that out and it's just everything is just hoops and hurdles and bureaucracy and pain and no one does what they say they'll do and they, you know, the salespeople lie their asses off constantly. When we took the broadband six weeks ago we also took gas and electricity as part of the package, and they said yeah there's no cost, there's no setup costs, there's no additional costs, oh okay cool yeah no no we waive the costs. Great. We don't charge anything up front. Okay, great. First build the electricity comes in and they've got 50 pound extra on it, so I was that it's like, oh, that's the connection fee, like you said there were no costs. You weren't gonna charge us No we didn't charge you upfront, we just added the connection fee to your first bill, little bastard man. And that's just it that's how they do things here, which is something I still have to get used to. Because in the UK. They don't really do it like that
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Welcome to Episode 143 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest and it is Sunday, the 25th of October 2020. Yeah. So today, it was frustrating very frustrating because I, I wanted to put my attention on audience ninja specifically on one of our clients who were running some ads for. And our only client and we're running ads for, and they're musician. And so, I really want to get these right and one of the guys on the team has been running the ads, and this is the first time I've got to see how he is running ads, and I'm not convinced that we've got the right approach, I think maybe we need a slightly different approach because it's a musician rather than necessarily a business. So I wanted to have a crack at it today. And the problem is this artist is hip hop artist whose videos which we use for the ads are all her drinking and smoking and partying with our friends and on Facebook the videos keep getting stopped by Facebook because you can't show tobacco products or smoking you can't show drinking how car, etc etc. So he's been really frustrated because we called a conch couldn't get them going. And then I had the problem that the internet on my phone died. So I ran out of internet. It started on the 15th. So now, that's a bit of a bugger. But hopefully in the next couple of days we're going to be able to get broadband ordered and hopefully set up within about a week so we'll see but either way I need to get some internet tomorrow. And so using submodels Internet, and it's just been really slow. And then I was thought I had an idea of changing the video by putting like an overlay over the video so that Facebook didn't ballet and saying, you know, watch the uncensored video over and blah blah blah. That's a good idea. So then I tried to open the Adobe video editing products I've got. And this is my old computer from back home and it's not been updated. And then they weren't working and then did a long story short, just to try and get to the point where I might be able to even edit the videos. Having already got these ads up and then been taken down, etc. It was about like six hours of work. Like, it just took all day and I still haven't managed to do it so basically I worked all day and got nothing done like literally just didn't move the needle at all. So really frustrating. On the plus side, did move some furniture around did tidy up the kids room a bit. So you know we're still in this unpacking and moving stuff around phase to try and get everything fit in. And right this minute, it's 10 to 11 in the evening, although it feels like 10 to 12 because the clocks went back for whichever it is this morning, Sims finishing moving the final boxes in the bedroom, finding places for those. So, by tomorrow. We should hopefully How many have mess in the lounge basically pushed up against the side of the lounge so there'll be a big improvement and a good start to the week, and then also tomorrow. We're going to hopefully so the internet and the broadband, we're going to get my inch health insurance because I need that before I can get my residency, and then hopefully Tuesday, we'll be able to open an Italian bank account with an Italian high band, which will allow us to get broadband and registered for that. Hopefully I'll have my health insurance I'll be able to go to the council and get my residency that I could get my, my tax code as well as an Italian tax code, and then hopefully I'll be able to get my driver's licence transferred over to an Italian one. And if and when we can do all of those. That's, that's big admin done like that. That's that'll be huge. There'll be so many things out of the. Yeah, that and tidying up the house getting rid of stuff you know. Next week is gonna be admission just to get rid of all this stuff that's now parked in the lounge, you know whatever cheap. Throw it away, give it away whatever just get rid of it. So, hopefully by the end of next week, we'll have done. Finally, all of the admin hoops and
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Welcome to my podcast episode 142, and it is Saturday the 24th of October 2020, it's not strictly true it's actually Sunday the 25th, but I didn't do it last night because I was so tired, so I've got an up and I'm gonna do last night, then this evening I'll do today's exciting. And so yesterday was a slight, slight change of the day because I actually spent most of the day working rather than rather than tidying and unpacking as has been the previous basically five days. And it was pretty good day, but very good day I woke up to find that somebody had bought one of my calendars, which is great so it's nice to wake up to purchase which is brilliant. And then I budget no no I didn't wake up until about nine I sent out an email about my calendar about voting for my calendar, and somebody, replied or somebody bought the calendar straight off the back of that which was really really cool. So, that was nice to see two things one sports and banner Canada which brilliant and to that you know when you put in a little bit of effort, or you know you do something and people react to it, and I sent out an email to say you know if you have voted please do vote on your favourite photos or somebody bought it. And so that's really cool, really chuffed about that. And then I promised my brother, I would do some Facebook ads for him for a product of his has just been launched in the states it's been out in the UK for August several years, and now it's just been launched in the states in Amazon. And so he wanted to see if we could get a bit more traffic to Amazon to happen. And so, I ran some Facebook ads for him. And it seems I could be, we could be wrong, but it seems that we might have made a couple of sales straightaway on it which would be really positive because, you know, it been out a few weeks it's sold a few items but it's got no promotion so no one knows to look for it or to find it. And if the case is that we run a few ads and we've generated some sales, that it was more than five quite a bit more than we spent on the ads and obviously that's really exciting potential new so we'll monitor that over the next week or so and see what happens. But um, so that was really really cold really chuffed about that. And then I replied to emails I've got my emails from or some of my emails one of my inbox is down from 100 to about 60, I think, and amongst that I was replying to people who would very kindly reply to my emails when I send out newsletters. A couple of weeks ago, and that week and I hadn't really hadn't got around to replying to everybody. And I do feel overwhelmed is not the right word, but out of sorts and not in control when my inbox go you know go skyrocketing. Because I like to be on top of everything it just clears my head. And so it was really nice to clear some emails, but also, I felt really thankful that. Can I spending time writing to you know various different people who, a lot of them I've spoken to quite a bit over the years, you know, back and forth emails, and so yeah that I felt like we know each other. And I felt really privileged that this is the kind of level of, you know, relationship I have with some of the people on my list or some of my fans some of my friends online. And, you know, I was just, yeah, very happy that people basically care about my art and care about what I'm doing in my little corner of the world which is looking out the window currently raining although yesterday was a quite a nice day a bit windy, but still, I think. The sun has disappeared now for about 24 degrees yesterday I think today and onwards, it's going downhill, but I should really talk about today because that's the latest podcast, and, but for all of that, I did feel a little bit of a plea was not the right word is Lowe's not right word but maybe motivated, I saw a video from one of my friends that I knew in London, very talented, very talented singer songwriter, called Dan Olson, who has just done I believe like the world's first
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Welcome to Episode 141 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and it is Friday 23rd of October 2020. And guess what I did today yes that's right so bloody boring. I tidy stuff started continuing to put stuff away. But don't actually, I had a personal training session this morning, it was conditioning so circuit training and first half was challenging the second half was a bit easier on each circuit. So, If I'm getting fitter or what but it was definitely put me through our paces. And a nice way to start the day, and then carry on with, you know, unpacking and tidying so now here's the status I've set up the drum kit, it fits in the music room along with the piano. And there's a bit of space to spare so that's really encouraging to me pretty quite a long time to get it set up though. Frustrating the door but that's cool. Then I attacked the bedroom, and we went from about nine boxes down to three or four. And so, and they're much more contained now so that's cool. I also reply to some messages which haven't done for a few days and also bought myself my 40th birthday present. Yes, I splurged on some music software. but I can't actually use it well I can use it on my laptop I can't use it on my desktop computer because I can't download Cubase, the music software that I use that I need to connect it to, I can't download it, because I don't have enough internet because I'm still on poxy phone internet limited to 65 gigs a month and Cubase itself is 60 gig download and that's before I've downloaded all the extra stuff. So, I also in very bad Italian. Try to find out what's going on with our broadband, and then I found a couple of other offers online for different broadband and also different mobile phone providers who provide unlimited apparently internet. So possible to smaller I found an online Italian online bank, because we might be having trouble because we don't have an actual Italian bank account. So, in Italy they charge you like hundreds of euros a year to have a bank account whereas in the UK they actually pay you to have a bank account. There's no way I'm paying someone to hold my money for me. Ridiculous. So that's why an online free kind of bank account, there are some, I knew there would be because the world has changed in the last bunch of years and surely it is not that far behind. And so hopefully we'll get something like that sorted and then now is the pain towards getting broadband, in some way or unlimited in installing this place even if it's through my phone. And that's, that's basically it it's just the same old, same old. No creativity, no creative projects. Businesses dead because of not doing anything for it. Quite directly in that sense. But yeah, that's the view from the crow's nest today so short and sweet. If you've got anything to add to that or want to anything then hit me up on Twitter at Romeo crow. Otherwise I'll speak to you tomorrow. Take care of yourself to pit and good night.
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Welcome to Episode 140 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest, and it is Thursday. The. What is it, the 22nd of October, actually. Friday, 10 past 12 and nine are in the morning, but I'm going to go with Thursday 22nd. And today I had high hopes of finishing the house, as I write and read in the bedroom, and I did music room, and then similarly the kitchen. The kids room and what will be done. And instead, I managed to set up my desk in my computer, and that's pretty much all I managed to do all day and update my computer. It just took so blindingly long, and well I really, I feel good low because all I really think it is so much to do. I'm surrounded by mess. That's fine with us after a few days. Got truckloads of emails sitting waiting for my attention, and I need to move things forward, projects, creative stuff with music with business. We go than when we just we just jettison so much money in the last month or so, with regards to this movement related things. And we have zero income. And it's like, oh man, maybe working on tidying up doesn't help alleviate that problem. So I'm feeling a little bit a little bit stressed, I guess. Also, boy do I ache from yesterday's session without them tomorrow morning. I've got the next one, I'm sure be separate training. I don't think I could do any anything with my chest or shoulders because they're just, yeah. Yeah, that's it. I mean that's the view from the crow's nest that's kind of all I did, getting annoyed about the internet situation, I got my computer running which is great everything's, you know, working which is great except, after all the software updates and Cubase was a working side and installed it and went to a sort of new one and then realised that Cubase is the music production software I use, and then realise that I can't instal the new Cubase because it's 22 gigs and I've only got 22 gigs of internet left to last me until the 15th of next month. And there it is now they're the 22nd or the 23rd. So basically, I'm screwed for Internet, And I can't download all the other museum related stuff because they're all very memory intense. So that's just frustrating. Just simple things that we tried to get it sorted six weeks ago we ordered it, and they just dicking around, and welcome to Italy. So, yeah, that's the crow's nest. So a GFI today it's all about knitted today. If you're bound Twitter. Government tell me some good news at Romeo Crow, otherwise. Either way, I will speak to you tomorrow Toodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 139 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. And it is Wednesday 21st of October 2020. Today, guess what I was doing. That's right. I was tidying and unpacking unpacking and tidying tightening and unpacking. We had all our stuff delivered from the UK storage yesterday, and the place looked like a bomb site and now allows doesn't look too bad, our bedroom looks like a complete bomb site. But everything is slowly making its way into, you know interposition so tomorrow will be another day. Hopefully I'll get in the bedroom I will get the bedroom sorted tomorrow, and potentially the music room, and hopefully Simona will get the kitchen sorted with all the kitchen stuff, and then maybe we can attack the kids bedroom, and then we'll be done, then we'll have all our stuff in one place for the first time in years. So very exciting. And that's to my whole day. This morning I had a training session with my with my personal trainer, Carlos Fenix callisthenics coach Abdel, and we tried to do so well we did do some calisthenic movements. First, and vice it to say that I could hardly get my ass off the ground, literally, really challenging. And then after that we relaxed, quote, unquote, with some really hard, chest and shoulder exercises based around a kind of dips and lifting legs off the ground and all that stuff. And basically just destroyed me, like, the whole day. Also I guess yesterday I spent, pretty much 12 hours solidly lifting and carrying stuff and moving stuff in boxes and furniture. And then I didn't get a particularly good sleep last night, and then today kicking off with those kind of exercises, is just yeah shattered me, but I've plotted through got the rest of the day. You know done and so we're getting there, and that's gonna be very glad when all this is done and dusted and we've kind of got our place. You know, back. And with our stuff in it which be super cool very looking forward to that. But it does mean that I have spent no time on any kind of business or creative stuff. And I really need to. That's basically it. I found out today. What I found out but it looks like an investment that we made a couple of years ago, was turned out to be a Ponzi scheme we'll see but it looks like all of that money has been joint and disappeared. So that's a kind of a really feel any, I don't feel good or bad about it. Amazingly, though we do really, you know, it's just ones and zeros on the screen and we wouldn't have cashed it in now anyway so probably doesn't really make that much difference in the grander scheme of things, it probably won't, but it does remind me that I should you.
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Welcome to Episode 138 of my podcasts, the view from the crow's nest, and it is Tuesday the 20th of October, 2020, and it's a big day today because today was the day that we had all of our stuff shipped over or arrived rather from shipping over from the UK. And if you want to see the results of that, then have a look at my Instagram or Facebook story for today, because I documented it all for your enjoyment, or pain, depending on which side you're looking at it as it wasn't too bad we unloaded the, the truck and unloaded the lorry took about 45 minutes, half hour to unload the lorry. And then within two hours to the minute we got everything off the lorry and everything in the flat. And there was a lot of stuff in the flat. In the in our apartment. And then I spent the rest of the day. That was basically midday, and then I spent the rest of the day, sorting through stuff and empty boxes. I built my, my old computer desk, which is a really nice still nice big office desk I mean it's 20 years old, or more, but it's still in really good condition and it's lovely tablet, big desk again and I'm not upset at it yet, but I've got my old chair, my old office chair, nice comfortable swivel chair. That's lovely to have I built the piano. it fits in our little storeroom which is going to be the music room. Tomorrow I'm gonna see if I can get the drum kit to fit around it and we'll see if I can be super awesome and put the TV on the stand and I'm watching TV this evening, which is just awesome to have our TV back which is, yeah, which is really cool cuz we haven't had obviously haven't had our TV since we left London, and we miss it is nice to have a nice big TV. The kids are gonna love it tomorrow. Had some toys for the kids, old toys but also I've got a couple of toys. Article my mom to pick them up and she shipped them over. So they had some new toys which they were super excited to play with, which is really cool. And they were just fabulously excited to have everything here, bookshelf our library is now looking really good we got all our books back so we've now got our travel section, we've got a health the martial arts section, got music section. Got business and writing section of photography and the kids books is cool. I'm so chuffed. And so, there's still quite a lot of stuff still to deal with. Not sure how we can fit all of this stuff where we're going to fit it, but that is my forte. And also you know we want to be getting rid of a lot of this furniture I mean we've got now the two cot beds or kids beds, from London which we don't need at all. So we need to sell those. And then other furniture in this flat make some more space. But, yeah, so that was my entire day. As you can expect, but I'm really, really chuffed because not only do we get it all, not only is it all in perfect condition, which is good because it cost me 1700 and 50 euros to bring it over, but also actually 1900 euros has already paid on previously. But it's all in Universal so fine which is great, Christmas decorations of Christmas tree, which we were going to get rid of when we left London but then we thought I'll put it in storage you never know. And we certainly didn't know that a year later we're going to be using at Christmas in Castroville that we did not see coming. Yeah, it's nice it's exciting to have stuff back you know start you know, it was never meant to be home, but last year we were just visiting and it was convenient. But now, at least in my mind it's really starting to, to become home and be, you know, be a long term home. And we had for lunch. There was really nice sunshine is about 20 degrees. And we had lunch on the balcony and sat there with the sun on us and it's got a really pretty view. We're very fortunate we like on the edge literally on the edge of the town and a bit higher than the rest of the town. So you can see the mountains to the left. On the left, straight head and on the right as well. So it's really pleasant to sit there and
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Welcome to Episode 136 of my podcast review from the crow's nest. And it is Monday the 19th of October 2020. And so my last two days have been nice and productive. And I was, didn't get out of bed without plan. And I focused on two or three important things that really make a difference in the long run, and dealt with them one at a time. And it was good. And today, I was in bed, I had a plan. And I didn't manage to do any of it at all. So my great routine last days, and then it kind of failed here, I have my training session, leg day, which is always fun. And then I had a zoom meeting for an ID check provider for worldschooling hub, which I went into a bit yesterday, if you want to listen to that to get more of an idea of what I'm talking about. And so that when well. And actually, you know that we may well use this service, I've got I think one or two more kind of video called demos to go with other providers. And then by the end of this week, I'll make a decision. Hopefully next week, I'll implement. And then the following week, we'll be ready to start bringing people on board, which will be brilliant. So I guess that was good, that is an important move forward. But all the other things that I had in mind to do, I couldn't get my I couldn't get my mind. And I just I think maybe I needed a bit of break or time off, I don't know. And we needed to get water, because we can go to supermarket and buy bottled water which we have been doing. But there's fresh mountain water to be gotten from cunningly enough the mountains, about 20 minute drive. And so we often collect soda bottles, and then refill them all there. And it's lovely water and healthier, and you're not buying as much plastic etc. So I said all I'll go get them because I one wanted to get house. And two, it was kind of it was raining and cloudy. But they were still sunny beyond the clouds. And so there were glimpses of really interesting light on the mountains, the peaks around us. And I thought to myself, you know, maybe I should get out and just try and find a spot for taking some photos and do some photography practice, which is equally as important or important. If you want to get better at photography, you must practice and the weather conditions little or they might lend themselves nicely to some interesting photos. So I will spend probably a good hour and a half finding a goats and a shepherd who wanted to talk and talk and talk. And also well and good. And maybe I've got some interesting photos, maybe not. Not really too sure. But it was really good. I enjoyed playing around trying to improve my understanding or knowledge or whatever and take some good photos. So we'll see how they came out. And then basically got water came back. And it was even time dinner and then cleaned or tidy it out the lounge because tomorrow some point between eight and 10am apparently, now stuff from the UK arrives. So needed to make a lot of space because I think we have a lot of stuff literally a truckload. And, I mean, we're just gonna get it into the lounge and then deal with it over the next week or two. It's gonna be quite colossal task, I think. But now that that's all ready. And so yeah, that's really going to be my focus for next few days. Certainly tomorrow is gonna be moving furniture around and discovering stuff we have and trying to find homes for sale and all of that stuff so fun and games to come. And then it's the view from the crow's nest today. Nice and simple and nice and quick. If you got any thoughts on that, feel free to share them on Twitter at Romeo Crow. Otherwise I will see you tomorrow. Probably sounding rather more tired than I am now. I'm pretty tired now. doodle bit
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Welcome to Episode 135 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest, and it is Sunday the 18th of October 2020, and I've just spent two and a half hours on the phone to my brother. And so this one's gonna be quick, because I want to get to bed at 10 past 11 tired, had a good day today are built on yesterday's Good day, by doing something really simple, which is staying in bed, the whole day no yesterday and today I didn't get out of bed until I'd made a plan for the day but not like a whole plan of 2pm I'm gonna do this or bla bla, much more simple. I literally just thought, Okay, what is the one thing that if I achieve today focus on and achieve and get finished today, I can finish in the whole day. And then, therefore no matter what else happens with my day. I feel like I've achieved something and now be good. And of course I came up with four things. So you left out. But no, the idea was the least that very main thing. And then the second the third things might have been like, because I knew that the first thing wouldn't take me all day and I'd select time, and then maybe the third or fourth thing we're just bonuses if I go round to it, and actually got three of those four things done. So, I felt like yeah, I want the whole day but in fact probably that's why I felt good because I work the whole day and I really focused and, you know, got important things done so. The my calendar. The 2021 wall calendar of my photography. Yesterday I put up 22 photos on Facebook for people to pick the top 13 that will make it to the calendar I've already edited the photos. So they're basically ready to go. And then today. I did the months like the the actual you know the calendar part of it. So I got all of those 12 months ready. And I placed them in the template that you'd use for the printers. And so they're done, so that's brilliant, the calendar once those 13 are picked I can put them in the template and basically it's ready to go to the printers and Bosch, so I'm very chuffed about that because that's like a big project. Very nearing completion, and I've done definitely the bulk of the hardware there. Then the next thing was the second big thing, which was the world schooling hub which has been on the back burner for the last bunch of months. And if you don't know what that is. It's. Eventually, the idea will be it's a platform a suite of tools that are there to help world schoolers principally with things like connecting with other world schoolers and with educating their kids, which is the travelling, here are the two things really that world school is all about. And so I built a platform. Earlier this year, which basically if you imagine it's like Google Maps, but instead of pins being places pins of people, and then you click on someone's profile, and then they've got a telegram link and you click that and you can start dropping a message. And the idea being that you can basically find people near where you are or where you're travelling to or whatnot. Amazingly, no one has built anything like that before we needed it so I built it. And then, then, just as pretty much as I built it coronavirus happened everyone stopped travelling and then other things took precedence. So now I want to re. Earlier we want to bring that out again. And the idea was that we would eventually it was free but we would offer a membership, an annual membership. And part of that membership would get you secure like a Id check basically. And then if you had your ID checked then you'd have a badge next to you to say that you'd been ID checked, and therefore other people might see that say oh I only want to meet up with people who ID checked I better get my ID checked and therefore I will join the, the membership for the site and get the other benefits as well but that's a really good one. So that was the plan, and then. Recently we decided that actually we were going to offer it for free. We're just going to go straight to the ID checks and straight for the pa
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Welcome to Episode 134 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and it is Saturday the 17th of October 2020. And I'm feeling better than I was yesterday, which is good. Obviously it's nice to feel better. I think the last night or this morning. One of the two but I remembered something so simple, so obvious that you know that helped me today and that is, I realised why I felt so I think I realised partly why I felt so productive or not focused or whatever the last few weeks and I'm not getting anywhere etc etc. and scattered and it's simply because I am too scattered. What a reveal in the sense of. I have been trying to do too many things some things I needed to do some things I wanted to do something I had to do, but just too much stuff and trying to spin too many plates and I forgot that, you know, a few months ago when I was feeling like I was making progress on stuff, the simple reason I think was because I was just focusing on one thing and you know one project really getting that sorted and what have you. And so today, you know this morning I was I right well focus on, you know just just focus on getting the calendar out the way that's the first thing. You know I did it a couple of, you know, a couple of things come after that but you know just focus on that and so I mean, to be fair, I'd kind of almost finished the calendar anyway. But the other thing that made me feel good is that I put it out. I put 22 photos together. out there as a shortlist and I need 13 for the calendar and then I put them as a vote on my Facebook group and then emailed a mailing list to let people know that there's that vote and they can vote which photos they want in the calendar. And I think that also really made me feel better the fact that, you know, putting something out there for people, a bit of work rather than just noise and being sort of visible and active. You know makes me feel better as well. So that really you know that's something that's really helped. And also I like the idea that I'm very close to getting there. Canada kind of out of the way and then I can focus on the next project but I think it's really simple. I just need to remind myself one major project at a time you know that's that's it just focus, get it done, move it out of the way. I know genius right. What news. And he hasn't been the app which was amazing. I woke up before everybody else was similar already been up twice during the night the Leonardo but she was currently asleep because he amazingly went back to sleep or whatever it was six or whatever that he woke up the second time. And so similar in that sleep. So at 10 past seven I woke up I thought okay well I can't just get working because they'll disturb similar because you know my desk is everything's in our bedroom. So what can I do here I thought well we've just bought these bikes secondhand so you know, maybe I'll take the bike out first time because I'm saying you know you really should get out, you really should get some fresh air do some exercise outside and blah blah blah I thought what a. What a lovely way to start the day that'd be great. So we are right on the edge of the biggest National Park in Italy and right next to our apartment is a cycle. by gravelled psychopath or atomic psychopath. That starts literally here, and then goes on for the how many kilometres but he goes into the mountains and then he winds its way through to villages and what. And so it starts up here quite steep goes on for a while that into the mountains and then it kind of levels out. And I thought to myself, well, let me cycle up 15 minutes, see how far I get. And then, you know, and I can cycle down so I set time 15 minutes I'm cycling the bike up and it's hard work really hard work, but I was really pleased I was able to go for 15 minutes. And I got to the top, basically, the main first sections is literally just uphill for 15 minutes, and like a good gradient to not just smoke. So I got to the top and then it started
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Welcome to Episode 133 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. It is Friday the 16th of October 2020. And I'm not feeling quite as long as I was yesterday. After the pain of the removals business and paying 80% more all of a sudden, but I'm not, I'm still not feeling great, I'm not feeling particularly positive or optimistic per se. I'm really struggling to get my focus to get to achieve anything to feel like I'm making any progress with anything, neither business nor creative, and maybe I'm being a bit too scattered I'm not focusing on the right thing. I'm not putting the time in I'm not I don't know what I'm doing really are what I'm not doing this morning, I woke up at 10 past seven, and I exercised first we had our training session. Similar and I with our trainer normally Same goes first at eight o'clock today I went first eight. The idea being that I'd go eight to nine and have a shower and then be ready to work you know shortly after, instead of the other day is Monday, Wednesday, this week where I had in start working to kind of midday after, you know, after I'd waited and then bla bla bla. Anyhow, same deal I don't know how, but I still didn't start work until kind of midday and not even that and I call it work but it's just not even that's not even the right term I'm just kind of doing stuff but not really getting anywhere, then it's gonna make some change I don't know exactly what it is. On a positive note, I, At the end of each day. I've been doing a bit of guitar practice only for about five days or something like that. But my. I try I've style was watching an old looks like an old 80s video from guitarist called Richie kotzen who did a tutorial video called rock chops. It seems in the 80s and I got it off YouTube, and it's a lot of old, old it's a lot of the sort of metal or not metal but I'm kind of Van Halen dream theatre john Petrucci that kind of stuff. And I was never into Van Halen but when I first picked up guitar when I first started learning around when I was 17. I was not so much heavily into the music, but heavily into learning that kind of technique. I had a john Petrucci book called Wild string them. Brilliant name, and another one called rock discipline, and it was all very technical, you know, kind of math rocky type. You know techniques. And I did that for a few years till I went to uni and then I started discovering groove and blues and funk and then applying went in that direction. And I've never really gone back to it. And recently I've been listening to Richie kotzen who has just become my kind of new idol, as it were, because he sings like Chris Cornell, who's dead, he plays all instruments and some writes and produces like prints and he also has a vocal like prints as well he can go from soul to funk to great gritty rock and is a, you know, far superior guitarist is virtuoso. So it's pretty good guy to kind of follow. And, you know, he's quite famous it seems for what's called his legato technique basically using his left hand on the guitar without really needing to use his right hand. So a lot of hammer ons and pull offs and slides and all this kind of stuff so that's what I've been kind of doing and trying to learn a bit of that. And also, a little bit of Van Halen tapping. And so yeah, in the last few days I've been doing that and I've noticed my guitar playing has noticeably improved. You know my interest and my sense of timing has improved my rhythm and my just my ability. So that's definitely positive. And also another positive note, three days ago I wrote a song late at night. And then today I wrote the lyrics for it. So, and did a video of that topic. So that'll be up in the lab. This week I guess. And the story behind it so I did a bit but basically, I think I need to do is really simple I need to just abandon trying to do anything and just do music. And then I'll be happy. Basically, the calendar I was working on a calendar the last couple of days and said yesterday. My 2021 ca
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Welcome to Episode 132 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. It is Thursday 15th of October 2020, and it has been a challenging day, good points. What are the good point, what were the good points today. I finished, 12 photos for the calendar. And then in looking through them. I had a feeling that two of them just weren't up to par. And I showed them to sumana without saying anything and she picked out to them that she felt weren't up to par, and they were the same, which confirms it. So, I've got to try and find a few more photos and see if I can find a couple more that fit, actually three more because I need a back cover as well. So, getting there. My breakthrough with the MIDI controller, listen to yesterday's podcast for controlling photo Lightroom was great, really, really pleased about that still works, treat. So that's positive. And then my day started out by getting stiffed by the mobile phone company. I pay, 10, euros every month, the mobile phone, they send you a text message to say you must stop up on the 15th, or like you know runs out on the 15th. So yesterday my internet actually ran out. That's fine so this morning, top, top 10 pounds. And it worked for two hours till midday and then it stopped working. And then when we eventually got Hold on, they said oh yeah cuz top up starts at midday On the fifth day because, obviously, Italy, you know because anything starts on midday when you talk about a naturally, and therefore the 10 euros that you put in this morning was to last month's beyond doesn't carry over so brilliant, thank you very much for that. It's great. So that's how my day started, and then it just got worse, because the removal company called it I called my dad to say, oh yeah we're gonna pick it up today, even though they're meant to give 24 hours notice. So there was a scramble to get things finished that's fine they got there. And then there was this problem or that problem anyway eventually they loaded all the stuff in the van but told me that it was vastly over the weight limit that apparently my size booking takes. And so instead of 1050 quid. It will be 1800 pounds. So, Helens a bit of a blow, which made my 10 pound loss this morning. You know, much smaller. And it took the driver an extra hour that it should have done so therefore it's an extra 20 pounds. So, just that was just disappointing and then the straw that broke the camel's back, my dad got home afterwards because he had been helping and loading it. The Sterling job, and he said I'm really sorry I realised the lesson stuff in the car. Well, your computer monitor, somehow, my computer shipped over the monitors still in the UK. So, 1800 pounds doesn't actually bother me my monitor. So that's frustrating, and they're really, that was, that was, I mean small in and of itself but they really put me over the edge. So I thought I'd come down by trying to update out Tom Tom from the car. I need to find that, I can't update. So then when I put it back in the car never tried it before I put it back in the car. It gave me a nice warning saying, Oh, you should update this because it hasn't been updated in over two years and 22% of it's probably wrong. Thank you. That's very funny. Well, why don't you pick it up data they want to try. So that's been the day. Couldn't get on with anything useful. First, internet problems or morning, you know, loss of internet and then faffing with the removals thing and then this than the other. We did get a bike for me today so now we will have bikes that bike is now with the bike repair shop because of course, just because we spent 50 euros on a secondhand bike doesn't mean that actually works properly. Apparently, brakes need a couple other things so that's in the bike shop, we'll pick that tomorrow then. All four of us will have bikes and theoretically on Tuesday, the removal company will arrive with our stuff. And then we'll have bike helmets as well. Except meanors which we left in escapes can fit in th
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Welcome to Episode 131 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest It is Wednesday the 14th of October 2020 straighting day to day kick off the day with session with personal trainer Abdel, and it was good. Chest upper body and, you know, it was good I'm getting stronger It was challenging etc. But basically, by the time, same thing as Monday by the time, I'd done it and then waited that a shower, washed and blah blah blah. It was like midday so basically the whole morning is gone, which is just frustrating when there's so much that I'd like to do and be the needs doing. And those two things aren't necessarily the same. And so that was a bit annoying and then this afternoon I don't know it's just a very, very busy. Afternoon not really much fella normally much, much got done, despite the fact that I was working I mean after I guess. By the time it was midday and then it was lunchtime and then it was by the time I got to work it was kind of two o'clock or 230 or something like that. And really wasn't in my most dynamic frame. I did, I did do something very cool. I'm very excited about because this is my life right now, and I was working in Lightroom which is the Adobe programme for editing photos so I'm sorting out the calendar for my 2021 calendar. And it occurred to me that maybe there was a controller that might make working like room, more speed up the workflow. So controller with dials or knobs or something like that. And there'll be a lot quicker than having to use the mouse and find a little bit I want to adjust and then click and hold and drag and I find it very fafi Lightroom because the control is quite small, etc. And it turns out there are controllers and they're about 200. To 500 pounds and it occurred to me that that was ridiculous. And then it occurred to me that if they are controlling it by sending MIDI signals which is like, basically, sending binary ones and zeros. Over cables which has been around for about 40 years and as a user like music. Then I already have a MIDI controller and I might be able to use that. Long story short, I could have got a free programme which allows you very easily to map the controllers on your MIDI to whatever you want on line run so basically what that means is just plug in a MIDI controller, which is like a sliders and twisty knobs. And as you move a slider. The programme detects which slider you've moved. And then it says What do you want that to control and you say, Oh, I'd like to control the exposure or whatever. And that's it that's how you map it. Now, I cannot tell you how I mean it took me a while to map all the bits that I wanted but I cannot tell you how fast much faster. One, it makes the working, and to how much more creative and intuitive it is because when you're using the mouse you kind of got half an eye on what you're doing with the mouse so it's not so easy to see what you're doing on the screen, added to which the increments that the mouse moves are quite large. So if you could move up let's say one or down one with the mouse it's quite hard doing one or two or foot you end up doing like 12 or 15, up or down and it's not ideal. With this, the increments are you know one or two as you do it's much more tactile it's much more precise. So the combination of the two means that instead of looking at my mouse or faffing I've just got one hand on a lot and I'm looking at the screen and as soon as I'm turning the knob I can see what it's doing. I don't have to think, holding the mouse moving up and down. Anyways. Suffice it to say, it's very tough there's quite a breakthrough with workflows and amazingly of all the tutorials I've seen on Lightroom over the years I've never seen anybody talk about using a controller like that speed things up, and it's just brilliant. And the funny thing is this controller I bought like eight years ago, or 10 years ago. So, it's like an old controller that now you could pick up for probably 20 quid or something like that. Brilliant. I'm
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Welcome to Episode 130 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. It is Tuesday the 30th of October 2020, and hopefully you're doing fabulously so yeah today. I mean Groundhog Day at the moment. Well, ish. So it's just, I wanted to get up I wanted to get stuff done I wanted to get cracking I wanted to be productive. And I guess we achieve some things today but it's just never enough. I'm particularly wanted to do music and I basically didn't. So I did clear out the storeroom here or the smallest little room nurse in this apartment, which was like the last thing that needed really clearing and tidying it was basically a dumping ground for by the previous owner my wife's art now deceased It was a dumping ground for her stuff so it was just a complete mess in there. But we cleared it out, and now the complete mess is in our lounge instead. Similarly, cleaned the bejesus out of that room, and now potentially well not potentially now it's going to be our music room when our stuff comes over from the UK, and by music room, we may be able to fit well we will be able to fit the drum kit in there, like the electronic drum kit, we may be able to fit the piano in there and that will be it. Pretty much, so it's very small, but if we can get that in and there'll be school sort of very excited about our kids, we're very excited about that and you know that's the last of phase one phase one with this apartment is cleaning it. Phase Two is getting rid of stuff. Phase Three is getting all our stuff in, and putting it in place, and then phase four is resuming some semblance of normal life. So, that took the morning, and then start even know what did the rest of what I did I do know that I worked on the calendar. I've selected a bunch of shots and my 2021 calendar and started editing the photos. So I've done maybe about half of them actually so I'm not too far off, finishing the photos for the Canon serchio was quite a chunk, then organise some stuff with my mum and dad for the removal guys picking everything up in the UK on either Thursday or Friday this week. And then we bought a couple of bikes secondhand in Castro victory. We had delivered Leonardo's first by Hitler balanced bike, and we've potentially found by which we can look at tomorrow for Mina. So actually, that has been quite, I guess quite a lot being done it just doesn't feel like it doesn't feel like it doesn't feel like it's anywhere near enough. And then I actually Well sort of accidentally wrote a song in 10 minutes. Same as putting the kids to bed I just finished in I picked up the guitar straightaway my fingers went to something I don't know what, and then I came up with a song so that was really cool. Got the melody got the chords first and chorus, have no lyrics but that's fine. So, so I guess it was a bit of music in there but I'm feeling. I'm feeling so for one a better word musical at the moment like I really feel like I could create song after song after song I just want to focus on music. I spend a little bit of time on audience ninja client stuff today and trying to get a team doing stuff. While not trying to get into stuff that I do stuff but I mean trying to get stuff done. But my heart's not in it at all at the minute I can't get my head in it. I just want to be creating music. So, if I could, I'd wave a wand and just do music the whole time. Unfortunately, I can't. So I'm gonna have to find a way around that at some point. And then there was one other thing which I've subsequently forgotten. Although if you think last couple of days I've been listening to Richie kotzen, who I amazingly had never heard of up until a few years ago about four four years ago I get some of that. And I went see him in concert not knowing really anything about him just somebody said it's good. And it's one of the best gigs I've ever seen and I was like this dude is like a cross between Prince and Chris Cornell, like he's got the voice and the look. But, Chris Cornell had. But he's a vi
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Welcome to Episode 129 of my podcasts, the view from the crow's nest. And it is Monday 12th of October, 2020. Yeah, big day today after the last few days of working on music and thoroughly enjoying it. Today was more Capita focus on business II type stuff. Because, you know, we need to get some income coming in from somewhere and there's projects that need pushing, etc. So I started with personal training session this morning leg day. That was fun. But by the time you know similar had her session first and I had my session and by the time that finished. By the time I had a shower by the time I had a little bite to eat it was pretty much midday. You know my session was a quarter past nine finishing around sort of 20 past 10 and then 10 minutes, sort of rest and then a shower and then it's kind of 11, and then, you know, so kind of got to work late which, when the morning was gone like that it's a bit frustrated that I had to work on in the insurance list all the inventory list for our stuff coming over from the UK, otherwise the insurance won't be valid and that took you know a fair bit of time to compile and then just the itty bitty things like that they're just they're needed doing such that, you know, by the time they really get around to working on anything as far as I'm concerned that was significant, and obviously important but only in the short term kind of thing. So, yeah, feeling a bit like man hope to get back to music, and then Amina had a friend over that, that she knows from from out here that she met when we heard earlier. And it's a little girl who told me their brother actually the girl I think is six brother is four, I think, and it's very sad because they lost their father in the last few months, and it was very quick turns out he had testicular cancer and basically didn't notice. And it just it's even though I think I met him once, maybe maybe twice, but that's about it. But it really puts things in perspective. You know, when, when you see that and when you kind of start realising that, you know, you're getting on and into the age range where mortality becomes a thing. And you got young kids and you got to think about your seat, assume it's not going to happen but plan for So, worst case things to happen, and plan, not just financially you know how it's going to be left over or whatnot, but also plan with what you, what you're doing you know do you want to be spending your time doing x if really you want to be doing Why do I want to be spending my time doing business II type stuff when really I want to be making music and writing and whatnot so it's the eternal question, but it's definitely been in my mind today. On the plus side, the kids had a wonderful afternoon playing. And we cleaned and tidy before she came and her brother came. And now the place is an absolute shit is the best thing that can describe it. I just spent two hours doing the washing up. Despite the washing up being all done by lunchtime today. And somehow they got their hands on a bag of confetti. So, just the place is a mess. It's gonna take another couple hours to tide out tomorrow but I really don't have the energy now. So at least you know at least they had fun, which is, which is the main thing. But yes, they are feeling a little bit blue really over over those thoughts. And, yeah, that's it, really. Still, you know, still trying to organise stuff with this movie and stuff coming over I've seen insurance thing do from earlier trying to sort out my residency, before I can apply for my residency here in Castro billary. I need to so our health insurance which has to be Italian health insurance. So that's the next hurdle I've got to jump through. And then to the aspects my dad who's like our house your car, we bought our first car last year secondhand 2016. They said you know about candles that have no idea about cabinets, as well basically you you know they're really important you know when you need to change yours the manufacturer will
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Welcome to Episode 128 of my podcasts, the view from the crow's nest. It is Sunday the 11th of October 2020 Welcome, welcome. And so I had a bit of plan today to do a few things. So our storage cupboard here that will eventually hopefully will become a music studio for me. And then, my brother wanted to speak, and he did some work with him with audience ninja the agency, and that call lasted nigh on a couple of hours. Thankfully, it was very helpful for him. In the end, so that was very good. Basically I woke up a bit late so it's a bit of for this morning is because last night I had video call with some friends, including them, but the guys that used to live with and plan a bandwidth at uni. And one of the guys I haven't seen in seven years and he is living in Australia and he actually joined us. So it was six o'clock in the morning his time. And one of the other guys was in Scotland couple in the UK I was in Italy. And we had a bunch of beers so both Time went to bed at four and got up quite late this morning about nine o'clock, then spoke to my brother for a couple hours after breakfast, it was basically lunchtime so it was the morning, and had a very relaxed morning but what I did do is write not one but two new songs. So this is off of writing two songs. A couple of days ago and a handwritten song as in a while. I wrote two new songs and kind of say I'm on a. I'm on a streak at the moment. So, a couple of days ago. I wrote lyrics. The first time I wrote lyrics in about, at least a year. And I wrote lyrics to some music that I'd written in 2013 it was basically a bond song. And then I got inspired to, kind of, with another idea for a bond song. And then I worked on that couple of days ago and it's it's strong is really different, really proud of, it's good place good man. So that was a couple of days go to those and then today. I had this idea for this kind of just a simple guitar thing I did. But I thought it could go with a hip hop beat someone was asleep in the bedroom so I did it on my phone, and then improvise a little vocal for and it sounds cool it's kind of like, it's very fun loving criminals is the focus and if you've listened to my podcast for a while, you may know that's one of my favourite bands vastly underrated as far as I'm concerned. And so it's kind of in that vein. So that was quite good. And then I literally picked up the guitar and just straight away like the very first thing I played once again was turned out to be a new song, and I wrote the lyrics for it as well. So, two sets of lyrics in nylon two days are first time in a couple years. Basically, it's hysterical it's the most one of the most simple songs I've probably ever written in terms of chords it's D and C the entire way through the song basically. I think there's a G in there for a couple of hours and that's about it but basically it's, it's like an 18th, like an 80s Stadium and the song is the best I could say like rock song, it's, it's just it was so be, you know, it was so fit. I don't know whatever Motley Crue Guns and Roses or something like that. Bon Jovi. It's just, it's simple but it's it's just the air it's got that vibe to it, and it's really good song, so I'm super chuffed that's like for, you know, decent efforts in the last three days. So, hopefully in the next week coming. I won't get sidetracked too much with business, which is necessary because I actually need to get business in and get the money going, but I can actually keep focusing on music because I'm loving it and I'm doing some good work so right now that's the view from the crow's nest feeling very good about music and hopefully it'll follow on this week, we'll see. That's all I've got for you. If you want to know anything more about it, I'll be releasing the music in the lab, which is my private member's club, I'd love it if you were to support me and join that if you want any more details head to Romeo crow.com or just drop me a message on Twitter at Romeo crow. Oth
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Welcome to Episode 127 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest it is today 10th of October 2020 and I bid here how to do it how to do off my podcast yesterday. Yesterday I spent time on music, like, a lot of hours on music for the first time in a long time. I did a vocal practice for someone on time did a guitar practice for the first time in a very long time, especially It was very more technical guitar practice. And I recorded, I wrote lyrics for the first time in about 18 months or two years, something like that. And I recorded the song there and then the version of a song and put it in the lab, and then I started a new song, which has been haunting me since yesterday, it's, it's quite different and it's really compelling it's really atmospheric. It's really cool. And it's quite different to my, my usual fare, but um As you may or may not know I've been trying to kind of not trying I've just been doing different things just been when I have been able to make music I've been trying different things just to play around a bit more electronic a bit more production lead from the start from the songwriting rather than just pick up the guitar and here we go, although that song yesterday did start with guitar. So yeah so that's cool so this morning. We'll have a chilled morning with a family, but then I wanted to do a bit of music, and I knew I was gonna be out this afternoon we're out, you know, carrying around a bit. And so I've managed to do another vocal practice, and another little guitar practice so that I didn't manage to get down to recording anything. She was really good to be doing music. Aside from that, I kind of set the guys on audience and interrupt with a couple of tasks because that's what they're there for so hopefully client work is still getting done, I'll find out next couple of days. But really, just took my eye off of other work because I've just been enjoying music and just as a reminder to myself once again that this is what really should be doing this, writing fiction screenplays and take your photo, because I love doing it and some somewhere amongst that lot I've got some small talent, I think, you know, maybe it's not the biggest, maybe it's, you know, only a parents a few people or maybe just to me and my wife, or maybe just my wife. But nonetheless, that's what I really want to be doing and I kind of need to keep moving myself towards that and the best way of doing that is by doing it. So, then this afternoon, we went out family we went out to Jupiter, which is a village my father in law's from in the mountains, and then we went on top of the mountains as the sun was fading to pick wild blackberries, which kids thoroughly enjoyed us not really my thing but Simona thoroughly enjoyed his work is her thing, and also some other very type things which I don't even know what they're called but apparently they're quite expensive, you have to buy them and they're very good for you in the winter, but I don't know. That's all I got. And now I'm about to go on a video call with some old friends. In fact, I think we've been joined by one of our mates who is living in Australia so it's going to be a fully international call from a few different countries so I'm really looking forward to that and probably drink a few beers and we'll be less commerce mentors by the end of this evening. So that's what I'm gonna leave you with today, short and sweet if you're about on Twitter, let me know. Say hello. At Romeo crow. Other than that, I will be g a wonderful day. Take care. Goodbye.
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Welcome to Episode 126 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest, and it is Friday the ninth of October, 2020. Today has been a productive day depending on which way you look at it on the manual labour side, simola has tied it and cleaned our balcony. Now that won't mean anything to you, but if you'd seen the state of it. Then you'd be most impressed. So the apartment that we're staying in at the moment is was my wife's aunt's place, who died a couple of years ago and she had an incredible amount of pot plants on her balcony. And so we've just come down to Calabria, and we've taken this apartment, and the plants don't really seem like they'd ever really been cared for in the last couple of years. So it's just like, just dust and crap, up and down, they're just all up and down the balcony. And now we've got this lovely clean, clear balcony I can't tell you how impressed I am so that's really cool because now we're gonna be able to put a table and chairs out there, it's, it's not massive but it's big enough for a table and a couple of chairs and so pretty nice. That's very cool. And on a personal level, I started restarted I should say with my Italian studies gently this morning because I'm aware that I need to pick that back up. And so that's another thing and then I then I kind of spent the morning. Doing vocal practice and guitar practice, two things haven't done it a long time, or quite a while, and then that led on to. I just couldn't get my head into I can be motivated to go into kind of normal work fire on the computer and go emails and start the business business. I was in a musical mode. And so I thought, actually, one thing I do need to do is the last two weeks of lab posts so the lab is a private member's club and every week I do, I share some music in there, some exclusive music, and I hadn't done last week's we're moving and I hadn't done yesterday because just haven't got around to it yet. So I was okay right go through some songs some old songs which is what I do. And, you know, see which one's gonna fit. And then I do a video for each one has a story behind the song and given a bit of context and whatnot. And I found and remember this song of mine called tried to hide, which I wrote in 2013, and I wrote the music and I had the lyrics and the melody at the melody, and I had the lyrics. The opening two lines of the chorus that was basically it. But it's one of my, what I call my bond songs, so I've written, try to write a few songs blatantly trying to write like a bond so because I love bond music consistently brilliant. And so yeah so I was trying to do that. And then I did something which I haven't done in over two years I think which is write lyrics, or certainly over a year. I actually wrote the Full lyrics to this song tried to hide. And then, unashamedly turn it into no time to die. Because, still some of that traffic. But no, it's my bond song and actually suited really well the vibe, and then I realised actually I was, you know, might as well change the lyric and and get it really kind of tied in to that feeling that I think the new Bond film will have could be wrong, but so I look to the trailer of it and I was like yeah this really kind of fits blah blah blah. So I was really chuffed to be that and I thought let me just record a video of it. Just so I've got a copy of me playing it so that I can, you know, see how it sounds and whatnot. And then later I'll have to record versions on the computer and all of that and blah blah. And I recorded a literally one video one take. While I was reading the lyrics off the off the computer, and it came out all right and I thought you know, boom, that's what I'm gonna use for the lab and hopefully that's acceptable to people but I think it's a really nice soul, so I'm really chuffed with myself because it's it sounds good. I sound good. Despite being kind of out of playing for a while. And so I was really chuffed, but then the next thing and this I wasn't expecting.
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Welcome to Episode 125 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. It is Thursday the eighth of October 2020, and I have nothing to report. That's it. podcast over. I work today I, I had training this morning. And my coach, right, we're gonna really clean your shoulders. So I'm training with a guy who's a personal trainer who's callisthenics instructor. And we're working towards callisthenics move, but the ones that you see on YouTube videos and our Facebook videos where they make everything look smooth and controlled. And so simple and easy, really, really challenging. I can't have any of the moods. I'm only building up to them, like real baby steps. And today's was a lot of shoulder type exercises which was knackering, but I am getting stronger, and then fast forward towards the end of the data at the kids to the park and they've got a couple of inner like gymnastic rings hanging down. And I did this kind of move, which I wouldn't have been able to do months ago. So I was really pleased that I was definitely getting stronger effects if you want to see what I'm talking about, head on to my story from today on Facebook on Instagram and you'll see it. And so those were the bookends of my day. The middle part was, you know, working, trying to get some projects moving forward a little bit. Working on the calendar 2021 calendar, trying to decide between using photos from my various travels over the years, or if I do one specifically on this area of Calabria pollino National Park where we are more or less. And I think I'll go with a former. But I did stitch together a really nice photo I took of Jupiter from a distance Jupiter is the village that my father in law's from it's about 25 minute drive from here, and it's in the mountains properly nestled in the mountains, I think it's a UNESCO heritage site. But 600 people in these old kind of houses have been modernised inside but on the outside, they go out houses anywhere. Yeah, I took a bunch of pictures on one trip and stitch them together today and it came out really nicely right so makes it basically means it's a high very high resolution photo, which is really cool. So, those little bit on that a little bit on music trying to get my, my brain back into thinking about music. So, all that really meant is I plugged in a few other things on these plugins get the music working on the laptop, pulled up the track and that was more or less about it, really. But just you know baby steps to get back into it. And that's it it's a bit of a nothing day as far as work is concerned, work but nothing, nothing really to report. That's what I've got a really. That's it. That's it for today. If you've got any feedback on what I just said, which is pretty much unlikely because I didn't really say much, then hit me up on Twitter at Romeo crow. Other than that I will be with you tomorrow. And who knows what tomorrow would be. We did buy it we did pay for the car insurance today so that was fun leaked out a bunch of money. 800 quid. And then leaked, a whole bunch of the money for other bills and other things to pay. We did find out that the internet broadband that we ordered about three weeks ago, the salesperson never actually put the order through, even though he called up a week later to say, you know Is everything all right, you know, we're getting it sorted, he actually never did. Never put any notes on the system so we've had to reorder from today. Hopefully it'll only be one or two more weeks, we'll see. So yeah, still faffing around still sorting things out, because it's an E. And I'll leave you with that. Take care, speak to you tomorrow. Bye bye.
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Welcome to Episode 124 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest is Wednesday seventh of October 2020. And today I was determined, I was determined right I'm gonna get a full day of work is going to be great. And my entire morning disappeared in admin. First I had an error from Google which cost me an hour of time on chat support to find out that the email alert for my spending that I got was an error and I hadn't actually spent anything, which is obviously fine. I spent half an hour to export to Adobe because Lightroom wasn't working. And if I want to do the calendar for this year, I kind of need it. And then at least I found out why that wasn't working, etc etc. But one of the things that I did do that was, I guess probably quite an important thing is paid the deposit to have the stuff from the UK shipped over. So it's, it's in, it's in progress now means actually being shipped through this minute got about a week before they pick it up but it's happening. It's getting serious. If it wasn't already. So, that was good. So as you know stuff that got done and then in the afternoon. You know I worked on a few projects got a few things moving a little bit more, not as much as I'd like, and you're never going to be, but for all of that, I really need to want to need to get back to doing something creative music. principali above it, because I don't want to get caught in that trap where I was just working working working on projects which yes could bring in revenue, but on dearest to my heart. So, I want to sort of get back to that and equally. I don't want to end up just working working working or spending time with the family. So I've been really trying to spend a bit more time with the kids and not be so focused on work. And I think it's either coinciding with or influencing Leonardo's reaction to me in the sense of his reaction to me is fine, but now I think he's, you know, because he's spending more time with me he's looking to spend more time with me as well and that's obviously really nice to see you know, it's not just mama mama mama now it's also daddy daddy I mean his wife mama mama mama still, I can see that there's a little bit of a change, unsurprisingly, there so that's very positive. Tomorrow I'm going to work for the morning but then in the afternoon we're going to go out. So, again trying to balance things up a little bit more. And, yeah, that's basically the view from the crow's nest socket for the minute ready. Yeah, that's it for about on Twitter happy to have your feedback your questions, your comments, your anything's sharing with me at Romeo crow. Otherwise I'll see you again tomorrow. When I say see you I mean speak to you via the podcast. Take care of yourself. Goodbye.
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Welcome to Episode 123 of my podcast per view from the crow's nest. And it is Tuesday the sixth of October, 2020, hope you're doing well. And well, yesterday I was super super naked and feeling. Quiet. What's the word over wellmed, that's the word quite overwhelmed and quite stressed, with everything. Today was my first day attempting to work so yesterday, I've got my desk ready. After a week of moving house and today I tried to work. It took me a few hours to kind of get into it I couldn't really get started you know I kind of lost my mojo and lost my rhythm and all this. But, long story short, I got into it eventually and then I had a very good period of work for pretty much the whole afternoon. And I don't feel so overwhelmed. Now, I kind of. I'm starting to wrestle a bit of control back, and they what I'm focusing on. And I was moving projects forward. And, Yeah, basically I feel a lot better today also not as knackered I guess I must have had a much better sleep. So, the view from the crow's nest is very different today, it's back to one of positivity it's back to one of opportunity and possibility. And, yeah, basically I feel like, okay, yeah, now I see where I'm at and now I'm getting on top of things. I mean there is an incredible amount of stuff to do and there always will be. As I get through some things. The next things will rear their head and, you know, slightly cresting a mountain you know you have full summits, you see the top. You're nearly there you get over it and you realise it's not at the top there's more to go in it just looks pretty much the same as the last one. I think that's life really isn't it. But nonetheless, I've now I've got a whiteboard, in front of my desk now with five main projects on it. You know what it's ninja Romeo crow in terms of my own music and the calendar. And then worldschooling harben Uk open mic and independent artists. Following on for a few days ago where I said I had a bit of kind of a bit of revolutionary eureka moment that was like the the missing thread that tied together a lot of business ideas into one Sunday very cohesive and effectively it's a subscription service for musicians, basically. And it's hard, but there's a bit more to it than that. And independent artists is probably the brand that will form a central kind of backbone to that. So you'll probably hear me talking more about that as the days and the weeks progress, the unifying brand, let's say, and yeah it's feel bad. I feel a lot better for getting getting working. So hopefully tomorrow I'll have another more or less full day of work, and really plough into it. And then, as part of my determination to not repeat old habits. On Thursday, I'll take some time off, despite the fact that I've had a week off of work, quote unquote, when the whole house move. Actually I've been stressed massively stressed by this whole last week so I need a bit of time off for so the family we need a bit of time out together. So we're gonna do something fun on Thursday not sure exactly what might only be half a day, but we're gonna make sure that we, we get moving with that straightaway and I don't fall into the, you know, just work work work and then no balance so definitely we're focusing on getting balanced and getting this flat to order the way we wanted this apartment. So yeah, lots more to do this week, but feeling like a little bit more in control about it now so that's cool. Sure, I'll share with the more insights ideas and details and whatnot as the day's progress. But, yeah, feeling a bit better now so that's the view from the crow's nest as far as I can see today and tomorrow will be another day let's see if you're about on Twitter. Come say what's up at Romeo crow. And if you're not, I'll speak to you tomorrow. And if you are. I'll speak to you tomorrow. Either way, I'll speak to you tomorrow. Thanks for listening, And I'll speak to you tomorrow. Bye. [This note may be incomplete because it was exported before processin
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Welcome to Episode One Two to 122 of my podcast view from the crow's nest, and it is Monday fifth of October 2020. I am shattered. Another day of sorting out of the house now I've done the bedroom, more or less, and got my desk and my computer's back out and so tomorrow from tomorrow hopefully we can have some normality. I can work, but today I'm just feeling so drained and overwhelmed because I'm remembering all the things that I need to do all the work that I have done and all the projects that have just been left dormant, or just left. So hopefully tomorrow. I'll get back on top of a few things and not feel so overwhelmed, but right now I'm just knackered and feeling a bit overwhelmed that's all I got. Today is the view from the crow's nest today. Added to which I realised I recorded yesterday's episode and didn't share it skills. So I'm going to share a double bill right now. And I'll be back tomorrow if you've got any thing, then hit me up at Romeo crow on Twitter. That's it, I'm done I'm out I'll speak to you tomorrow. Bye bye.
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Welcome to Episode 121 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. It is Sunday the fourth of October 2020. And today, it's just a continuation of Groundhog Day was cleaning and moving furniture and putting stuff away. We're nearly there. We're nearly there. So we're nearly there. There's two big cleaning jobs to be done in this flat. One of them is a storage room, which we need to empty out clean. And then hopefully when our stuff comes out from the UK will be turned into music room is a very very small, but I'm hoping nonetheless to be able to fit in my little electronic drum kit and the full size piano or my like cleverlayover electric piano. If I can get those in it will be awesome, but I don't know if I can, we'll see. But first we got to play now. And the second one is there's a lovely balcony. But it's chock full of potted plants and associated as accumulated there the last couple of years, and discarded crap like you know sticks and mops and stuff. And that's going to be a mission to clean properly. but it's such a pleasant place because itself facing so you get the sun the whole day and it's we're fortunate to where we are. There's basically a field in front of us so you get kind of left to right sky when you sit on it, you know, a view in front of you and then you can see over the town into the mountains behind. So it's, it's really pretty. And I actually spent a bit of time out there yesterday and today with a cup of tea reading my book, and I played guitar today and shared a new idea and the improvise thing on my Facebook group. Fans of Romeo crow. And it was lovely. And it will just, it's a glimpse of how nice it might be. If you know once we've cleaned and tidy and we're gonna put a table out there once we've done it so we can eat out air and chill out there's not very deep, but deep enough you get a little table there and a couple of people around the eye Simona and I, and then maybe during the day I'll actually work out there and parts take my laptop out and maybe work on music with headphones or riot or whatever. So, you know becomes another part of the room and with the sun on you it's glorious today it was again about 2728 degrees, really, really pleasant that I've thoroughly enjoyed kind of having a couple of breaks like that because I don't really take time off normally so though being crazy stressed with the move and everything to just sit down and chill is quite Rarity for me and a real pleasure. And also, today I set up some speakers and whatnot. And for the first time I listened to Huey Morgan of the fun loving criminals he does a weekly radio show on radio sex. And as you would probably imagine if you know him and his music it's really quite eclectic is really cool show three hours long and then after that, I listen to a show that I've not listened to in at least a year if not longer but we used to listen to quite regularly which is Craig Charles funk and soul show on radio six things radio six, and again three hours which is great stuff, James Brown and interviews with James Brown he did, obviously went live and stuff. And it was just so pleasant and music just going through the flan see now in the sun reading a book, music in your ears and chilling and you know it's a point of our new kind of trying to make these habits of actually having fun, you know, not just me working and same with the kids, but, you know, putting a bit of fun and enjoyment back into what we're doing. The flip side is having not worked for really the best part of a month or focused properly on projects, outside of study for my Italian moving house and whatnot. We like no new clients for audience Ninja, and basically no revenue coming in at all and we're spending money low water at the moment, paying this bill that bill and got the car tax coming, insurance, I mean, you know, in a week's time and then you've got to pay for the stuff to ship over to England and you're just training through money so I need to pull my finger out s
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Welcome to Episode 120 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest. And it is now Sunday the fourth of October. Well, actually, this is a really meant to be Saturday the third of October, because for the first time in 120 episodes. I forgot to do my podcast, I plain forgot to do it yesterday. And there's no excuse, there's no excuse. But I thought well I'll do it right now it's seven o'clock in the morning so I've just gotten out of bed, made up about an hour actually but I was reading a book which I'll go into in a second. But, I'm going to do a very quick report here because then I will do another unsealing. So, yesterday or today, depending on how you want to be this was just another entirely full day of cleaning and tidying so new placing cast your victory. And I've completely abandoned work kicked it to the sideline and everything is focused right now on turning this apartment into the environment that we want. So, I realised how true. And I'm realising how true environment dictates performance is, you know, it's our guess another way of saying it's possibly Fung Shui, I don't know I need to do more research because I don't really know what it actually is I've never read a book on it or anything just a few anecdotal things that I've read. So I want to go deeper into that to understand it because I think that we as humans don't quite appreciate most people don't quite appreciate quite how powerful the environment is in shaping everything shaping their emotions shaping their habits, and therefore shaping contentment and happiness and fulfilment and productivity and all of those things. So, the idea is that, you know, we want to turn this department into the ideal environment for us so that might mean a little Music Corner, a little arts and crafts corner, you know, things that are creative and inspirational through two things that are practical or practical things that are helping to change the mood. So for example, here's an example of an environment it takes performance, and you want to watch a film or something like that you know you put the lights down, you want to. Yes, so you can see better but actually with modern screens, you can see well enough anyway but you put the lights down because it creates the environment and lighting is one of the easiest ways to change the environment for the type that you want mood lighting etc. What was it called mood lighting changes your mood. And so things like candles, you know, smells those can change your mood etc etc. So, it's visually as well. This is one I think people don't clock so much is the flow of furniture is the flow of a room is what things look like if it's tidy if it's clean etc etc. These you know these help change your state change your mood, which in turn, obviously influences everything. And so we're on a mad cleaning and tidying flecks, and we're going to get rid of a whole bunch of furniture, and eventually get our furniture or some of our furniture from the UK and change things around and really try and find the layout of the apartment that lends itself to enjoyment. And that is something which you know we've been, we've been lacking and yesterday I was explaining to Mina that it's not just a change of change of environment, change of where we're living etc location and change furniture, but it's also a change of habits, and some of them are really deeply ingrained individually and as a couple, and as a family and some of them are more recent but nonetheless. We're on a real move to change our, our habits to unlock more fun and more creativity and more better work life balance and all of these things. And of course, they take time. And a lot of that time yesterday was spent in cleaning cupboards and cleaning the inside of things and cleaning all the plates and cleaning and cleaning and cleaning and then tidying and not, everything's not put away yet but it's certainly getting better and better every day the lounge in the dining room and the kitchen are kind o
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Welcome to Episode 119 of my podcast interview from the crow's nest. It is Friday the second of October 2020. It's 11:07pm, and I am shattered. So we moved, today we did the move, we actually managed to more or less fit, unbelievable amount of stuff in our car. I love our car no scenic scenic. Excuse me. And in fact, if you want to see what we fit in the car then have a look at my Instagram or Facebook story from today because. Yeah, it's quite impressive. Anyway, we managed to get pretty much everything in the car we managed to get the boat on time. And we arrived upon the mainland and had the 300 kilometre drive south ahead of us, which I did normally we actually share someone and I we have a thing where we want to make sure that we share the driving so it doesn't end up like a lot of couples where one. You know one person tends to drive by for example in my mom and dad. It's always my dad who's driving especially on the motorways, and we wanted it to be so that you know it was more equal, not from the point of view of. So, the driver feels like awesome thank goodness somebody else is helping me but actually the opposite, for example, my mom isn't so keen on driving on motorways now because she's not used to it. Because my dad's been doing it for the last however many years. So we want to make sure that there's more. Empowerment there. But that said, Today sim was up early blazes o'clock with the annatto. And I felt okay and I said you know I don't mind driving late and I feel bad at any point. And also I wanted to see how I fared on 300 kilometres which I've not done before in one go. So when I say one guy actually we had a break in about 10 minutes at a service station after about 45 minutes, but it was fine. It was good, you know, that was all fine so that was cool. We got Castro victory we got into the house to discover that it was filthy. The guest the windows basically be left open and because it's kind of a countryside house on the outskirts of town, very dusty because it was so dry around here. Literally, he was just caked in dust red Sandy grimy dust. Everything the seats the couches the floor the tables, every surface. So, the kids who had been marvellous this morning while we were packing, you know, while they would just watch TV but basically you know. And then on the journey. It was an hour half hour and three quarters on the boat, and then three hours driving, and you know they were brilliant they were so excited to come here and then we got here I was like sorry guys no can't play with you because we've got to tidy and we've got to clean and then. So, that's what we've been doing and we're not finished. But it's looking ahead of a lot nicer and more habitable than it was previously. So, plans tomorrow. I mean, that's all the chair so we've done today is drive and tidy, playing rather plans tomorrow is to finish cleaning, putting in all our stuff from the car the rest of the stuff and start putting everything away. We also found when we got here that the wardrobe had gone, there were two wardrobes, that we were relying on and one of them is gone. It got sold in absence, which is fine, but obviously we had ideas to put stuff in there so that's the whole bunch of it wasn't just a wardrobe was like a really big kind of wardrobe affected because exactly what it was. With drawers and cupboards and. So, tomorrow we bring in our stuff. And then, then we're on a mission to clear out all this redundant furniture so the place we stay in at the moment. We're now going to live in is my, my wife's aunt hails her flat she died a couple of years ago left it to my father in law. And she liked antique stuff. So, I'm staring at a wardrobe which was handmade probably over 100 years ago at over 100 years ago, looking at an cast iron bed. That's got the most uncomfortable headboard known to man, why you don't make a headboard like that I don't know but I don't know if it's Art Deco I'm not even sure. And then there's all these piec
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Welcome to Episode 118 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. It is Thursday first of October 2020, welcome welcome welcome. Well, definitely I'm sure one day because all I've done is pack. We nearly ready we're moving house tomorrow. We've got 300 kilometre drive the car is pretty full but now tomorrow morning I'm going to bang the roof rack on and try and fit yet more stuff on. We've got four boxes to ship. And I'm not quite sure if we're going to fit everything, but that's going to be the joys of tomorrow. A guess tomorrow reflect on leaving his gear after seven months here or there abouts, but truthfully, just looking forward to getting into our own place. I'm looking forward to changing it and turning it into a home, haven't quite organised getting our stuff shipped over from the Academy to pay the deposit and sort the day out basically as nearly ready to go. And we'll get, you know, things that we'd forgotten about and we left a year ago and put in storage, things that kids have reminded us about you know little couch that they've got and stuff and so looking forward to creating a home. We've been away Yeah. And yeah we missed having a base, so I'm looking forward to doing that, getting the space how we want it it's not huge space but you know it should be big enough for us. And then, to be honest, I'm looking forward to getting back into work has been feels like a month for haven't really been doing work work and you know with the Italian exam it's taken all sorts and now this move and blah blah blah. Then there's still lots of admin stuff that needs sorting ASAP I've got to change my driver's licence to Italian one I've got to get my residency transferred over before the end of the year and all sorts of stuff all fun and games. But yeah, so hopefully tomorrow morning we will finish getting the car ready we need to get the boat. I think 1130 so there is a bit of a time deadline. And then the boats burn out half nearly two hours of my that. And then the drive is about, like 300 kilometres about four hours I guess. All told, with stops with the kids, maybe five depending how much we stop. And then we get there at the moment. There's no electricity and there's no gas. The electricity and gas company, we went with a new deal a new company and they said it was all done last week or two weeks ago and it's not. And so we're gonna get there and if it doesn't work they promise they'll send somebody out within a couple of hours, which in the south of Italy I, you know, I'd be amazed if national company could get anybody with you in a couple of days, let alone a couple of hours but we'll see. So, this time tomorrow I might be talking to you via candlelight. That's it, that's where we're at. I'm tired, but I'm looking forward to it. I really am. If you've got anything to add to the mix then hit me up on Twitter at Romeo crow. Otherwise RBG a good night and I will see you tomorrow on collaboration time. Take care yourself, bye bye bye.
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Welcome to Episode 117 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest and it is Wednesday the 30th of September, 2020. Today it's gonna be a very quick one because all I did once again was pack. So I'm still not done, still not finished. They might even hear an echo in this room because we've got rid of so much. Well, we've got rid of quite a lot of stuff but it's amazing how absorbing. Because actually, it's not that much stuff from the surfaces now around there's like four shelves and basically those are empty. But nonetheless, a couple of it's under the desk and that's basically. Yeah, change the sound of the room which as a musician. If you ever recording and using a microphone and you're doing a vocal then these very important things to know if you're not probably don't care so it makes no difference to you anyway. The boot of the car is packed so that's the start and we think we're going to be able to fit everything else in. If we can send our clothes in boxes via, you know courier service hopefully we'll do that can't take the couch with us because it's going to cost more money than to just buy a couch when we get down there so it's it's pretty pointless. That's it. Really, I did a couple hours work this evening, just trying to keep on top of audience ninja stuff and you know the team and TAs I've set them and whatnot and they've come back to me on. But I really feel that you know it's been weeks I haven't really had much focus on quote unquote business. In fact, I just realised tomorrow is meant to be the lab, my post for the week for the lab and I haven't got anything sorted so I'm just gonna go on there because tomorrow, supposedly, we're meant to finish packing and going to negombo which is the thermal spar park for our 10th anniversary and my 40th birthday, but instead we're going to be packing. I'll be doing a bit of work, and then hopefully Friday. We'll be hitting the road, we'll see. And heading to Custer victory. So that's it that's the view from the crow's nest I'm feeling a little bit drained. A bit of sore throat bit of sinus is just just tiniest inkling, but it's there. So, I've been feeling a bit drained these last few days so maybe it's an illness maybe just need more rest, who knows. Outside of that, on the long left bad news but on the positive side. This morning I had a training session, and it was strength training, and I was focused on a lot of press actions and I'm getting stronger, I can definitely feel I'm getting stronger. So, yeah, for me personally, that's just that's good, that's what you want to know you want to see you want to feel that you're making progress. And so, that's good. And that's about it really Leonardo, suddenly, it was really cool Leonardo, we started counting with it i mean he can count, we started doing matter them today or I did with some cupcake type things. And he was banging on it. He loves learning, he really does love learning like if you do something or mean is doing less than he wants to get involved so that was really cool. And, I mean, just fun. That was all. That's all I got. Right. If you're out on Twitter, say hello. Romeo crow if you're not doesn't really matter either. I'll be back tomorrow, either having packed or not having bad will soon find out. Take care of yourself wherever you are in the world and I will speak to you tomorrow to door pips then, goodbye.
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Welcome to Episode 116 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. And it is Tuesday 29th of September 2020, welcome welcome welcome. Today, as an extension a continuation of yesterday. Today was about packing. And thankfully we found out this morning that we don't actually have to lug it out of this region of Italy out of Campania as quick as we thought we might, because the generally CMO of compania said that he's not going to lock the region down he's just going to tell people, there's a few stricter measures but you're still gonna be able to travel about. So we're not on a mad rush. Now, to get out of here down to Calabria down to Castro battery. But now we've started. You know we're getting packed so yeah I miss one more can you say packing, how much fun is it. But we're getting there, because you know we're, we're taking kind of everything. And we, as I've said before, we're trying to actually build kind of our own home now, not build by me and you know create our own home. In the place that we're staying last year in Custer victory. So we have enough stuff shipped over from the UK, etc etc. So that's basically been been the day did a little bit of work. Answering messages and doing a few little bits that needed doing. But other than that, has basically been it feel like the day is kind of just disappeared when I say louder. Yeah, I've got nothing. I've got nothing. That was it. Probably nothing useful to share really tomorrow, carry on packing. Get everything ready. And then, if the weather's good the weather got a bit better today if the weather's good and once we've packed, we might finally similar and I have our 10th anniversary stroke, my 40th birthday present, which is a day out, or at least an afternoon now at a place called unabomber so Escape is quite famous because it's a volcano. And it's got thermal waters, and there are these thermal waterparks ballparks and the gumbo, had been voted a few times by one of the best in Europe. And it's basically like 26, I believe, pools, cut into the rocks around this bay and this beach. And it's really pretty. And they're all these like you know summer plunge poor summer, like 35 degrees water or whatever. Volcanic stuff and some waterfalls and all of this, so it's very idyllic. And the last time seminar were there, she was pregnant with Mina so eight years ago. And it's a very relaxing day out so I figure if we can get all our stuff done and packed, then that will be our swan song before we then travel the next day so hopefully if we can finish can pack tomorrow. And then we can go to the gumbo on Thursday, and then we can drive off on Friday, that might work. But of course, the packing does this depend on one thing which is what we're putting in the car and what we're shipping, and the shipping depends on whether we're sending it via normal couriers or whether actually having a van, because we'd like to take a sofa from here. The problem with that is you can't get any bloody straight reply off of anybody in Italy for bloody anything. So trying to find, even though there are career companies that have moveable removals for moving house, you call them you message them you send emails, and you have to wait days and days and then this person isn't about that person isn't about you know the price at some point in the next century, etc. So frustrating, get anything done in Italy is the ball like. So, we've got to wait on that because that dictate what we actually pack and how we pack it. So, yeah. Another thing we got to wait on, but we get in there. Sooner or later, and that is that's all I got. So that's the view from the crow's nest today. It's 1010 I'm going to get into bed now and hope to have a decent enough night's sleep. Cuz I'm feeling really tired recently and I really drained and tired. Even though I got an okay night's sleep last night like more than seven hours, feel very tired today. So that's all I got. If you're about on Twitter come say, Yeah, I'd love to hear
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Welcome to Episode 115 of my podcast interview from the crow's nest. It is Monday the 28th of September 2020 and I hope you are doing fantastically well. So, the continuation. We are in packing mode, because there might be a second lock down in this region of Italy compania, it might be starting this week, and we were planning to move to the Calabria region of Italy to place called Castro victory. And we are bringing forward our plans. Only by a few weeks but we kind of galvanised into action because we don't want to get caught by a lockdown and not be able to move for another bunch of months, again, because that's what kept us in this gear these past six months anyway. So, then there's that kind of realisation that packing is a ball ache, and we. This time around, we're kind of bring in everything, and we're even shipping everything from the UK that we have in storage and turning Caterpillar into a bit more of a permanent base, because we feel that we really need an environment for us, and the kids which is basically home. So, what that means is more, you know, that'd be lovely but it also means more effort and more hassle because you're going to organise everything and more cost as well, which is not an ideal time for it so just also realise we've got the car insurance pay next month, along with transportation of our stuff from the UK so that'll be together that'll be about two grand, which we do not have. So not quite sure how that's gonna work out but that's the fun of the fair. So yeah so packing mode, and just getting stuff kind of stuff ready mode. So, yeah, the, the, the irony of course is that while you're spending time and money getting all that sorted. One is not spending time or money trying to bring in more money so audience ninja. You know the guys are doing the tasks of the day that are there, but I'm not necessarily doing a particularly good job of trying to find or get more business because I don't have the time to do it yet. Well schooling hub which is another potential revenue stream, that's still going to be in hibernation for another few weeks so we can move forward on that and get this out the way So, and other things and my own art. I've continued to make some little changes to my social media accounts which you probably haven't seen because there's only four or five of you that are listening to this. So, probably haven't seen it, but I am. As of yesterday simplifying everything I'm really trying to simplify stuff. If I can't hold the. The reason and the plan and the marketing and all of that in my, in a very quick kind of couple of sentences and it's too complex. So I'm trying to simplify stuff so for, for example, my photography is gonna go on my Instagram channel. There you go. Instagram is for photography. And not only that, but at the moment I think I've left about nine or 12 photos on my Instagram. And what I'll do is, I'll put up a new photo to a shedule, I don't know the schedule yet but it will maybe be every two weeks. Something like that. Maybe one a week. And then, which ever is the least you know the least performing photo of them are remove that and keep the other one so there's always kind of only about 12 in there. I don't know if I definitely do that but I like the idea of keeping it quite simple, and then having on my website a portfolio which has golden images I've done. And in also one of my kind of new focuses again this is stuff that I've known for time I've talked about before but I haven't done is, unless there's a basically a campaign reason for doing something or you know product reason, then don't do it but if there is then get it to be a product as soon as possible. So what I mean by that is, I'm not just gonna put photos up for the sake of having pretty photos or put photos up that you can buy as prints or as canvases or what have you, whether or not I start selling them I don't know. But the point is that they need, you know, there needs to be a reason for it because I just
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Welcome to Episode 114 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest and it is Sunday 27th of September 2020. How you doing so. Last night I didn't get a good sleep at all. I couldn't sleep till after fourth. There's a consequence today, I have been pretty devoid of motivation devoid of energy. However, it was also been a really rainy day as well like a really stormy rainy day so the kind of the perfect day to just chilling. And so, this morning I continued for I think the fourth day in a row. Getting made to do maths first thing in the morning, and it ends up being about our I give a five plus five minus five multiplication of five division sums. And by the time she comes in ours and then we go through stuff and I explained stuff, etc. It seems to take about an hour and it's good because either coincidentally or not. We'll soon find out. Each evening. She's asleep by about eight o'clock, since we've started doing that even though she's not really been out, so it could well be that it's really mentally taxing for her and it ties her out and we've just discovered fire. But we'll see. But certainly, she's enjoying it and and that's really cool. So definitely keep those going. And then I've been playing I played with a bit with Leonardo as well today. Kind of basically took the morning off kind of totally and didn't even berate myself for not doing anything and then in the afternoon I mean, I was really just, yeah, that devoid of energy I didn't want to turn on the computer I didn't want to do, quote unquote work that instead I did kind of mental work so I started a new book reading a new book, and this one is called profit first, I can't remember why I put on my Kindle, comma, what it was about. So I thought, let's just try it. And, in a nutshell, so far it seems to be basically pay yourself first, which is one of Robert Kiyosaki Rich Dad Poor Dad one of his kind of main tenets, which is the route to wealth or least profit when you're running a business where wealth is that you pay yourself before you pay your bills and all of this stuff and blah blah blah. And there's a little bit more to it but I don't think there's a huge amount more to it. In this dude's book. But it's interesting you know it's a good reminder. Actually states, as far as I can tell, so far, you should have four bank accounts for your four accounts for a business you know one that you put profits into what everything goes into one account but then you split it out in percentages straight away, one's for profits one's for your salary one's for tax and one's for expenses or something like that. So, I was sort of reading that and getting to that but particularly I was thinking today about generally about what I do, particularly social media wise and particularly from my music and art point of view. And one of the, you know, one of the main things one should we strive to do is simplify. I think it was Einstein, he said, you know, button paraphrasing but basically simplification is genius or something like that. And so, it's, it's easy for me to get distracted by all you know, and I've said this many times before, it's easy for anyone to get distracted like when you read value you should be on Instagram, you should be on Tick tock, you should be on this you should be on that you should do this. And it can get really overwhelming. And the ironic thing ironic thing is all I've wanted to do for the last 20 plus years is write screenplays, and books, make films. Right, and make music and and tape and do photography, the photography is a more recent one to be fair but that's it that hasn't really changed and actually it's really quite simple at its core edition. Additionally, something which is known and often quoted is that people who are considered to produce masterpieces. So let's say classical composers studies were found that actually this composers who considered to have created the most amount of masterpiece is more simply tended to just create the most amount of
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Welcome to Episode 113 of my podcast, the view from the crow's nest. And it is Saturday the 26th of September 2020. And it's three minutes to midnight, as far as Italy is concerned, and how are things? What is the view from the crow's nest today? And I guess I don't know, I can't work out whether I had a frustrating day or I've had a good day. So let's see, what did I do? I'm stuck. So I have this brand idea independent, as in, in the like, I NDA independent artists.com. And I bought the domain name over a year ago, a couple years ago, maybe. And the idea was for it to be some kind of management or agency for musicians. So today, I connected that to a website built a simple holding page, which you can see independent artists calm, and put that together, and set up tracking and stuff like that for it. And basically, the reason for that is because I will be using it as the platform from which to market or to try and do PR to not market or to do PR for my own music. The idea being that it kind of comes from that agency or that company. And then over time, hopefully, we bring on board other artists that we represent. And we help market their music and do pay off their music. Specifically, I've had one of the team on audience Ninja, do some research to start putting together a database of internet radio stations and a database of internet blogs, music focused. And the idea is that we'll be contacting those blogs and content in those radio stations. And we'll be doing it through independent artists and saying, oh, would you consider playing x song from y artists. But of course, at the beginning, it's just going to be my soul. And I'm the artist, although I would like somebody else to be doing the contacting because I nearly started doing it myself today. And then I remembered that that's totally a job for somebody else, because it doesn't need my specialist skills. Or though I have skills in cold email and on sales, it doesn't need my specialist skills in order to do it. So I kind of started the ball rolling there, we've got the database, we've got at least a starting database, we've now got the brand, we've got the website. So I need to bring in the person who's going to be doing the cold email or the selling so to speak. And to that extent, I have an ad out last couple of weeks for a salesperson. And I set a task for one of the applicants today. So we'll see how they come back. And hopefully they come back and they're decent enough with cold email, and then we'll bring them on board. And then this will be one of their first jobs. So I guess that's cool, because that's moving that forward and has got big potential leverage outcome. Second thing I guess I did today, or one of the other things I did today was started my photography portfolio, it's actually going to be housed at Romeo crow.com. And you won't be able to find it yet because it's not live rather than being on a separate site. But I do love photography. And every year I do my wall calendar. And every year my full calendar of photography, I should stay, you know, like landscape photography, and every year want to do that. And I'm looking at photos, I get all infused with photography again. And then over the course once I've sold the calendar, I usually buy a couple of pieces of gear, new gear or whatever, expand my my tools, and then try and use them for the next year's calendar. And so I have these sporadic bursts where I'm all into photography for a little a short while and then other things take precedent. But I really want to bring that as a more major part of what I'm doing. And I don't just want to be every year. Here's my photography for the end of the year for all calendaring, you didn't know I was doing that because I've not done it at all for the rest of the year. You know, I've got a lot of nice photos currently. And I'm sure I'll take a lot of nice photos in the future. And I want to expand upon that. And the cornerstone of that is having a portfolio section wh
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Welcome to Episode 112 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest and it is Friday the 25th of September, 2020. And today, I put on sale. My 2021 calendar. And so, this is an interesting little product or story or what have you. So I first started doing my calendar, about four or five years ago, and each year for the first three years, I guess, basically up until last year each year. It got a bit bigger in terms of sales, not a lot but bit bigger each year a bit bigger each year. So each year I'd use the proceeds from it to buy some more photography gear or what have you, so I could do more interesting calendar the next year and each year. I make the project more and more involved. So last year, I thought right I'm gonna go really all out. And I did this whole thing, focused on London because we were leaving London, and did London landmark. And then, I did this whole video flogs these video journals of the shoot, the actual calendar shoot and I was talking a lot about it. And then I did a whole bunch of blog posts I think about 13 or 14 blog posts, at least one for each of the photos on the calendar where I did a whole in depth blog post where I'd researched the history of the place that I was filmed that I was shooting and had photos and I had videos and I had links and I had history and facts and I went really to town on it and then I had this whole bunch of emails, you know, over the course of it, talking about it, blah blah and people really like the email so they told me and they like the information in the blog posts and whatnot. When all said and done, I sold far less candidates and I've done the year before when I didn't put in anywhere near the same effort. So this year, I thought let me try again the complete opposite direction. So, not that I'm not going to put in any effort but instead of putting effort into the marketing of it. I just want to get it done, let people know, and sell whatever gets sold and focus my efforts on actually just the photography, you know, and edit it finding and editing the photos and whatnot, which takes a fair bit of time. And so cool. It was a little ding dong somebody just bought one. And then so a couple of weeks ago I asked people. I didn't because of COVID I haven't been travelling around like a normally would have done. And so, I haven't got the shots that I might have taken over the year so I said you know what are people want are they in asked of questionnaire with a bunch of questions do you want. x y Zed nice for people reply to the question so I had almost 100 replies, therefore most sent proper percentage data set. And so today, I just wanted to get it done and ready so I've sent out an email that basically said it's an early bird pre order, and the price is 15 pounds for UK, including postage or 18 pounds rest of the world including postage 18 pounds about $22. And I really tried to squeeze it down as much as possible and out of that I mean, I'd make about two pound 50 to three pound per calendar that the rest is just cost so it really is next to no margin products, but this year instead of thinking about it as something that I, you know, gonna make money on that I can then use to buy gear. I just want to make it as affordable for people as possible and have as many people as possible, be able to enjoy it because actually I'd rather, I'd rather more people enjoyed my photography than making a little bit of money off of it in this in this with this calendar. So, I still don't know what the theme of the calendar is gonna be yet. And so I put it on for sale, and that was another sale while I was talking here. So it's just an interesting experiment it'll be the tale of two marketing. Our marketing efforts. And it's on this early bird price until the fourth of October, so we'll, we'll see what happens then and then revert pricing to something a bit more. In keeping with the previous years, but I wanted to. Yeah, I want to talk about it now. And then we'll review again in a coup
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Welcome to Episode 111 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. It is Thursday, 24th of September 2020 and following on from yesterday's kind of pulling myself out of the doldrums by taking action. That's exactly what I did again today. And I've said it before on the podcast and I had to remind myself of what I'd said before yesterday that when one is feeling overwhelmed or apathetic to things or depressed or whatnot, then it's action is the way out. I really truly believe that. And those actions might start small and might be as simple as you know making a bed tied in the room cleaning the house whatever but it's. We're, we're creatures of movement, as humans, we're creatures of action. And, you know, particularly a few be overwhelmed with work situations and that's it that's the only way out really providing Of course, you've done your, your thinking and you're picking the right actions well that's a whole, you know that's a whole nother podcast topic or conversation you know how do you know you're picking the right actions, and that is not what's on my mind today what's on my mind today is that, yeah, I'm at least now as the last couple of days. I'm very much re reignited re with the flex of moving all projects forward, rapidly, and to follow on from somewhere was a few weeks ago, to not let kind of excuses or, you know, waiting for the perfect time getting in the way as I often say Do what you can with what you have right now. You know, I know what I should be doing so do it, simples. So to that end, dishing out tasks to the team the audience ninja team and really getting them moving things forward we're looking at marketing plan and putting together materials that we need to bring in new clients for audience Ninja, the agency, starting to make inroads towards worldschooling hub, what we need for that is going over the, the main website that I've built and making sure it works but also inserting our payment gateway, so that when I built originally it was free. With the potential that we could add payment charges and subscriptions. However, with the relaunch we want to charge straightaway, one because it's going to cost us to maintain it. So actually we do need to bring in revenue, and two because that will enable us to bring onboard some kind of ID verification service which gives a bit more security, given that it's a platform for families with children, that's probably a good thing and that's something I think most people will be quite happy to pay towards. So, and three because we need to bring in revenue, as simple as. So, going to start moving that forward now so that feels good, because that's another potential revenue stream it's also a project we're really passionate about that we want to work because we want to find other world schooling and homeschooling families to meet with. So there's a very much scratch your own itch need to that. I started yesterday advertising, the grip the sky experience. And I know that I haven't set up the ads properly, ironically, given that I've got a digital marketing agency, because I rushed them I just like right, I'm going to start yesterday. Bosch, let's just start doing stuff let's get some data let's know that it's the wrong data and let's, you know, iterate and iterate quickly. So, in the next couple of days I record a few videos which I'll be using for ads for it. And then hopefully, how we'll be able to not just actually get results which would be great, but also be able to prove my methodology which is exactly the methodology that I want to use for audience ninja Thus, I have my own case study I can say look, this is what most people do where their ads, what I did yesterday and it doesn't work. Here's what I would recommend and you can see the change here in the graph and blah blah so that's the plan. And then my calendar. Again, we've got the audience ninja team to start looking into some things my calendar my 2021 calendar, which, you know, I'm going to move towards t
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Welcome to Episode 110 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest It is Wednesday the 23rd of September 2020. And after the last couple of days podcast if you listen to them or who is very low, ironically, given that it was my birthday, but I, on my birthday, I was very low. And then I hit an even love point, the next day yesterday, when I took my Italian test if that leading to my Italian test, I was very low. And then I took my test and I felt that I screwed it up. I might be right, I might be wrong. But apparently I need to wait sort of up to 60 days to get the result which is you know, classic Italian speed. And also totally useless if it does take 60 days because the next available time to take the test will be November. And I may not get my results by the time I have to take the test again, if I want to take the test again this year, and put in my application for citizenship before Brexit happens at the end of this year. And yada yada it's a bit of a pain. But we shall see, we shall see. Maybe I was doing myself a disservice. But nonetheless, I felt exceptionally low. After that I really did. And sensibly, we left the kids at home, Simone had come with me to Naples yesterday to do this, and we've had this plan that I have my birthday. And then the next two days, we'd go to Naples with the kids with Stan Naples overnight, I'd get an exam out of the way and we do these fun things. And, and because of the way I was feeling on my birthday, and it was just we cancelled or fun. And yeah, and so we went to Naples and and I was feeling terrible. And I was monosyllabic at best. And then we just came straight back home again, it costs us like that I like 50 quid to get the boat there and back on top of the cost. And then we got on the boat, and I couldn't even speak my mom could do one speech, my mom really feeling feeling low. And then nothing sumana said would help. And so we were just caught in silence and it was very sullen. And then I put my head on her lap, and she started massaging my head. And it was like, like, night and day. You know, for days I've been in this bad grumpy mood. And, you know, started giving me a head massage. The sun was on our faces on the boat crossing it was the slow boat, which took up to nearly two hours. And normally that would be too long, long hours. But instead it was kind of like silence because the kids weren't jumping all over us. I was getting this massage Simona wasn't getting asked 1000 questions by the kids and having to entertain them. And let's say someone's on our faces. And I actually fell asleep while she was massaging my head which I never fall asleep during the day. And that's when I woke up I was like a different person. Already know what the moral of the story is, other than you know, sometimes you just need to hit his knee touch. In other words, don't do it. And it completely changed my mood. And then we got to the port, we've got a skier and we could have gone home we're like screw this mess Ganga and appetitive which in Italy means you buy one alcoholic drink and it comes hopefully with a whole bunch of different bill plates of food basically, this bar though, or this restaurant, and we've seen before the platform right on the beach, it was really quiet because it was the end of the day, the tour season's over, had a couple of for me a couple of glasses of Prosecco and the woman really outdid herself to bring us all these various different plates of you know, this that and the other really tasty very bad against the diet but really tasty. And so then we came home and we're in a far far better mood and then go home last night and then we put the kids to bed I fell asleep by eight o'clock while putting them to bed sim said you know Go in, go go straight to bed, you know, our buttons bed, so so as not to not do my podcast. If you listen to yesterday's one, I did it in that moment that I'd woken up come in the bedroom was getting back into bed. So it's very short and very tired
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Welcome to Episode 109 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest. It is Tuesday 22nd of September and this is gonna be a super short one, because I just fell asleep and it's, it's only 20 past 8pm going back to bed. Won't for my exam that was the big thing for today my talent exam and ensure I was in a supremely bad mood, until I went to it. And then I did it. And then I was in an even worse mood afterwards. I feel that I I ruined it I don't think I passed. And to top it off, I asked them, and they said, we'll tell you in 60 days. What kind of exam or an exam with two of them sit in there examining me. Do they need 60 days to tell me whether I passed or not. So I was in a super bad mood. And then we came back to this gear. We're on the long ferry and amazing the whole gratefully or whatever Simona was able to bring me out my bad mood, by giving me a head massage and foot massage and the rest and then that completely changed my mood in the last few days, and that was one when we go back to Ischia. And we decided not to go straight home let's go for an aperitivo which is like an alcoholic drink and food. Like an early evening thing, and add a couple of glasses of Prosecco, and we had a really enjoyable times out on the beach in this bar. And it's just amazing what a difference in my mood from a few days. Massage made. And then we got home kids been watching for about four or five hours which we told them they could, and we tried to put them to bed and then I fell asleep putting them to bed. And now it's 20 past day and I'm going to bed and there has been my day I got nothing else to tell you. And no doubt. Tomorrow will be a different day and we'll see what happens and. So thanks for sticking with me, and I saw like go. If you're on Twitter, leave me a message because I won't be there tonight at Romeo crow. Take care yourselves I'll speak to you tomorrow. Good night.
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Welcome to Episode One of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest LED is Monday 21st September 2020 is going to be a super short episode because I'm really not in the mood. Today is my birthday my 40th birthday, and through absolutely no fault of anybody else. I've just just found mode basically a very low foul mood. How am I telling this in this morning ahead of the test tomorrow. Cut it short because I was just bumbling all over the place. And that was after my exercise session, which To be fair, when all right. And then I kind of did a bit of work not enough work, and then now it's lunch. I ended up having lunch at three because I was working, and then lunch was nice. And that's it, that's all I got. And then I went back did some work and then we went out for a walk, which, oddly enough put me in an even more foul mood. And that's it, and now tomorrow we're gonna do the test and see what happens. That's all I got told you is gonna be a short one. Speedy tomorrow. Bye.
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Welcome to Episode 107 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. And today actually is September the 20th 2020, which is one day before my 40th birthday. So today if you listen to yesterday's podcast I recorded it at three o'clock this morning drunk. And as a consequence, I ended up having about three hours sleeps that basically today is complete and utter right off in almost every sense. So yeah, I just was like really not allowed to do anything I've still got headache even now. And, yeah, so that's like well that's not nothing's gonna happen. Though I was meant to be doing Italian lesson but I postpone that till tomorrow morning. I wasn't planning on doing any Italian tomorrow. Before my test on Tuesday. It's my birthday tomorrow but now I'm going to do two hours of Italian tomorrow morning after my hour of personal training. And then I was meant to do some work for audience ninja and give tasks to the new guys on the team but I messaged them a similar that's not gonna happen and because my birthday tomorrow then we're taking tuesday wednesday off to go for my test in Naples for the Italian and then Wednesday dinner so I'm not really going to get going with any of these guys until Thursday or Friday but there's stuff that needs doing before that the American clients ready now for advertising side of things. So basically, I've got to work tomorrow morning. So, welcome to your full T's exercise work, Italian, but I'll be fun. What I did do today though, which is really cool. What out for what with Leonardo. It's the first time in a long time if I want not ever I'm sure but a long time it's just me and him, we went out for a lovely walk. And that was very nice and then when I came back I thought well I've spent time with Anya now let me spend time just with Mina. And we played some card games, just mean her and I and then we did some drawing. And that was really lovely and it did make me think that, you know, every week we try and have a family day out, you know, and that's really really enjoyable we all get as a family. And then one of the other days usually Sunday or whatever we're just kind of at home chilling as a family maybe we end up with family movie. And I was thinking as a new routine or idea whatever is on the Sunday on the second family day of the week. You know, I go out with one child or just play with one child meaner with the other. And then Mina similar with the other and then we swap over so that at least every week at least, each one of them has had a good hour or so or hour or two with each parent just on their own. Because life gets busy and they're always together we're always together so we always do stuff together, play together or. And actually, it's really nice I think for each parent and each child to have some alone time, a one on one time, you know, with each other I think that'd be lovely as they grow up for us as well. So, I will speak to similar about that tonight but I'm sure she'll be well up for that. The other thing is, I recorded a song I wrote a brand new song and recorded the boat bare bones of it. I started reading Prince's autobiography yesterday. The beautiful ones I think it's called, and he'll some really simple line in it, which is kind of something I've heard before, and I'm gonna paraphrase it but it basically I've ever said it last night, but it basically says that when you're writing. When he's writing a song, you know, songs or stories and he thinks, you know, you put another kind of hope in it, you know your characters put on other people's clothes and put on other people's situations and blah blah. And basically, it's the opposite of the camp of Riot what you know, the opposite is, you know, just make up, make up stories I've considered myself a story teller because fiction and screenplay writer and these are fiction stories and I've got a good head for fiction stories. But oddly enough with my songwriting I've pretty much never done that I've never really just worked on fi
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Welcome to Episode 106 of my podcasts if you from the crow's nest. And I believe the time or the date is Saturday the 19th of September, 2020, despite the fact that my phone says the 20th of September, but I believe that's because it's three in the morning, by the time I'm recording this. So what is the view from the crow's nest. Today well. I spent a huge amount of time, like four or five hours of my day, focused on, Italian, and learning Italian and trying to learn Italian and trying, trying to learn Italian and blah blah blah. So if you've been following the podcast for the last bunch of days you'll realise that I have a test on Tuesday that is stressing me more than anything that pretty much never stressed me before in my life, and I really wish to pass it on Tuesday and so I'm studying hard, and I'm trying hard, but maybe I've left it too late, I don't know, we'll see. So that's what's led to nigh on five hours of study day. It would have been a longer day of working etc except I had. What did I have had my personal training session this morning, but the time I recovered from that which, to be fair was not as challenging as it could have been on other days. It was still pretty much midday and then. Ah, that's what it was. And then we sorted out. Blackfeet, then we sorted out the internet for our moved Castroville here in a couple of weeks, and we sorted out the gas, and the electricity and when I say we, I mean Samana. We did it all in one go because there was like his offer we had about seven minutes to accept it or not because the Italians don't work in a normal way you know up on the spot you got to do this, you got to do this or it doesn't ever come back again ever point being that within a few hours. We measure the gas, electricity, or the internet, the new place which is a whole bunch of bull a we have our bills that we would have last year, and got permanent internet hits, that's good. And then I focused on Italian, and I didn't do any music whatsoever and then this evening. We had a video call with old friends of mine from uni. Guys, our main unit guys are played to the bandwidth guys I lived with my best mates, we drifted apart cabinet gather, etc etc. And the overarching thing which happens every single time I meet up with them is this to me. I massively Miss, and you may tell I'm bit wrong now. But for me, I massively miss the, the potential that we had the opportunity that was in front of us. I see the bigger picture I see the thing that we could have become the ceiling, we could have done, and personally I don't believe that they see that, and it's a shame because one of them is one of the greatest rhythm guitar players ever in my life and the other one is one of the best musicians I've ever met in my life. And the three of us together. I feel. We're more than the sum of our parts. And so I feel it's very different depressing for one of a better word, that, you know, didn't work out and to me it's like a marriage. You know you try and put together a band and over the years I've tried to put together enough bands, and every band is like a match about seven people on account, the basis is married to the guitarist basis married to the singer the bass match the drama there's three marriages right there. And then when you multiply that up, even just by four people. And then you can see how many marriages are in the band. And so me and myself and the other person. We live together we played together I felt we were totally married together. But it didn't work out, I mean I honestly feel like it's like. In fact, I live, as I said a few days ago I live, mostly in the future. Rarely do I live in the present. Absolutely. Nearly never do I live in the past, except when I think of times with these guys. And then that is my past, because that I feel is a real shame. I feel it's really shaped my future. And it's a real shame because I think we had something. So talking to them tonight, always seems to bring back that shade
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Welcome to Episode 105 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. It is Friday the 18th of September 2020. I had a decent enough sleep last night so today I wasn't completely devoid of energy and just feeling grotty. So that was a big change over the last few days. And what a difference and sleep me because of course, you just got energy, everything looks better, you got more positivity about things. And so I channelled that positivity this morning by doing something I haven't done in I don't know how long someone had taken the kids out early because Mina had wanted to go for a walk which was bizarre firstly and wanted but that was so out of the house. So I got up and I was making I had a slice of bread for breakfast and I was making a cup of tea and I thought you know what, I want to I'm going to do a vocal practice which I haven't done in ages. I certainly haven't done in the morning for the knows how long and the reason being because the grip the sky experience, which you may well have heard me talk about, which I released a few weeks ago, is the grip the sky is an EP, grip, the sky is an EP and the grip the sky experience is effectively a marketing experiment. And the whole kind of point of this marketing experiment is it needs to be married with a particular advertising strategy that I've got that I wanted to try on Facebook. And the first part of this advertising strategy should be a live performance video, of which I don't have any certainly not forget the sky, or need to track some great this guy. And so, audience Ninja, which you probably heard me talk about recently is my digital marketing agency that I started in a while ago. And we've got a guy who specialises in ads and the intention was that I was going to say, this is what we need to do blah, blah, blah. But then it occurred to me a few days ago, I was like, well, actually he specialised in this let me just see what he comes up with because I might be over conflict. cating things and actually, he might have a better way. So yesterday or the day before he started an ad campaign for me for the grid sky experience. And we got an incredible amount of people seeing the ads and clicking through. There were an increased sale except in the ads guy, what's called bounce bouncing off the page, or in marketing terms. Anyway, so that got me thinking, Well, clearly, something's not right here. I don't know exactly what it is. But it might be that the audience has a fake audience. Or it might be that the site is just not attractive to them, whatever it is, the point being, I thought, you know what, I really need to return to my original idea and record a live performance video for one of the songs off the sky. So I can use that as the first ad, which is the idea and so this morning, I think No time, like the print And, you know, let's get started by not to record the song. But let's get started by starting to get vocal, do vocal parts again and try and get yourself back into music with the idea that maybe next week, I'd record the song or the video, and, you know, go from there. So, I kicked off with quick vocal rights, I thought, you know, there we go 1015 minutes every morning, get it done, get my voice back to kind of working, you know, and go from there. But of course, having done the vocal practice, the voice being a physical instrument that the body being the instrument, well, once you warm up an instrument, and it's sort of playing quite nicely, it makes you feel good, specially if that instrument is your actual body. So I was kind of feeling pretty good. I was feeling a bit musical and I thought, now I could go and hit my desk at like 930 or whatever. And just get working on you know, quote unquote, work on its niche stuff, or I could do a bit of music and haven't done Nine months properly, after, you know, a bit of music. So, this morning to compound on top of my decent enough night's sleep, I decided to work on a song. And I decided to work on a brand new song and
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Welcome to Episode 104 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest. And it is Thursday 17th of September 2020. I am knackered. That's pretty much the end of the episode didn't sleep again last night very well it wasn't it after kind of three or four or something and that's been a bit of a pattern this week. And I put it down to a bunch of things but probably over marking them is my stress. I Italian exam. On Tuesday, next week. And I think I didn't take into account how much your stress maybe there's generally things don't stress me. But I guess this is, this does. So, that's the, the net result was because I didn't sleep I ended up getting up. You know late in the morning and have my exercise session which got put back with my, my coach my trainer. And that was a good session and actually I felt surprisingly felt powerful circuit training today. And I felt strong I felt powerful, and I really handled it pretty easily really. But by the time I'd done that, it was pretty much nearly lunchtime. So by the time I got started at work, it was in the afternoon. And I worked all afternoon I can't really tell you what actually achieved or caught down. It's one of those days. And I just feel so very very frustrated because it seems that I know that stuff is happening I know that I am making moves towards you know something, but I guess I'm not doing any music or any writing or anything creative and that's, oddly enough that saps my energy rather than you know not doing it saps my energy and doing it gives me energy I guess that's the same for anything that people are passionate about. So I've just won this, I think I just want this all to be over this Italian thing I want the hiring and onboarding of the new guys for all its ninja to be done so they can really be working. You know, so they know what's going on and I can get up. Excuse me, they can get up to full speed full steam. I want. We just started. We've just started advertising campaigns actually for various different things so the first guinea pig advertising campaign on Facebook is for grip the sky experience so I'm the guinea pig. And I have a very clear strategy on how I think to run an effective ads campaign for musicians and particularly for this. And I built the grip of sky experience, specifically so that I could do this kind of advertising campaign, which I won't bore you with now but this by it that I've got a guy on the team who is an ad specialist and so it would be wrong of me I thought to just kind of go well, you're an ad specialist, but this is how you're going to do it. So I thought, well let me let him do his way. And then I can see and then maybe adjust because my way will be more complicated, but actually if his way gets results then, you know, that's good so I don't want to let my ego or preconceived ideas and limiting beliefs hold back from actually just getting stuff to work. So we just started that yesterday, and the initial data is that I'm getting an abnormally high amount of people clicking the ads and coming through to the group the sky experience, but pretty much 100% of them are not doing anything once they arrive, other than leaving, which throws up warning signals to me of saying, you know, they're kind of click farms or basically spam affectively spam. So I hope I'm wrong. I've brought it so the dude's attention, and he will look into it and then we'll see and then we'll adjust a few things etc etc. But what it's reminded me. Why I guess I feel a bit kind of despondent too Is it reminds me that. And also a conversation I had with another entrepreneur earlier, who's in a similar boat from a different angle but is that it's, it's hard, especially when you don't have a large budget. You know, it's hard to find people who do things in the way that you want them to be done with the expertise that you may have if you build expertise up over. You know how many years. And the whole point of getting a team on board is obviously so that I don't have to do
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Welcome to Episode 103 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest It is Wednesday the 16th of September 2020. And oh boy, do I have no much to tell you today. So you got off lightly. And also my brains got off lightly. So I couldn't sleep again till after three this morning, which meant that my morning was basically ruined. I thought I was gonna lose all day, but actually managed to rally in the afternoon and get some stuff done. Key stuff that I did today, bringing on board like into the team to new people. So now our audience ninja team is for including myself, Boss on an art stroke video person and a VA stroke researcher. So that is potentially huge. Move forward. Very important because obviously the more the team grows, the more capacity we have, etc. So that's Yeah, that's, that's really positive. Obviously, we'll see how these guys go moving forward, whether, you know, they kind of past the trial period, which I guess is like two or three weeks or something we'll see and see. But it feels good to get people onto the team, you know, moving forward. On a different note, after yesterday's eureka moment about planning to stay in Castro billary, not just for a few months, but maybe a few years as a base, and how that actually changes. What we may do there, for example, getting rid of furniture and getting different furniture in and making a far more livable place. for both of us feel very settled with our idea, like it's, you know, it's clearly the best course of action kind of thing. So now we're going to start moving towards getting ready for that including ordering eventually, broadband internet to be wired into the place, which I'm super looking forward to because last time we were there for the six months, we were there. We were using mobile internet You know, the whole time, which was just the ball ache. And now we're not gonna have to do that when we get this pumped in. So that's cool. And then, yeah, just as I keep saying for last few days, I guess this has been the kind of thought the overriding thought for the week is really just getting in, I just turned turning a big corner I feel is a big, big corners being turned right now. And like any corner, you can't see what's around it. But you do know that you are changing very much changing your view. If you imagine you're walking down the street. And that Street has lasted 10 years, well, for 10 years, you've basically had that same view, you know, you've been focused on the same thing, getting towards it, getting towards it, and turning the corner. You're completely changing the view. And of course, whilst you're turning the corner, you can't really see what it's going to become. It's just a bit of a blur. And that's the that's where I'm at right now. I feel like it's we're turning into something. And once we've turned that corner, whether that takes weeks or months, and I think it'll take much longer than that but once we take on that corner, then we'll be able to see the new street that we're on. And we'll be able to see in the distance what we're working towards now. And again, that street might be a five years three or 10 year Street, who knows. But at the moment, I feel like I'm in the turning the corner face definitely changed my perspective changed my view. But I'm not yet sure exactly what the next perspective looks like. So exciting and daunting in the same in the same moment. And outside of that, basically be my day I feel like really added anything to it. Oh, doesn't sound very interesting or very good or very satisfying of feeling or whatever. Successful. I don't know what the right words are. But I guess the real success is in turning that corner. So we'll see what comes out. ahead, my Italian lesson today. another hour and a half session. Tomorrow is gonna be a two hour session. So I'm building out my stamina. I am improving. You know, I'm starting to understand it's about the grammar they didn't understand before. I'm getting more confident with my spe
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Welcome to Episode 102 102 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and it is the 15th Tuesday the 15th of September 2020. As you may know, for the last few days I've either by choice or not so much by choice, had a few days off of work. And as a consequence, sort of three days off or whatever it was getting back into it getting my mind into it was a bit more challenging. So this morning I kicked off with some training with personal trainer. And that was good but then I was, yeah just a bit, kind of, I didn't want to just rush straight into turning my computer on and going into the same old habits or being busy for business sake and I thought, you know, let's have a bit of a think, and I don't know if I was just procrastinating for for not getting on with things, quote unquote, I should have been getting on with, or whether you know I really need to think about stuff. And one of the things I was thinking about was how can I living situation and the things that we want the things we need and the plans and blah blah. In fact, as I said yesterday in the podcast you know I really felt that fulfil that we're kind of on a very turning a big turning point of a new era, new a big new section of our life the next five or 10 years like closing off the last 10 years kind of thing and then moving on with the next kind of 510 years. And part of maybe that'll go around my brain I don't know but so I was thinking about our upcoming move, we decided, a while ago that in a few weeks, hand side of the exact date, we're going to move back to Castroville array, which is in the region of Calabria further south in Italy. And that's where we were for pretty much the winter. In fact, over the winter from about October last year through to March when we came back to Ischia, and it was only ever meant to be temporary. And even six months was far longer than we envisaged, and that was that. And then we're thinking we're gonna go back tail end of this year for a few months and then see what happens with COVID see what happens with our finances, see if we're able to travel again etc etc. And we, we did you know it was gonna it's always going to be a temporary kind of kind of place. Anyways. On a related note, you know, we've thought about and we've discussed that we want to base when we're travelling this summer we wanted for years. And we thought about looking in certain places to buy where it's gonna be a lot cheaper than others we thought about a big lifelong project that I talked about. I don't know, probably about 40 podcasts ago or even more about some, some proper bonkers idea about a kind of building in a state or like community project estate bit by bit over the years. And I'm not going to go into that now but that was kind of one of the ideas and we're like, yeah, we really settled on that that's what I want to do is our big kind of long lifelong plan and they they're the base etc. So we talked about all these things we need this we want to go here we want to have this, and then it occurred to us well curtain here that we've got this apartment in juke castability, which were intending to sell when we can. And, you know, it's just a small two bed apartment. But it occurred to me that rather than thinking about it as a temporary place where you know internet is coming from, you know, 4g on our phones, not even, you know, having a proper broadband put in there or anything. And I thought what if we considered it as a home base for the next kind of two three years. How would that change how we plan it and how we react to it. So for example, we're currently paying about 130 140 quid or something, a month for storage of some of our stuff that's in the UK and a storage locker. And, you know, how much would it cost to have somebody transport that stuff down to us in Castroville or in store it there, at least, maybe it would cover the cost of the transportation you know maybe the next six 710 months worth of storage fees would be would be saved by the
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Welcome to Episode 101 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. It is Monday the 14th of September 2020 which marks it one week, I just realised before my 40th birthday. So, yeah, that's something for you. One week before my 40th birthday, I just read that, there is the distinct possibility that life has been found in the atmosphere of the planet Venus. So, I don't know how that's related, obviously it's an early birthday present for me. But I there's a pretty important scientific discovery if it turns out to be accurate, and therefore I thought I would share it today, because, you know, I think it's cool. Today, well today. So, as you know if you're listening yesterday to Episode 100, I was really tired drained drained drained drained after the week looking forward to a good rest and a good sleep. And instead, I couldn't sleep till after five this morning. Just lay in bed, could not sleep. And so today, instead of kicking off the day with a an exercise session with a personal trainer and then doing, getting back to work. So I've had kind of two days off and then in Italian and my Italian lesson this evening my Italian coach and instead I just set everything off, almost, right, that's it I just don't have the energy. Now I'm not gonna have the energy Saturday, we're going to pretend I got the energy. And in few of my new filter, which I'm trying to apply to everything which is, it can wait. Or you can turn into question Can it weigh in most cases it can wait. So I thought everything I thought, you know, it can wait. So I messaged everybody that was expecting to hear from me on Sunday or today, or expecting to meet with me on video calls and settled I'm really sorry but we'll bump towards you tomorrow. And as a consequence, after, sort of a little bit of time this morning I said to Simona. Let's go for a walk. And I hardly had any energy to go for a walk like really I was walking like some kind of stone drunk man. But um, we, we went out and we had a walk, just the two of us while the kids, presumably watched, and it was glorious haven't been out during the day with Simona for a walk in months. Literally months. And so we went down to skip on to walked up to the castle walk back we sat on the rocks, overlooking the sea for 1020 minutes was chat is wonderful. And then after that we came back, we had lunch the kids were embroiled in a game where they basically took a ball a string and tied it, I mean literally around every room in the house is like a spider's web and then they came outside with it too. But once they're in the house. We seem cooked and then we set up table on the balcony. And we had a nice luxury allegedly lunch glass of wine, just chilling just talking did a video call with my mum and dad. And it was super super pleasant. And then after that, we then we decided to go to the beach. So we got the kids ready eventually and then we went down the beach and we're just for an hour. We had a swim. And then we came back. sim a dinner while I shower the kids and myself and then we go into the kids room, and we watched the rest of the third Lord of the Rings Return of the King for the last couple of hours. And it was just, just a really enjoyable day off, just not just the day off but not feeling guilty about work not thinking about what just just enjoy being in the now, and a follow up from yesterday is you know I realised I really do spend my life living in the future. Too much. I think and plan for the future I defer gratification, you know, until the future and the and too much of that is not a good thing just like living too much in the present is not a good thing, but a balance is what you're after, and what I'm not having at the moment, and I'm not balanced. So, in view of these new ideas and these new changes in my outlook and how they'll last but we'll see. I thought you know I slip in the moment let's just enjoy a day of doing stuff. So that was basically my day on a grander scale. I really feel that you know
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Welcome to Episode 100 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. It is Sunday the 13th of September 2020, and we have reached Episode 100. So I'll quickly gonna state, the position of the podcast right now recap my day and then close it off, it's not going to be a very long one, given the above agenda. So currently, according to the analytics on anchor.com, or anchor app or whatever, which is what I used to record the podcast on 100th episode while this is 100 so it's not the hundreds but it has been listened to 441 times that doesn't include YouTube but I don't think the YouTube listened to particularly great in terms of didn't make much of a difference so that may be a few of actually maybe a few per episode so I guess I could be another 50 or 100 or whatever so maybe 500, but 441. And apparently, I have now an average listenership of five. Now that's, that's awesome, because that's 25% higher than it was, you know, up till about a week ago, where it's been a four and looking at the stats, which I just did in order to be able to tell you this stuff I'm not, I haven't been tracking them to be honest but um, I just looked, and it seems I just had my best week ever. I think it was 66 plays in one week or something, I think. And it looks like there's a little bit of an uplift. In the past month which would make sense we've gone from four to five regular listeners, so that's pretty much you you you you or you and. And that's awesome, because you know you've been listening so you know exactly what these are like and they're not really full of wisdom or wit and they're probably not all that interesting. A lot of the time so they're kind of like a diary really. So thank you very much for being so awesome and sticking with it, maybe that's a, you know, a sign of things to come, a slow build. But on that note, and just to reiterate if you are one of the few or the new, whose noses come to this. So the original idea of this podcast was because I wanted to do something that kept me feeling like I was doing something busy there's a few reasons. You know, one could do social media posts this that the other blahblah, people say you should post on Instagram every day and all of this stuff and I wanted something that I could do something that I could keep up with. And wherever I was something that was easy to do. So that was one reason for thinking, Well, you know daily podcast that could probably do, because I like talking to. Speaking of the like talking. And I think that just read a book or something maybe that's in my mind or had been in my mind that, you know, there's so many options for expressing yourself through different art forms and that might be photography or whatever you're Some people love using Facebook. Some people love using Twitter Some people love and do video some people, etc YouTuber, and I love talking type sorry I do I love talking. So it was very natural idea really to go with the best, you know, go with the, the medium that you're most comfortable in and talking very easy so Bosh that's the second reason for the podcast. The third reason for the podcast was to create a diary for myself effectively of my thoughts of what I was up to that may or may not be of use, or interest at any time later in the future. But like all things, if you don't record it if you don't put it down if you don't do it if you don't have that data you can never go back and get it. So, it's kind of like well okay let me do that. And because you know these last few months life really is changing, obviously, you know coronavirus has changed a lot of things but our personal journey as a family and my personal journey you know I can feel that there's a. It's undergoing really quite a significant change probably one of the biggest changes that I've had in years. And it's by certainly no means finished it's like it's just the beginning of that change but I feel like it's really basically at the start of a very big new chapter, and a new phase of t
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Welcome to Episode 99 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, it is Saturday, 12th of September 2020. Today was a day off. And it wasn't I have tried to just literally turn my brain off today I really, this, this, this past weeks been really draining mentally I think particularly the Italian studies that I've been doing, has really weighed on that and the pressure of trying to get ready to take the test next week. And I also had a bit of a hangover from last night went to bed late last night so I was devoid of energy. So it's a bit of a nothing new day, highlight the data meaner. Well, two highlights of the day that tells you in a parental stuff first highlight you'll be delighted to know is that finally managed to convince, and get Leonardo to use a toilet for number two. He's been using it for number one. All months, no problem. But for number two, he's been insisting on nappies, and his nappies ran out. Few days ago and we've told him, we're not going to get any more. He hasn't did therefore didn't do number two for like three days. And all parents are they'll know what I'm talking about. And he hasn't been out of house for three days because he refuses to put on clothes without his nappy. So, the more pressing problem was the number two, which I'm very happy to say we got through today. Bit by bit, he kept going on to the toilet we like we convinced him to try the toilet seat on at least bit by bit by bit until eventually he was just running backwards and forwards, but he was still not relaxed enough to go until eventually he went very good enjoyable news. Hopefully you'll be able to keep that up. And then the other side we did have partially Family Day booked the four of us we're going to go horse riding for the first time, and but because of the aforementioned not wearing clothes without nappy Leonardo stayed home Simona stayed home so Mina, and the two of us went horse riding, for the first time, and it was, it was good. Mina was very brave and very relaxed. And I guess I was a bit brave as well, and relaxed them. And we did a short thing sort of 45 minutes but they literally straight on the horses. And we started walking around and holding on and do various little things that I guess are all designed to help you get your balance and not fall off the thing. And then we came home and it by that point I was, I mean even driving to it wasn't a long drive but I noticed how tired I was and that I wasn't feeling comfortable driving particularly. Sorry I was glad when we got home, and basically had dinner gone to bed and just chilled with a bit of quiet time. And that's me basically drained drained drained so hopefully an early night tonight will re energise me tomorrow. That's it. So I will leave you right now, and I will see you again tomorrow for Episode 100. So it is so thank you for joining me. Any comments or feedback or anything like that, head over to Twitter at Romeo Crow and I'll speak to you later. Bye.
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Welcome to Episode 98 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. And it kinda is. I'm still not entirely sure what it kind of is. But I think it is like Friday the 11th of September, 2020, although it's 130 in the morning on the 12th that I'm recording this, so I don't know when this is going to come up anyways. Suffice it to say that today has been another of those day or Today was a complete casino of a day, in the sense of the day just kind of disappear for me because everything just came unstuck. Everything just kind of seemed to go slightly wrong. So for example, the kids have broken a glass. We've got tiled floors here because we're in south of Italy, and the kids haven't broken glass in months. Today we broke two glasses in separate occasions. And, you know, I was trying to do one thing and then a glass breaks at a run in the other room so the glass. I was trying to do my Italian lesson and Leonardo does not want to put. We're trying to get him out of nappies, and he doesn't want to put on any underwear. So Simona and Mina went out and stayed here, which meant he was with me when I was doing my Italian lesson, which were not quite distracted and that was quite challenging and then later I had my personal training session, and I both kids here, and they were jumping all over me and that was challenging. Then later I had another tiny lesson with the same dude and another was back in because again meaner and Simona went out, but Leonardo wouldn't go on his underwear. Because he's still scared about the nappy so so the whole day, and on things but the whole day has been one of those kind of days where everything has been more challenging than on other days. So on one side, you know you can get annoyed about it as I did earlier because. On the other side, you look at it and you go hang on what's awesome about this, you know, It's easy. I read something today which is what splits into my mind. I read something today about don't think it was from Derek civils, who's an author and an entrepreneur who I really dig the guy says, and he said, in the thing that I read today he said, Don't think about silver medal. Think about bronze medal plan to be a bronze medalist, which on the surface you think well that's kind of bizarre don't really get what you're talking about. And his point was this, which I really liked because all of his points are kind of counter intuitive and that's kind of why I like them. So, he was saying that the, the silver medalist, they get really stressed because they almost won gold, and they're focusing on the person who beat them they're focusing on the situation or whatever it was that is better than what they have. And his point was, instead of being a silver medalist, you should focus on being a bronze medalist, and a bronze medalist is happy to be on the podium. They're happy because they beat, or they're better than or they were above the situation that is just below them. So, a silver medalist looks up, and a bronze medalist compares downwards and his point was, you'll be much happier if you compare downwards to if you compare up. So to put that into absolute practical use straightaway. My day was really frustrating because I was comparing upwards, I wanted to get stuff done. I wanted to blah blah blah and it's getting all these interruptions and, etc. Whereas when I reframing I look at it as comparing myself downward. What a wonderful day I had because I managed to put in two hours of Italian study towards you know getting my citizenship, I managed to put in an hour of exercise towards being healthy and able to enjoy my citizenship. I managed to put in some time with my son, playing around and whatever. And, you know, I managed to do all these things which, if I compare upwards would make me think. I didn't manage to. But if I compare downwards. I completely managed to against, you know, another reality let's say whereby I was at work for six or seven hours and I managed to do none of those things
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Welcome to Episode 97 of my podcasts, the view from the crow's nest. It is Thursday, the 10th of September 2020. And I bid here Hello, hello, hello. Oh, my goodness, today is just, I mean, went to bed late last night haven't done. I mean, I'd been getting back on track last night was 130 in the morning, not so late. But when I woke up sort of quarter past seven or whatever, my I was knackered, but my day, I tried to sort of get into work kind of thing, but it's really work, I could really concentrate. But my day has been, you know, this recruiting process, basically, the various different roles. So now, I put the job roles up for audience ninja and people had applied, and I'd sorted them and given some trial tasks to a bunch of them and now these are the days where those trial tasks are starting to come back. So I'm looking at those and then I had If you've been missing the last few days, a bit of a panic con, decided that I'm going to take my Italian oral exam next week. So I've give myself a week to prepare and I feel very ill prepared but I got an Italian tutor. We did a I did like three or four hours with different tutors yesterday picked one of them and started Stace. We did one hour, I think stuff in the morning just after lunch, remember and then another hour in the evening. And my whole day is kind of felt like I'm really just focused on Italian I'm just absolutely drained. So the good thing is he gave me a bit of homework tonight which was to watch Gladiator that with Italian audio and English subtitles and the dishes need to doing so I just spent the last hour and a half watching Gladiator with Italian dubbing and English subtitles. Were actually not true. I started with English subtitles but after 10 minutes I decided to switch to Italian subtitles and I really hate watching dubbed films, you know, every film I watch if it's foreign film I watch from afar films, you know, then you have English subtitles, but you want to hear it in the original language. So it's really freakish and annoying at first to listen, you know, to the dub, but because I guess I'm really focused on listening to the like really listening to the dialogue, listening to what they're saying and trying to place it and whatnot. That I guess that's kind of helped me get over the fact that it's, you know, the wrong voices doing it, but it's good exercise. And people say if you're trying to learn language, you should watch you know, the the films or whatever in that language in terms of you know, if you're in Italy, so watch Italian films, but the my tutor my coach told me something, which I thought was an interesting idea. He said, problem is if you watch films made in that country, they've all got accents, you know, whether those are local accents or regional accents or whatever he said, but when you watch the dub films, that's a really kind of true flat, non accented You know language so he said it's better to watch the foreign films with the Italian dubbing because they'll speak proper Italian you know with with the without the accents and regional and blah blah and the other benefit is when you watch films that you already know especially if you know them really well and I could almost recite the you know the dialogue in Gladiator even I haven't seen in years, then obviously it helps because you know, what's going on and you know, also what they're saying so you can translate more quickly in your head. So that was a really good exercise. A little tip for you if you're learning any language. Now NACA NACA NACA to tomorrow, another couple hours with him another hour with a personal trainer, and I had a good ache today in my pecs, because yesterday, we did a lot of pushing exercises. So a lot of pecs and better shoulders and arms, butt, and triceps. And I supplemented today for the first time I did pull up Because I thought you know, not so many pull exercises, because they're, I guess a bit harder to do when you're not using any tools. So on my off
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Last week, Hello and welcome to Episode 96 of my podcast view from the crow's nest. Today is Wednesday the 10th of September. No, the ninth of September, depends who you speak to because it's 20 to one in the morning so is it the 10th is in the ninth. I'm still going with the night for the reason it's one in the morning is because Simona and I actually had dare I say, a bit of a night out. Yay, we, we went, put the kids well we we put the NRA to bed and then we put Mina to the couch to watch TV, for an hour and a documentary, and that was about nine o'clock and we came in at midnight and she was still on the couch, not watching a documentary. Clearly having just watched cartoons and whatever for the last three hours, but what it did mean is that we went out we had a lovely walk. And we got some street food, which was not in our diet, and then we sat in a really beautiful spot outside to have a drink and some more food, overlooking the sea in the car so it was beautiful and then we walked on got an ice cream none of this was in the diet. And then we returned home. And now we will be strict about the diet for about 10 days. I think nothing this weekend, but it was. It was lovely really needed both of us really needed to get out and, particularly, it was a really intense day today. Because, as you may know, in the last few days I've been on a mad quest to expand the team team team team team team. So I've just been basically I've just been doing full time ad for writing recruitment exactly full time recruitment writing adverts responding to people setting test tasks for people, etc. And then today though some of those are coming back but to add to my. Add to all of this. I had this, this, we had this kind of panic a couple of days ago on residency and status after Brexit and homeschooling the legalities of doing it. Now if we're Italian residents and blardy blar and all of this stuff so just to add to the chillaxing that we've been doing. I decided that next week is the opportunity to take an Italian oral exam, which I need in order to qualify for Italian citizenship. And if I don't do it next week in Naples and it will be next one is November, I think. And so, yeah. And so I thought, yeah, okay. But to do that, but the net result is I'm entirely unprepared so I put an ad out for a bunch of Italian teachers and today I did three or four sessions with different tutors. And it's the most Italian I've spoken I think in my life in one day. And tomorrow. I think I'll do one or two more sessions and then choose one of the tutors and do one or two hours with that tutor, a day for the next week. So it's going to be a very intensive week, but already I feel a bit better about the exam because at least, I kind of know what it might be. And, you know, my Italian my vocab is not too bad but my grandma, my tense is pretty poor. And my understanding of people is pretty poor, but it's getting better and by next week you'll be a lot better here's the plan. So yeah, very intense. They have this plus one of the clients, who's about three days ago they were considering throwing in the towel. We had a chat suggested a few things did a few things. And now their fortunes may well have been reversed. So, they're looking a bit happier about things and you know if it all comes off that'd be good because it also reflects well on the advice and the work that we've done for them in sort of changing their direction so potentially that's really good. And, yeah, I mean so so much happening so much happening, but now it's late and frankly I'm not gonna go into all now but suffice it to say, by the end of this week I think the audience ninja team will have gone up by three, four, maybe even five people. And, you know, we'll be in a position to really motor for more clients. Clients we've got seem to be very happy with our services which is brilliant. And I might have Italian oral language qualification. So it's all going in the right direction and crucially what
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Welcome to Episode 95 of the beer from the crow's nest. It is Tuesday the eighth of September 2020. And I really think I will keep this one short tonight because I'm super tired, it's, it's only 830 it is quite early for me to do this podcast, but it's been quite an intense day so it's a follow on from yesterday. And there's some concerns over, we have some concerns over residency status in view of Brexit looming at the end of this year, and whether I'm allowed to travel around the EU in 2021, and the legalities of homeschooling the children and we're probably have to register them in Italy, which is different homeschooling rules to the UK, etc etc so it's been quite a lot of stress today, trying to find out what's actually happening and blah blah blah. The current view is that I probably moved my residency to Italy. Although we found out today, we realised today that I should have done that after being here three months. And I've been here a little bit longer three months. So, yeah, that's been a whole bunch of stress, alongside that, as well as that, I when I was working, I was focused still on team building this week audience ninja is all about expanding the team, big time and giving us the capacity and the capability to, you know, have more specialism more manpower and effectively get results quicker and scale ideas and whatnot. So, we're currently. We've got three VA street researchers on a trial. We've got video editor and graphics designer on trial. And we've got a salesperson who will probably be on trial at some point this week as well. And for audio engineers who are all on trial. So, lots of tasks and trials going out so that by the end of this week we should be able to bring onboard two three maybe four new team members, which is really exciting because that means that we've got manpower to get moving on and a lot of the projects that I've gotten crucially removed my need to, you know, do a lot of the, the bits that take me away from what I'm probably better at certainly enjoy a lot more which is creating music creating stories and photos and films, so I'm really excited by the prospect of where we're going with this. And that's gonna be the focus of this week. Outside of that, just been my day, like I haven't done my daily noodle it's the first day so I think day nine, maybe day 10 day nine I think and I haven't done it I just don't have it in me today. So that's gonna be my first missed opportunity or missed. You know, mistake. Although, with 95 episodes of this, I haven't missed one day yet on my podcast so that's good. This is most definitely sustainable. Now outside of that the only other thing was I woke up this morning. Dreaming a story idea, which I can, I can best describe as like kind of a 1920s British Batman. I guess it's part of a better word, so bizarrely in my dream. It was like the son of some, like big wealthy department store owner like Selfridges or something like that, who was fighting crime or fighting something in London, but not with all crazy tools and technology and, you know, suit someone not like Batman, but you know just normal as a normal man doing normal stuff. But in my dream it was all like secret passages and stuff in within Selfridges within I think that the thing that was caught in the story of my dream and then when I woke up was that I thought actually that that was quite cool idea is to use some old buildings in London and history and heritage in London, and then invented this kind of backstory and secretiveness to them. So you know, people can go visit the buildings and wonder, you know, much like Harry Potter platform 13 and a half or whatever Kings Cross, you know, people go and have a look and this is where the, you know, this is where the secret chamber was that if the. I have no idea. But I think that was the vibe of my dream. Whether I do anything with that idea or not I have no idea but that is my creative Thought for the Day. And that's all I've got for the day so if y
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Welcome to Episode 94 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest and it is Monday the seventh of September 2020. I don't know where I was. This morning, to start at the beginning this morning had a personal training session, it was circuit training and coach said he's up the ante made a little bit harder and happily I survived. I wasn't too taxing. So that's a real positive so I'm glad about that. Then, my focus was on doing some financial admin which I do every Monday morning. But then, I'm really now on a mission to work on my business not in my business, and get myself to the position where I'm doing the things that I really love and excel and get excited by more and more, rather than the stuff that I can do and that I'm not too bad at or pretty good at, but doesn't really excite me. So, the principal key of that this afternoon was writing job descriptions and postings and following up on the application from previous postings I've done in the last few days, because I figured the single best thing we could do is to expand the team, and really just bring people on board. And the idea being that when we've got more team firepower, then it's going to be easier to get things done more quickly. Hopefully to a better degree as well to have more specialism in the team, and ideally be able to get clients on board I'm thinking, particularly for audience ninja at the moment, such that the revenue starts coming in to pay for these new team members. So I'm really focused on accelerating things at the moment you know like making things happen faster by bringing on more resource. So I started that process, continue that process today and I will report back on how it goes. Either I don't find the right people or I find some good people bring them on board it cost me a lot of money and we don't get anywhere. And then I have to let them go, or we bring them on board, and it cost me a bit of money but then we start bringing in more revenue, and then it's sustainable so that's where we're aiming for. And of course, the more sustainable you make it, the quicker then you can get more revenue above that, which means the quicker you can enact new ideas, and hopefully it's a positive circle. After that, so that's the focus there. And pretty much that was my day I came up with a little some idea while I was listening to Spotify while I was working and I rushed outside and worked it out and jammed it out, pretty much live for today's daily noodle post. If you don't want the daily noodle is every day I'm trying to get outside and play guitar, even if it's only for five minutes, and are filming it and I'm posting it on my igtv, YouTube, and eventually Facebook pages so you can catch anywhere there it's called Romeo crow his daily noodle coming, and part, the idea is that you're doing something every day, part of it is, it gets me outside that the house otherwise I won't leave the house, even if it's only five minutes apart the idea is that I'm actually playing a bit of guitar and predominantly The idea is that once I manoeuvre myself from working on my business, to being able to put more time into things I love I, learning to play guitar playing guitar playing music writing songs and moving back and back further further into my music, then it will spend more time playing guitar my guitar play will improve and you'll be able to see. I'll be able to see through the daily noodle how I've actually progressing. Because, like everything you don't notice your skills changing your ability is changing, until you really look back at a few things side by side that have separated by a number of, you know, months if not years. Case in point, probably two and a bit years ago I started trying to learn to play guitar without plectrum using my right, you know my right hand fingers instead of strumming with a plectrum, and it was like it was terrible at first, you know, I literally couldn't even pluck a string. Now I almost feel it's not true I feel more comfortable b
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Welcome to Episode 93 of my podcasts a view from the crow's nest. It is Sunday the sixth of September 2020, and not much to say today, you'll be possibly relieved to know. So took a day off like a full day off as I write not working today. And I spent my morning tidying and cleaning and then had a lovely lunch mother in law made fresh, fresh doughnuts. I three of them with jam inside. Very very fatty boom thoroughly enjoyed that had a bit of Spumante with it, and had a sugar and booze coma on the couch for a half hour. And then I did some housework and then made sure everybody tidy it up because the house is a mess. And then it got through to the evening, and we watched the last part of the two towers Lord of the Rings sec of film. And then, I really couldn't be bothered to do my daily noodle. But I thought, you know what, I don't want to lose the, you know, lose it for nothing. So I did like a one minute one pretty poor it was but you know I continued it, I did it, and now I'm doing this. So it's a pretty short day, very short podcast nothing really to say other than I guess what I did do today is. I was reading and thinking about, certainly in the morning about our position our situation it's very easy for us as we have done in the last few months to think of in terms of scarcity, with in terms of, you know, we need to bring money in we need this we need that the coronavirus is doing this is doing that, you know, victim victim blah blah blah. And actually, we're in a position of abundance we're in a position of great opportunity. And it was a reminder, this morning my thinking was you know we need to do something about that. So, part of the thought was that we take a week's holiday. Each month. That is to say, rather than trying to get the days off during the week which I'm not really doing you know we go away the whole point of us leaving London a year ago was to go worldschooling to travel with the kids and coronavirus shut that down but actually we're in a position where we can do some travelling and still work so we, you know, weeks holiday, even just not doing anything as a weeks travelling I mean exploring some places whilst also obviously doing a bit of work. And while we're around. So that was one idea. And then that evolved into you know maybe coming back to the UK over Christmas for a few weeks or a month or so. And a couple of places but long story short, it was the making do with what we've got. Making you know, do what you can with what you have right now, basically, and not feel like you're coming from a place of scarcity or fear. But instead, from a place of positivity abundance proactiveness etc. And the second part of my thinking this morning was just a reminder, I was reading, Derek sybers, I just finished his book you and your music and then started his other book, no or hell yeah I think it's called, and the end chapter one in the beginning Chapter The other even though they're different. Basically book ended very well. And long story, long and the short of it is, you should do you know if something doesn't excite you don't do it. Basically, even if somebody. People with success in that field or whatever tell you that's what you should do. If you don't feel excited by it don't do it so he gives an example for example, as a musician somebody says oh you must be on this app let's say Tick Tock he didn't say Tick Tock blsa Tick tock, if it doesn't excite you to get on the app and do it then don't do it, because you're just going to go down a hole that doesn't really fulfil you doesn't help but it's going to take time away from anything else. So the logical conclusion of that is, if it doesn't excite you don't do it but find somebody else who, it does excite he'll find a way of getting them to do the obvious ways paying them. Naturally, but there might be some less obvious ways you can do some work for them they do some work for you if you don't have the money the funds, whatever, but equally. There are plent
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Welcome to Episode 92 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest. It is Saturday fifth of September 2020. And it was meant to be a day off and I failed entirely. I had like what I thought was gonna be about a half hour maybe an hours of work to do this morning for a client and then I got a call from said client and we were on the phone off and on throughout the day for over five hours. And I was doing quite a lot of work for them. And I'm absolutely drained frankly. And the couple of bits I wanted to do for myself I didn't really do I think guy over the family I didn't have any sort of that time off. feel really tired to be fairly full the seats about half to this morning and then woke up five hours later or whatever. So feeling pretty tired anyway, similar kids went out to the beach. I didn't and I don't feel bad about it. I just feel drained. wasn't in the mood to do my daily noodle video but I do think eight in a row I can feel it's gonna be quite easy to do those like it's quiet you know the podcast is easy I just stopped talking as you can pretty much tell the widows I kind of have to work out what I'm going to play or at least have an idea of it though today so basically they usually take about 15 to 20 minutes and I guess the podcast does as well on some occasions, but I want to get myself with the daily noodle into a position where I don't feel so egotistical about how it sounds kind of thing like it's like do it get it done. Get out there now. Maybe people watch it maybe they don't watch it. But it starts charting for myself my progress if there is any on the guitar but also it kind of forces me to play each day which is kind of the main point of it. Outside of that measured my waist this morning, first time down to about As one second got Yeah, I've got down to basically 80 centimetres, which is definitely the lowest I've been since I started measure myself quite a number years ago. So my body is changing, it's getting into better shape. So that's positive, definitely positive. The call with the client this afternoon, you know, we helped reform pivot their business a bit towards solid, which I think is more long term commercially viable, and it gives us a more solid plan. So that's positive, because now there's actually things that we can really do. So that was good. Unfortunately, I had to part ways with one of the audience, Ninja team members today. I've given them a bit of a warnings probably, well, maybe it's the right word, maybe the wrong word. But basically I'd said that I wasn't happy with how things were at the beginning of last week and they had a way Kind of improve them dominate It was about communication. You know, they just seem to disappear for days on end. And they said, Yeah, now, you know, be back on. And then they weren't. And then today they send a message got I'm really surprised that you've done this because I was doing this stuff and you know, I was tired last night. That's why they messaged you. And so it's all of this stuff might be true. But it's a reminder to anybody who may be listening any point that communication is the number one obstacle problem and key to any relationship, whether that's your business relationship or your relationship with your boss, with a partner or work with your spouse or your partner with your kids. Talking about it, letting the other person know what's going on, is probably one of the biggest source sources of problems that most people have. You know, they either assume that the other person And knows, which you know, never assume because the other person probably doesn't know. No, they think, you know, it's obvious, therefore don't need say it. Or they, you know, they just don't update people they don't, you know, let people know what they're thinking or what they're feeling. And in business, I mean, you can't rely on somebody who you give a task to, and you don't know whether they're doing or not, you don't know whether they're coming back. So I would urge a
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Welcome to Episode 91 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest, and the date is Friday the fourth of September 2020. So, my day my day What a day, it has been. It's like I'm gonna make this quick I promise I'm gonna make this quick, so I kicked off with personal training session, like they thought it was going to kill me more than it did. So, I was quite pleased when it didn't, but then my coach said that she was a kind of an efficient day to day a smart day rather than a hard day. So didn't feel quite so good after he told me that. But nonetheless, It's getting in shape slowly but surely so that's very positive had less sleep last night than I had the night before yet woke up feeling more refreshed. How does that even work, someone tell me. Then, I thought I'd kick off the day after I recovered from my exercise etc and had breakfast. By focusing on some music, music theory, so I'm still trying to work through the basic music theory course on groove three.com brilliant brilliant course, I'm learning a lot from it. But these last few modules. These last few lessons of the whole thing are about cadences and modulation and sevenths and things like this and this is where I'm starting to struggle previously in the earlier part I kind of understood it, but now I'm really having to concentrate so I can only do one video at a time and they're about 1012 minutes, and I'm actually having to watch them more or less at normal speed as well that's how much I can't take on board the information, so that's cool because I'm really pushing myself to learn the music theory and get out a comfort zone so that's cool, and then turn my attention to audience ninja to work on my business rather than in my business. So now we've been going for about a month I've gone better or maybe six weeks but I've got a much better idea or much I've got a better idea of what we need as far as the team is concerned of what skills are lacking and what have you. So, I've put together a couple of job posts and put them up on upwork.com. So hopefully I've already had to apply for one and nine apply for the other or three apply for one and I'm sure we'll get some more of those. There's already at least one on each side of those job posts that I've probably take on. So that's really positive because, you know, if I want to do anything for scale anything it's all about getting the team of similar and I want to get more done if you want to really, you know, fulfil our dreams and our plans, then we need more people pulling in the same direction so it's really important that we get the team going get more people on board so that's hopefully really positive, we'll see how that pans out. Then I spent most of the afternoon working on a client's stuff, particularly on a marketing. Kind of campaign for them it's the first the first actual marketing thing that we're going to be doing so I'm really excited about that because you know all businesses all businesses everywhere. Need sales. Otherwise, they, you know, they're unlikely to to last long. If they're a very commercial business and they're gonna need sales to pay the bills thing if they are maybe let's say a nonprofit or something like that. They at least need sales in terms of people signing up or if they're charity people donating or in whatever capacity you want to denote sales but nonetheless you need traction you need users you need people to use the service so you can prove it works and then you can get funding, whatever it might be. So, a lot of I think I've said this yesterday but if I didn't test, even if I did it's worth reiterating, a lot of business owners and entrepreneurs make a crucial error of building something without making sure that they're focusing on actually selling it getting people to use it. It's actually 20% product 80% sales. But most owners, go for 80% 90% product 20% sales. So, hopefully, we can bring some more users to the client. And, you know, make things work for them and that'd be a real
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Welcome to Episode 90 of my podcast view from the crow's nest. It is Thursday the third of September and I am your host, Mr Romeo crow coming to you through your ear holes. Well, today. Excuse me. Yesterday, I think I was feeling a bit low I can't really remember, but it was a day of you know just kind of trying to get myself motivated yesterday trying to get on with work. So today I thought I would do something which probably motivate me straightaway which is starting the day with music, rather than trying to get into work and. Excuse me. As a consequence, I mixed or remixed the track, a song called east, which is going into the lab for next week the lab is my private member's club where I release a new bit of music every week, amongst a lot of other things. And then afterwards, I wanted to find the song for the week after because what I'm trying to do is every week do two songs two posts for the lab, which is the songs themselves. And the story behind the songs videos. So, every week I kept kind of one extra week ahead of myself. And so, I was looking at listening to a couple of songs and there was one song called worrying times, which I think was from 2013, I think something like that, perhaps earlier. And I'm sure I did some kind of recording of it somewhere but the only recording I could find was one of the original ideas so I could find two recordings. Now both on my phone acoustic guitar and vocals. Not very good recording and, but you know good songs so I thought, you know what, why don't I do something crazy see this is just an acoustic guitar vocal and rerecord it because I haven't actually recorded a track, like guitar, vocals with ever since probably about January or something. So I thought, let's do that. Let's just get the part of my, you know, just get out of your ego and have your old environment has to be right or I have to have done this so I can just get on with it. So I did. And so I recorded a version of it it's a track called worrying times as I say, and it's it's part of my bond suite, my James Bond suite. So one of them already released a few years ago which is called Please don't make me cry. And then there was this one called worrying times and then there's another one called me and what it's called. I can't remember what it how it goes, but I know this around somewhere, and the three of them collectively to my mind are very bond esque songs and in fact were written to be kind of bond esque songs. Eventually, I'd like to have the orchestra on them and everything but I'm getting a little ahead of myself because really, I need just man if seven years later to record an acoustic guitar and the vocal part so let's, you know, let's take things one step at a time. But um, but nonetheless I worked on music for probably about, by the time I did that mix that one I was probably about three. About three o'clock before I kind of got on with quote unquote real work. But it did, I gotta say it did really feel good to, to just focus on creative, you know, music and so that was cool. And I've had quite a few people ask a different note, the grip the sky experience which I released last weekend. I had, I sent out a survey, because I wanted to find out from the people who I thought had seen it, you know, a bit of feedback from them principally I wanted to know how I could improve it, because as you might have heard earlier in the week I was saying that I felt quite disappointed that there hadn't been much actual interaction on it. And I had some lovely messages back from people and on this survey had really nice responses for everybody. Either mostly five stars out five, otherwise four stars, and then, you know, lots of other nice things and it was an anonymous survey as well so no one has to feel obliged to buy anything but. So that's really cool but I still haven't had a particular response on on it you know and interaction on it so that's still a bit concerning because that's really important that it motivates peop
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My podcasts The view from the crow's nest, and it is Wednesday I think the second of September 2020. How you doing, what's happening. How's it going, do tell me come on to Twitter and tell me you say what's up what's up I can't find it tell you because I do not hear from you. Today, my, my day started with difficulty. I had just didn't have good sleep last night again and feeling really particularly anxious and stressed about about work and about all my creative projects and about all the thousand things that I want to do. And I had my training session this morning. First thing, and were meant he was circuit training today which is the joy when you're feeling drained in every way. And I got it was six sets, and after the fifth set. You know my, my coach said, you know, just I think we'll, we'll call it there, call it a day. And it's probably best that we did I just didn't have the energy. And by the time I finished that I just all it all I could do is lie on the bed and kind of just moan, you know, I was just stunned at the energy I didn't have the motivation I didn't come put myself in the mindset to get anything done. Anyway that went on till about midday and then I managed to pull myself out of my little funk. And, you know, start working. And then the afternoon was actually pretty good. You know, I started on top of view things again and, you know, put things in motion so they start moving forward with the team for audience ninja and planning and some other things but yeah just sort of struggling a bit a minute. I don't know exactly what it is not really sure what it is but I have lost my mojo in a bit. I guess is, is kind of what one might say, I don't know whether it's to do with grip the sky experience not really having the interaction that I was hoping it was going to have. Maybe it's to do with that maybe it's to do with putting more time again into audience ninja and client stuff, and not into my own creativity into my music and such like. I'm not sure. Not sure what it is, but everything you know you go up you go down you go up you go down, and nothing. Nothing lasts forever and you just kind of get yourself out of it and as I've said before on the podcast I'll say it again. The route, I believe out of these kind of moods is action is you got to take action. Even small steps. But, you know, it's by being creatures of do that we you know we move things forward I think and we move our feelings and our emotions, you know they're there to tell us that something isn't quite going right and then they're like a early warning system, and if we don't listen to them or we try and button them up, then it's only gonna crash us later. So when they come, embrace them, and realise that it's your body really trying to tell you something, and then try and realise as quick as possible what that is and often it's, you know, you find that way by introspective thinking, and by action, the two things combined so that's my, my route out, I hope back into kind of feeling fulfilled and productive and all of these things. So that's kind of been my day. Wow three nothing, nothing else really to share. That's a really short one for me today. Tomorrow's another day hopefully I'll get started much earlier in the day so I can really have a crack at things and get things moving. Maybe I just need to stop, you know, carving out some time for music again. I think that's really what it is I'm kind of really aching to get on with creative projects. And I'm finding valid or otherwise reasons why, you know, I've got other things that are pressing the need doing. And I guess principal amongst them is doing things that bring in the rent, food and all of those things which are very necessary. So we shall see. So that was me signing off for today, tomorrow, who knows, who knows what it'll bring. Anyway, thanks for listening, and I will speak to you tomorrow doodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 88, mph baby. It is the first September. 2020 So welcome, welcome. First of a new month. And I always find that that's a good time to look back over the last month, and see what progress you've made. And also look forward to the new month and make plans for the new month. I don't know who said this but somebody said, Excuse me one second. I didn't say that. I said that. And somebody said people massively overestimate what they can achieve in a day and underestimate what they can achieve in a year. So I figure split the difference is, and go for a month. And hopefully kind of more or less got it. So, I haven't actually done this exercise in, today I thought I'd save it for the podcast so positive things for the month, I guess it was the first kind of full month of audience ninja. The agency, and we've you know worked with two clients they're not upset yet, so we're not doing too bad a job, they're pretty happy I think internally team communication we could be doing a better job, I could definitely be doing a better job of managing the guys and giving them tasks or no today. That was really my focus, you know, getting a bit more organised and giving more tasks I gave some feedback to the guys yesterday on my concerns and asked for their feedback and, you know, improving our ways of working. So in that first month we worked out the tools we worked out some processes, and a few things like that so that was close positive, and, you know, the month has finished profitably. That's even a word, which is obviously very positive when you're in your first throes of a new business. So that's very good. Obviously, big, big news are released the grip the sky experience, which is a big milestone a big move forward. Initially indications as I was saying on the podcast yesterday were that it's, you know, people aren't interacting with it in the way that I hope to which has been really disappointing. I did a survey that I sent out survey to the 74 people I think whom I could tell had gone to see or kind of consider that and definitely don't see it but they take the link to to the social media to maybe go and see it so we'll see some of them already came back and said I haven't looked through it yet so that's fair enough. But on the survey, I think, 80% of respondents said it was on a scale of one to five five being the best they said five, it was five. So it was awesome. And 20% said it was number four, he was good. and the rest of the feedback was praise and was positive but though there are questions asking you know what could I have improved What didn't you like etc. So, the feedbacks been really positive. It's just people haven't interacted with it. And I got a message from someone today that made it seem like they didn't realise I need to confirm this with them tomorrow but it made it seem like they didn't realise that there was more than one song or one page. So, perhaps, I don't know, but perhaps many people got to the first page didn't realise there was more and didn't carry on. So, these are things to look at and these are why I want to do the surveys and find out because of course, just because I interact with somebody in a certain way doesn't mean anybody else doesn't in fact when I watch Simona interact with websites, especially stuff I've done to kind of see how she does, she invariably, you know, handles and very differently to how I do, which gives me some insight into my design process isn't necessarily as obvious or as good as it could be. So, it's positive that I got it out the door, not so great response but, you know, you build on these things that you get the data and you improve and. Outside of that, just in no particular order, and physically your health wise, definitely improved this month my strength, my stamina, my body composition is changing, I can see it becoming more muscular and less fat, which is, which is very positive. So that's really good, because obviously health is the most important thin
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Welcome to Episode 87 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and it is 11pm on the 31st Monday the 31st of August 2020. And I'm coming to you from my bedroom, which is also my office. So it's not gonna be a long one because I'm tired tired tired, but suffice it to say that this again I'll start with some positive this morning had a personal training session. And the last exercise of the session. The instructor, my coach said okay now we're going to do 200 Press ups, and I was like what he's obviously joking but he wasn't 10 sets of 20, and by God I bloody did them. So I was, I was very pleased and surprised. But obviously, you know, I'm improving, at least in my strength and stamina so that was very positive. And then I tried to get back into work Monday mornings always kind of financial admin. And then that leads me through into the afternoons. Having had Saturday and Sunday, off. I was kind of both raring to go because there's so much to do. And also, in a slow lethargic kind of car get my head in gear, kind of thing. So that was at odds with each other. But principally, I can say I feeling blue, while I have feeling low because on Saturday as you may well know, I launched the grip this guy experience. And as you also probably know there's a lot resting on it, both from a personal point of view I want it to work. Obviously, and from a professional point of view, I wanted it to be the, The kind of the blueprint for future releases also for clients and to help other musicians, and the feedback I've gotten from it has been very positive, which is great. But the actual use of it has been basically no one's used it in the way that I was hoping they would. So I spent an inordinate amount of time and hours configuring cool interactive elements to it from sort of games where you can win prizes, through to, you know, simple comments section through to bonus content and all sorts. I don't want to give too much away if you haven't seen it but if you've been through it then you know exactly what I mean. And I was really disappointed that not one person or one singular person has, you know, has participated in any of those elements and they're about five or six interactive elements. And they took me so long to configure like God so long so many hours and hours and hours and hours days and into the weeks to get that stuff. Obviously, you know, the easiest part of the whole thing was recorded in a sense was recording the story behind the song videos and putting the music up. And actually, those are the only two things that seems that anybody's actually been consuming, so I could have saved myself, basically the entire work on the surface right now and just put those up. But, you know, I want to do something more interesting and I want to do something more in depth and this is an experiment. So, you know, experiments, you have a hypothesis. And you see if it gets proved right or not. and at the moment is getting proved wrong. So, it's still early days are still not had that many people go through it. So, you know, I always say that until you've had at least, you know, the minimum 100 people do a particular thing or go through a particular part of a funnel is you can't really conclude anything about it. And so, they haven't been hundred people go through it yet. And they haven't been certainly haven't been 100 people get to the end of it yet. So really until that kind of those kind of numbers happen. I can't really conclude anything too much because, you know, it can be anomalous it can be all sorts. But nonetheless, egotistically, I'm very disappointed that no one's actually interacted with these elements. So, yeah that's that's a shame. That said, the focus of it is, as a marketing tool is as the first introduction for the second introduction actually for people to buy music, who have never heard me before and find those people will be Facebook ads campaign, which I'm yet to do. So, the people who have seen it thus far, are people wh
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Welcome to Episode 86 of my podcasts, the view from the crow's nest It is Sunday the 30th of August 2020 and I bid the very very Hello he welcomed me welcome. In fact, today was day off so I've got pretty much nothing to say to you. Okay, thanks. Bye now. Couple of things. Very, very much. After yesterday's very very relaxing family day where I really was able to rest my brain in always today, it was very hard to get my brain going. So I didn't really do much decided to kind of take the day off as well my basically had a weekend off which was pretty spectacular. And just, just children and watched them film with Graham page with the kids, and particularly Amina, and then finished off watching magnificent two or whatever it's called. with Mina though I'm very much feeling like I want to watch something that's a little bit more charged, let's say, a little bit deeper than those films that maybe I'll watch something tonight. But um, yesterday I, apart from launching the sky experience I also soft launched a new idea, which is the, the daily noodle. And this is where basically just jamming on the guitar for about three or four minutes, two or three minutes, something like that, and recording it, and then putting up every day on Instagram TV igtv, and also YouTube, and it's a real simple idea. I figured that having the pressure of needing to put a video up each day of me playing guitar might be singing as well. Am I not it's totally open might help me to focus on one one it will make me play every day, which currently is very easy for me to slip into weeks where I haven't picked up a guitar. So I want to you know get back to playing guitar every day. So that I'm back to kind of focusing on music every day, more or less, and to hopefully are kind of thing are this is getting a bit dull. People don't want to hear me do the same thing every day depending on what I'm doing. I better increase and, you know, improve my technique. So perhaps it will also force me to, you know, to work on new things and try new things, which goes alongside the study I've been doing on music theory recently and I'm trying to open up my, my brain and therefore open up my skills and understanding and open up my guitar play, so we'll see if that works but if you want to hear just go to Instagram TV igtv guests at Romeo Crow, I'm not very ofay with igtv, or just go to my YouTube channel and you'll be able to watch the first two episodes because I managed the second one today oh and the other thing is, I'm going to try and do them all outside, no matter what the weather, no matter what time of the year. The idea being that, then they kind of fall in with us travelling, even if it's just a day out but as and when we're travelling more, you know we're visiting nice places so it gives me an excuse to basically bring a guitar with me and jam in nice places. So we'll see how that pans out so that's that's that. The other thing is having the day off I'm trying to, you know, open my brain a bit creatively to new ideas or concepts, and one of them which keeps coming back and then I made a connection today which I was quite pleased with is every time I go to look for a film that is basically like India. Jones. The only thing that comes up is the mummy, realistically, and I love the mummy as well so every time I look for film like the mummy, basically nothing new or nothing interesting comes up, and I keep thinking. It can't be that difficult to, to come up with this story you know or a series of adventure stories in the classic kind of adventure style you know the live action films and there's a lot of films that are called Action, Adventure, but they're not really adventurous in the sense of like Indiana Jones was or not you know they really I mean obviously one contrast right Indiana Jones, but I really want a series of adventure films and adventure stories that are really fun to watch fun to watch as a family as well. And I you know they've got certain criteria to the
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Five of my podcasts, the view from the crow's nest. It is the 29th of August, 2020 It's a Saturday and it's the release day of the grip this guy experience to toe to toe to toe, toe, toe, toe. Wow, like a human trumpet and feels good to get it out, it really does feel good to get out. But, that said, I basically was day off took a day off total Family Day often aside from launching it this morning, and occasionally checking on my phone to reply to a few messages that's basically not thought about or done any work today. Particularly, and it's been a lovely day we went out this morning to the Botanical Garden called Villa, or avina, which is basically cactus city. If you like cacti, then you will absolutely love it because it's full of cats and cacti I should say. But it was it was actually it was really nice. And it's quite small in terms of our hearts ansata is quite small in terms of the area, but it's kind of very dense and compact, so hang on a sec. I've got this avatar in my sights don't lose him. Don't let me lose him Tell me lose him. If I get him. I can't hear. Hard to tell in a second. And. Anyhow, I digress. And Heather's lovely cafe in this car in the middle of it, which actually didn't sell basically anything other than sort of very nice fruit juices and things, but there's this beautiful outdoor area with the lovely chairs as a waterfall upon with carp I think and stuff like that. And they had a guitar. In a case, I saw it was basically nobody then someone asked if I could play the guitar and so I spent a little bit of time playing guitar in this really nice outdoor Oh It's lovely. So that set up the day, most beautifully. Then we went to have lunch in the crater of the volcano. Ah, to the playground. We went to the playground, that we've been to quite often with the kids, we've been there for you know a few family days out it's a really nice playground, which is a lot to say, in Ischia, and in fact, Southern Italy, it seems because most playgrounds really aren't that well kept, certainly not like the British playground, that the kids are used to but yeah it's a really nice playground that we go to regularly and meaner, they've got like a on those sort of, they go AP jungle walk things you know where they've got ropes and all sorts of obstacle courses tied between trees have been has been doing the child's one, a bunch of times and she's really good at it now and you meant to be, I think, eight and above have to do the more the next level up. But despite not quite being eight they didn't do it and they were like, I don't think you're gonna be able to do it though I think she smashed it Hello I was scared when it was like, you know, a lot of these walks were kind of 2030 feet up, so not not small, you know, and through the forest and stuff so she did that she loved it. She's really good at that. So I was very proud moment. So to celebrate we went to the bar they got a lovely bar there. Got her ice cream got me a beer that was great. I had a beer outside in a long time. And also nearly put me to sleep. So after that we went down to the port Ischia, sorry. The port is haunted. And there, I had ice cream. And I die out the window celebrated the week with an ice cream. And it was delicious. And then we came home, and did family movies so we started watching the second magnificent, which we got an hour into and then it's like cafe. Time for me Let's go to bed I think Leonardo's already asleep. And we're all really tied to the other half tomorrow. That has been the day it's been a day off. I'm toying with the idea. I have been toying with the idea for a few days of starting a daily video on maybe Instagram tv youtube, facebook, all of them not sure, call something along the lines of the daily noodle. And the idea behind it is very simply, it's me playing guitar. And that's it. Maybe I'm singing maybe I'm not, but it's improvisation it's just jamming about it sounds boring I know, but there's two reasons for it one, becau
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Welcome to Episode 84 of my podcast interview from the crow's nest. And it is Friday the 28th of August 2020. And this marks exactly a year since we left. London and we left the UK to start our adventures our world schooling adventures. And in that year, we managed to go and visit my mother in law. My parents, my father in law. And back to my mother in law. This has been the entirety of our world schooling adventure. To be fair, we did have a place booked in Spain, and we were on our way to Paris before that, you know, literally in March, just before COVID closed everything down. So, it wasn't definitely going to be like this. But nonetheless, we haven't quite managed to embark on the adventures that we planned. So, yes, if you'd asked me a year ago, where I was going to be in a year's time, I definitely wouldn't have said approaching my 40th birthday, my mother in law's, but you've got to go with what you've got, and I'm very grateful with what we've got the lovely place to be, this year. Excuse me, is still a very lovely place to be and see out the summer. Although, pretty much for the whole summer I've been set in the bedroom, my desk working, but that's fine I would have done that wherever I was most likely. And speaking of working today, I test, a kind of extension of yesterday really I struggled to get myself in the zone to work today. As I said, I think I need a bit of a break. I kicked off the day with zero energy, and did my personal training session where upon it was circuit training day, which was pretty much the last thing that I wanted. But nonetheless, I did it and I was, I was very, very pleased that I, you know, my stammers rice really proving my conditions and proving which you'd expect but nonetheless. So we did six sets of five or six exercises per set, including one of the exercises was bunch burpees. And for the last three or four times I've done the burpees during air conditioning or whatever I've done them with press ups in between like one. I think two or three press ups. And this one was without, it was like, well, these are quite easy. So on the sixth set I put the price up in just one press up in nylon killed me and kill me but it was, it was close. It was a close one thing, but it was good, so feeling fit and fit is stronger. But it took me a couple hours before I could really get my brain into doing stuff after that, and net result is such as I didn't really have very much have a productive day. I got videos up and posted for the lab up for this week and the one ready for next week, and I did a kind of a training video basically for for audience ninja but for musicians, where I basically went through it's like an hour and a bits video an hour and 10 minutes or something. And I put that up, and that's basically takes through from start to finish the kind of strategy that I'm employing the audience ninja is employing that I consult suggest to clients and musicians. And, you know, it starts with the basics getting your website ready and ends with, you know, a funnel. That gives you an ROI on your ads. So, hopefully very useful for people will soon find out. Only emailed about 20 people about it and put it in a place where nobody else is going to see it. To start with anyway so we'll see if there's any, you know, is of use for people tomorrow, or over the next week when they get back to me. And, of course, tomorrow is the release of grip, this guy experience. So that's, that's exciting. I'm looking forward to getting that out and and moving, I've just noticed that my calendar is still on July and August is probably one of my favourite shots, and we're like two days away from finishing August and the hand changed over. What a shame. And this is actually, oddly enough, it's my cat literally my calendar it's the landscape photography or travel photography calendar that I do every year. That's such a shame I could have had that all month. Anyways, I digress. So yeah, the witness guy comes out tomorrow. And
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Welcome to Episode 83 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. It is Thursday 27th of August and I am coming to you through your year holes. So today, I spent pretty much the morning on music, really music theory and then a bit of music practice vocal practice, which I haven't done in a long time. And just kind of continuing to move forward and reacquaint myself with being a musician which was thoroughly enjoyable. But the net result was I didn't really do too much outside of that, you know, I wasn't so quote unquote productive. And I just found it a little bit difficult to get into work in the afternoon to get into other things. And I did record a couple of videos, which are for the lab. And also, actually, to be fair, I spent nigh on two hours recording a video for musicians to explain to them a process of stretching J that they can use to, you know, to, to build a fan base online and to have it sustainable and get customers from it, etc. So basically, I laid out pretty much my entire plan, or my entire Yeah, strategy and way of working. And the idea is that, as you might have heard me mentioned, I have a business tool UK open mic, which is our main source of income until the pubs will close in the UK. And it was the biggest open mic provider in the country, though we only operated in London. So that's probably not saying too much, but still. And as a consequence, we have thousands of open mic performers who'd come through our, you know, various different nights over the years, I've met a lot of them. And so I'd message them say the open mic still on yet despite the pulse being back open, but I've started an agency and it's focused on marketing and principally, we will To our clients to be musicians, we want to help musicians and move forward. And I didn't say anything near as much as that but nonetheless, a lot of people asked what was this marketing agency? Can you tell me more? So I made this video for all the open makers or performers, musicians who are interested who wanted to know more about the company because they were saying, you know, how can you help us what can you do for us blah blah and I thought well, I can tell you that we do this service or that service you know, we can build websites we can run your ad campaigns etc. But the real truth is I want you to understand what it is that we're going to do overall because you might choose to do it yourself which is totally cool. But I want to empower you with the knowledge and when the idea or at least the understanding and then if you want to work with this great at least we're all starting from the same place you know, on the same page. So that was best part two hours recording that those videos and so to be fair, you know I was doing stuff in a sad to other video For the lab for the next two weeks of posts the story behind the song so you know just get stuff done and then same on his laptop arrived today we bought a laptop so that you know obviously she can work at the same time we don't have to worry about sharing the computer etc. And it's a beautiful little thing but Acer it's called the Acer Swift. I believe we've got a really good deal on it from Amazon warehouse, which is like their secondhand you know, secondhand kind of Portal, instead of buying a new laptop for like 300 quid or something because you only need something to do kind of basic browsing, general office type stuff. We thought I thought I'd look for a second hand but in sort of optimum condition. laptop that was made me sort of five 600 pound new, but is it for 300 quid, so if you don't know about Amazon warehouse, I heartily suggest you check it out because it's even things like pre you know, unboxed items, items that people have received, decided they want sent back. So oftentimes they are literally brand new. But they tell you the condition of them. So this was in perfect condition. And honestly, it came with shrink wrapped and everything and I thought it was brand new, I wouldn't have kno
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Welcome to Episode 82 of my podcast, from the crow's nest and it is. I believe the 26th of August, 2020. So, today. Today has been a continuation of the, the marketing side the promotion side of grip the sky. So, I'm sure you know by now grip the sky is made up, and it's coming out on Saturday. And I'm releasing it as the grip the sky experience, which is an experience of the bay, whatever that means it will be more clear on Saturday. When you've got a moment to have a look and go through it. But of course just creating the songs is one thing creating the content the experiences. The second thing, but marketing and getting out to people. The third thing, the, you know, the idea is using the 8020 rule for example that 20% of your work in any business should be on creating a product and 80% or more should be on actually selling it marketing it, because otherwise, what's the point. No one's going to hear it or see it or consumer enjoy it or benefit from it. And so today, I was I sent an email to my mailing list yesterday and today I was replying to emails to responses I got. And it was great. It was a little. I mean, it took me a good sort of hour or two to reply to the emails, but it was great, it gave me kind of a re glimpse of position I was in five odd years ago when I was putting a lot more focus and time into music and. About five years ago. And I'd spend about an hour and a half, two hours a day replying to messages from people all over the world who had nice things to say to me, to do with my music and what I was doing and it was wonderful when I was connecting with people you know with fans and it was really cool. And then in the intervening years I focused more on business like UK open mic and more family as meaner. You know became a toddler and got older and then Leonardo was born. And then I've been focused on other business as you probably know, so it's kind of glimpsing back at my, my original you know hope of being a musician my original focuses on compassion on being a musician and working on music. And to that end, after I finished replying to the emails. I was then thought let me get the songs ready for the next couple of posts for the lab, the lab is my private member's club I post a new bit of music every Thursday as best I can post a version of a full song. But it's not always that sometimes it's instrumental stuff sometimes it's more of a sketch of an idea, but hopefully it's something interesting and fun. And so I wanted to get ahead of the curve and you know get that ready so I pulled out a couple ideas from the archive one was a song called Don't cry baby, which I wrote around 2012, it seems, and I just had an acoustic version of acoustic guitar vocal and the vocal wasn't very good. It has a fairly off key I seem to remember that it was one of those where I wrote the song and then I did sign a one taken a phone call wasn't really sure of it. I wasn't confident in my voice I'm still not very confident with my voice but I'm a lot more confident than I was five, six years ago. And, you know, it was just it was a bit of a, you know you could hear the lack of confidence and direction and melody in the vocal, but I actually it's one of the few songs, where I actually wrote the melody properly like I worked it out. You wouldn't you wouldn't know from that recording but. And so, you know, I knew that that that melody wasn't quite right. And so I thought you know I want to, as I'm doing with all these songs, you know I'm loading them into Cubase my music production software and I've given them a bit of extra sheen before I put them in the lab, because you know it takes me a little bit of time extra, but hopefully it makes them sound a bit more interesting and a bit more impactful and a bit more pleasant on the ears, basically, and also gives me a little bit of practice every week or every time I do a song with Cubase with our production skills and that can't be a bad thing. So, I was going to put up okay we're goi
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Hello, welcome to Episode 81 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. It is Tuesday 25th of August 2020 and it is a continuation of yesterday's. Awesome. Step forward of a day, because today I continued the process of getting grip the sky experience out to people or at least letting people become aware of it. So I emailed everybody on my mailing list today to tell them that I'll be releasing it to them on Saturday, and lined up a bunch of social media posts, it's by no means the best marketing, you know pre launch effort that I could have done, but I'm done with the project, I want it out there I want people to enjoy it and people to listen to it. And principally I want to move on with the next project, you know, and so I know I there's a lot more I could have done with the next one I'm sure I will build up a bit more but it's something I always say, you know, do what you can with what you have right now but particularly, you know get started get something done get out there, learn from the experience don't try and make everything perfect, just make it shipped make it out there but so long as you learn from it, and then improve the next one that's what matters, and I really hope this is the first, although it was a huge amount of time for me, a massive amount of effort to get it done. You know, I really hope it's the beginning of a new way of working, which is what it's meant to be. So if it proves to be popular if it proves to be of interest and fun and enjoyable for people. And obviously if it proves to be profitable as well for me. Then I've, you know, that's the golden goose right there. And I will continue to go on that so there's a lot riding on this but it feels good to put it out into the world. And that was principally my focus for for the day. Of course, what happens is you, you know, you start telling people about something and only then, despite having months and months and spent hours and hours checking things doing stuff do you immediately see problems or things you haven't done with it, etc. So, you like, oh god did I not see this sooner. But I refer you back to my point of a minute or two ago, you know, get out there, make improvements, see what the problem is, as I believe mike tyson said you know everyone's got a plan until they get punched in the mouth, more or less, meaning it's all well and good planning these things is all well and good thinking that you know what's going on but until you actually get out in front of people. You really don't know how it's gonna work or, you know what the reaction is going to be and, you know, only when that happens, do you actually see in in reality of what it is. and then you can adjust accordingly. So I've got out. That feels good, and are working towards that. And also, on the audience ninja flex. Things are fairly quiet and all controlled with the clients, which is great. Got the team working towards some stuff there I've got some new tasks over to Dan on the team, which are some big research projects, which eventually will help both my own music but also, I hope our clients, and also future clients or even future. Let's say signings because or partnerships because I also want to, at some point, not to record label, because you know I don't have enough to do well enough ideas, but a modern record labels something different. Ideally, the idea is that it will be something which works along the lines of the grip the skier experience being the kind of formula to it, you know, having a business model that works for musicians and then working with select musicians who I really like I think their music and taking on board. Some of that workload for them in a partnership sense rather than just as a sort of client agency sense is part of it. So we'll see how that pans out. Outside of that, I did put a bit of time into my Italian again you know I'm still studying Italian and music theory practice playing on the guitar. See evening and it's starting to come together in bit b
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Welcome to Episode 80 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. It is Monday 24th of August 2020 and it is a big news day oh yeah it's a big news day. So what is the big news. Well, drumroll. Alright, enough of that grip for sky experience is now live for the people in the lab, and members of the lab, it will be live for everybody else on my mailing list in the next week or two. And, and then it'll be available, it'll be available to everybody. So, I'm so excited I'm so happy I'm so relieved to get out there. No doubt. When I get feedback from people and I see people going through it. Of find bugs and things that need doing to it, etc. So, I don't think it's finished in that sense, but it is, it's done, it's out it's it's, yeah there's real people's going through it. So that makes me so happy. So that's cool that's a big big step forward in my overall plans for various different things. So that's super cool. And really, that in itself is enough for a whole episode of the podcast I could end it here and it would be a valuable one. But outside of that had my training session this morning. First thing, it was a upper body one, and the very last exercise I had zero in the tank, I couldn't do it I couldn't even lift my feet is off the floor. So I imagine I'm gonna have some pains in my chest and upper arms the next couple of days, but my, my trainer Abdel said right now we're going to look at your diet. Because my diets not too bad at all but he says now we're going to work on the next couple of weeks, seeing if we can emerge your six pack. So I think that's a bit ambitious in a couple of weeks, but I am I'm losing centimetres on the belly. I'm now, like, a bit lower than 81 centimetres I think and I started at about 86, something like that so you know that's not too bad going, the six pack will be coming out. Let's see. So, the moment my daughter is fine but I don't know whether, how bad it's going to be or not, in fact he's actually going to liaise with Simona because, as he knows she's in charge of all the food or business and I just am very grateful that she makes food and gets food and I just eat what's put in front of me. Very very gratefully, so he's going to liaise with my weightings and we'll see what happens. And then I've got the sky experienced done. Ah, sansara mosquito. Sorry I didn't come on mosquito killing racket. Oh, he's gone, big one. I think they're, they're getting more cheeky these ones because they keep eating me and they're getting bigger. I like hunter me a second. And then after getting that I celebrated by doing more music theory practice and study, and it's really really cool because it's really starting to stick for the first time in my life, it seems to be starting to stick and understanding stuff and as I said in yesterday's episode is gonna be like the matrix I'm going to all of a sudden, look at my guitar fretboard and instead of seeing what I normally see I'm going to see like maths and logic and connections and patterns and stuff. And in fact, I did a little play around with an exercise. I see him I see him I see him. You evaded me. How did you evade my racket outrageous. And I did some exercises today and I'm kind of putting them around and I'm starting to actually use it in a little jammy I'm starting to put stuff together. So I'm really excited about that that's really cool and I really look forward to deepening and developing my musical knowledge and ability. When I translate it onto the guitar maybe even other instruments, so it's really cool. And then I focused on audience ninja for our clients. And one of the things that our paid all our guys this morning out on the team. But, you know, last week certainly I really didn't utilise it very much but I'm paying them the same amount each week so I think that's fair. Alice I really need to make sure that you know, I give them stuff to do. So, part of that is, I spoke to the client one of our clients today. A musician and we're going to be wor
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Welcome to Episode 79 in my podcast view from the crow's nest. It is the 23rd of August 2020, how are you doing well today was day off, it was up all day off. And it was so day after we didn't leave the house for family day until about 230 in the afternoon, had a bit of a lion. And then I did some Italian practice and music theory practice. If you want to know more about that. Then listen to I think either yesterday or the day before his podcast one of the two. And yeah and then eventually got up got ourselves ready very laser Lee, and the original idea was, we're going to go to Villa I kept calling Villa ravine over I think there's a bit of revenge. It doesn't matter because it wasn't open when we wanted to go opened at 10 shot at one, and then open again at 330 and that kind of didn't really work for us because we only checked in a debate 11. And it's a 14 minute drive away. So we kind of cancelled that, and then instead we took the kids to this very nice kind of playground for us the area the place we went to last week. In fact, the kids have been to like about four times a week since, and the week before is really really nice area, and very good playground, which is more than can be said about most of the playgrounds in in a skier in fact in a lot of places in Italy that we've been and Leonardo fell asleep in the car. So I took me into the playground and we played with fire. Well, the initial parts of it. So, a few weeks ago I was talking about that I wanted to be more outdoorsy I wanted to the kids to grow up more outdoors he, and I'm certainly not an outdoorsy type of person. But I want them to have more experience of being outdoors and enjoying the outdoors etc skills associated. So I bought a whittling knife for Mina, and a compass and a kind of Flint, like Ferro iron thing for making, you know, flame kind of stuff, and sparks, I think we call it, and also many already had a magnifying glass. And so I said to her, you know, let's take these things. And then let's see if we can find a couple of different ways of making fire. So we tried out the Ferro iron thing to make sparks and we got some sparks out of it so that was cool. We didn't try make fire because it really wasn't an appropriate place to actually make a proper fire, but we've got sparks and that was definitely cool. And then we, we use the compass, or the compass the, what's it called the magnifying glass, and even though it was quite cloudy, when the sun came out and it wasn't even that strong when it came out there's still a bit cloud cover, we managed to get fit a couple of little tweaks smoking within about two or three minutes, really strong. So I mean, I really like that. Solid like six, you know, close to fire. And again, we didn't let them take full fight to full fire, because, you know, health and safety, health and safety. And then we play with the knife, which was also health and safety, health and safety. So that was cool, and then we did some challenges on the actual equipment mean it's getting stronger and getting stronger. So that was cool, like it's off for a bit when Leonardo and Simona right. and then we went on to a friend's house for, I don't know, just together, I guess, and he has been, he's a is just started beekeeping so on his roof is got like four or five beehives and he's just started collecting I think the first of the honey. So, we literally had like this virgin honey. And it's crazy I've never been, you know, with proper honeycomb like taken out of the hive, before the to stick your finger in and slosh a finger and it's just it's just delicious organic, as it comes honey. And then we put it in a centrifuge cuz apparently that's how you get the honey out. You know, you do scrape off the kind of whacked covering of the hive parts of the honeycomb so that it's exposed and then you put it in a centrifuge and you turn handle and all the honey goes. And then it goes down the bottom and then there's little silver at the bottom and that o
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So it's 78 of my podcasts, the view from the crow's nest is 20 seconds at today, the 22nd of August 2020. And today, I kind of took a day off, I sort of accidentally took a day off. I started the day with a session training session with Abdel and with leg day. I have no personal achievement. At the end of the day, he said, Okay, we're just going to do something. Just one simple thing. Now to finish off, we're going to do the plank. So okay, I don't think I've done a plank with him. In all the sessions that we've had not like straight up a plank, and he said, we'll do it for two minutes. I thought man alive last a long time and only I can do two minutes. And yeah, got two minutes and he was okay, that's two minutes and I thought, wow, I could have carried on for at least another three seconds. No, I really I could have gone on for longer. And I was surprised how basically how much my stamina and strength has improved because of See It's, it's like when you It's like when you're growing as a child or whenever you know, or in any, in any way actually, as an adult, you don't really notice the changes when they're gradual. But when you see them, again, something in more contrast, and you notice, because I'm practising the plank, and because I've been doing it, my last time, I don't know when it was, but the last time I did a plank, you know, it was challenging for me on whenever, you know, it was really in contrast, so that was really cool. And he said, you know, yeah, I thought you're getting stronger fitter, and I just wanted to quickly test and it also shows you that you don't necessarily need to train one thing, in order to be able to do it, you know, you can try and peripheral things that will have an impact and everything I in this particular case didn't have to train plank. But other things have helped me to do the plank. And actually that idea that principle, kind of carries on into the second thing I did, which is a done my talents study. And then yesterday I decided to kind of get myself I think I said on the podcast to get back into music theory, and really try and get my head around it and actually I was starting to Understand it a bit more yesterday, like finally some things are really sinking in. But I didn't want to just sit on my lap. I wanted to build on that do some more studying today, which I did and then do some practical work by actually taking that to the guitar. And amazingly, you know, I play the guitar for like 25 or 30 years. And, you know, I still don't know my major scale properly. I still don't know my minor scales. I don't know the chords properly. You know, I don't know the notes on the guitar, the frets. It's terrible. You know, you get by by memorising a few patterns that you can move up and down the guitar. That's where the guitar is really powerful. But equally, that's what can make you particularly lazy. Whereas on a piano, there are patterns, of course, but I think pianists tend to have a bit more of a better understanding of music theory. And my reading my music reading is terrible as well. not terrible, but was pretty terrible. So I want to get it all up. But anyway, the point being that related to the first point, I figured that with the with the music theory, I might not be doing practising other things such as chords on the guitar or whatever, but my expectation is that it will peripherally help because it's all connected, of course. And then when I go to do something at some point that previously might have been challenging, or I might not have been able to do, I might be able to do it almost on the first time I try it because of these peripheral skills. And I'm really enjoying it. I love learning. As you may know, I love learning new things and new skills and better myself. And yeah, Music is my passion. And anything I learn more about, it equips me to be a better musician, and hopefully a better songwriter as well. So better producer maybe. So yeah, smells really cool. And so basically,
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Welcome to Episode 77 of my podcasts, the view from the crow's nest. And it is the 21st of August 2020, which makes it exactly one month before my 40th birthday. And if you'd asked me 20 years ago, when I was living with my bandmates, playing in a band, being all rock and roll, what I'd be doing on my 40th birthday, where I'd be, I probably wouldn't have said, stranded at my mother in law's with my wife and two children. Because that's not so rock and roll, but I'm happy man. I'm very happy. So you know, it's funny how life is. But that doesn't mean that I'm leaving it as it is. So as you may or may not know, I'm working towards a couple of or a couple of exciting projects at the moment. The first one is audience Ninja, my marketing agency. And that's, that's go well, you know, that's definitely going well. So that's cool. Today, I started the process of trying to get Some more clients have a prospects of about 20 odd people who may be interested, we'll see. But as you again may or may not know, I'd really like us to niche to really focus as an agency on helping musicians, particularly, because I think they're a bit of an underserved community and obviously very close to my heart. So these are 20 or so musicians, and I really hope we're able to work with a few of them and help them basically help them grow and, you know, make a living from their art, which is the dream of all musicians. And so we'll see we'll see what happens there. And the other project that is moving forward is to grip the sky experience, which is my EP, release. It's, it's basically done. I mean, it's done in its first iteration. So I'm small thing, which is to make sure the emails when people get emails from it seems to come from me, and not from Some random company that's in the middle of sending emails. But hopefully they'll get resolved soon or by next week. But the big step now was a challenge. But it's built, and it works great. It can be improved, I've got ideas of how to improve it, but that'll be for a future iteration of it. But the next thing is the marketing side of it. So that's what I've been looking into today. Because it's not simply a case of just banging it out there. Because that wouldn't really be of much use as a marketing experiment, which is kind of partially what the grip the sky experience is meant to be as well. So I'm looking at a bunch of different tools that I've already got, that I haven't deployed yet which do different cool stuff, and making sure that basically everything is tracked and everything is set up correctly and configured so that the experience is as optimal as I can make it for the user and equally as beneficial as I can make it as a marketer. You know, as the owner of the site and the data, obviously, I wanted to work on all levels and so You must put in the prep work beforehand, in order to really reap the benefits is literally the same as you know, putting stuff into the ground that you're going to grow the seeds and whatnot, you don't see anything for quite some time. But if you don't put them in the ground and you don't cultivate them, and you don't do the right foundations, and you're not going to get any crop down the line. So that's kind of why I'm focusing on that. And outside of that, today, mother couple of focuses, I am probably going to need to take my oral Italian exam in the next month, which is another stepping stone to getting my Italian citizenship. In fact, it may well be the largest stepping stone and that will obviously be great because it means I have a citizen of Italy I'll have dual citizenship, which would be really cool. But it also means that I'm still a member of the EU, which I really want, especially as we're travelling around the EU will be a lot in the future. You know Then I get the best of both worlds as an EU citizen as and as a Brit. Simone has already got dual citizenship, she's British, as well as Italian. And the kids are dual as well. So I've just got to catch up. And obvious
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Welcome to Episode 76 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. Today is the 20th of August, 2020. And just like last night I've been out for a walk, which has been fair pleasant, it's about 11 o'clock right now and evening, just been out for a walk, which is a second walk in as many days and probably about the second walk in a month or six weeks or something like that, because I've been so stuck at home. And I also. I was a bit cheaty. I had a little beer on the road, because it's really pleasant. And also wanted to celebrate adder yesterday was a very good day today is a very good day as well as kind of similar to yesterday in some ways in that I feel yesterday in favour the first two days in quite some time where I felt like I've actually covered all the things I wanted to cover in the day like I really, I mean, not all things I wanted to cover because you know there's no days long enough for that. But, you know, I managed to get things completed I managed to get things organised and I get, you know, move projects forward and really feel like I'm making an impact, which is really cool, and Chief among those. Well, well my own musical projects and I think that's probably why I feel so much better in these last couple of days, in terms of, you know, getting things done and being on top of things. And so today, I released five songs or some ideas into the lab. So the lab is my private member's club where every week on a Thursday, I put a new song, or a new musical idea into the, into the club in you know as basically as a blog post. And for five weeks I've not done any because I've been so embroiled with audience ninja with my new marketing agency and just been so busy with that. And I feel really bad because you know the lab is really that I want that to be my absolute focus you know those people who are paying to become members for the year apart via, they get other things apart from the post each week but you know I want to make sure that I I deliver on that. And so for the last five weeks I have not, and I feel really bad about it and can something so yesterday. I spent the morning, preparing the audio files for the songs that I was going to share. And that required me to open up my music production software and play with some new toys like plugins kind of software basically that I hadn't used before. And so that was cool because it kind of brought me back into yeah music I'm a bit of a musician here. And, and also listening back to those five tracks I mean they were very diverse. Some of them were recorded back in. In the earliest one of these tracks was recorded into this version was recorded in 2012. It was written 10 years before that, and the latest track of those five, I wrote earlier this week. And so, you know, real difference in styles and difference and stuff. And so that was cool because it kind of reminds me that, actually, you know you listen back on a particular if you haven't listened to it for a while, at least I do as a songwriter and as a producer and you go, actually, that sounds really cool. I'm proud of myself for writing that, you know, bit of distance often seems to do that i think you know you feel better about or at least I feel better about something I've written, maybe a couple years down the line or whatever when I hear it with fresh ears, and go actually that stands up on its own is good. So yesterday morning I was doing all the music for that and then yesterday afternoon or rather, evening after I'd done the afternoon's work of audience ninja I recorded the videos to go along with it so every post I put into the lab has a story behind the song video where I do my best to give context and depth and meaning to the song. And when I say meaning I don't necessarily mean some deep and meaningful I mean just so that you when you listen to it you understand kind of where it came from, what the point was and, and that might simply be. I was watching this huge video where he showed me some Hendrix c
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cast the view from the crow's nest. It is the 19th of August 2020. And here is the news and could they say, I am I, for like weeks I've wanted to get up earlier, because I figured, you know, then I'd get more time to get work done earlier perhaps finish the day earlier that kind of thing. And I'm not very good at the whole getting up early thing. And, you know, last this week was kind of my plans gonna do that and then I failed miserably. But for some reason, I think, Leonardo was a reason actually but this morning. I was woken at about half six or quarter to seven point is, I was up for seven. So I was like okay cool you know what rather than go back to sleep. This is a sign. Get your ass in gear and let's get doing stuffs right away. And so I did, I worked on music to a degree it was a, which was very cool. It was the lab posts for my members club. And I do a post each week, and I try and batch them together so that I get them done, kind of, you know, batched in fact is the term. And so this morning I was working on the music you know just kind of putting a bit of sheen on some of the tracks because I did five tracks today and some of these stretch back to like 2012 I think was the earliest recording for five from today. And so, you know, I have a bit more skill since then also got some new toys, because I bought some plugins a couple of days ago. And I wanted to use them. So this was a perfect opportunity it was work, it was play it was music. So I kicked off the day like that which is great got those five done. And then, you know, started getting into the rest of my day's work. And that was all fine. That was all cool. And then, then I recorded a bunch of videos in the afternoon. Ah, yes, I was very happy about that so I recorded the five videos to go with the five songs that I did this morning, which are, you know, the story behind the song It's the video series I do whenever I put up a song now, whether that's in the lab or elsewhere. You know I record a video that gives a bit of a story behind the song, kind of, I guess that's what it says on the tin. And they're cool because it makes me have to think back to where that song came from, but also hopefully they give a bit of context and a bit of interest in more depth for whoever's listening. So I've got those five done, and then I recorded the two outstanding videos, not saying, they were outstanding just did they still needed to be done. Outstanding videos for the grip the sky experience. Last, and so ironed out a couple more of the kind of, you know, not bugs, but things that didn't work as I wanted them to. I've recorded these videos I still need to edit all these seven videos. Hopefully I'll do that tomorrow. But I dare say i think i think i might nearly have completed I edit them upload them and then it might be one or two final things to just tie up but basically, it might be ready guys, I think it might be ready. So I'm gonna be super happy about that. Once that's out the door. Because there's a lot riding on it. Or I should say it's bottlenecking, a lot, you know, in the sense of creatively. I need to get that done before I feel that I can focus on new music. And the irony is that the new music I need to focus on is a blind eye to love my debut album, which I started recording about four years ago now I think something ridiculous like that, at least three years ago, so it's not exactly new, but I need to get the grip sky experience out, so I can work on a blind eye to love so I can get that out so that I can move on with actual new music like I've got a lot that I want to get through. And as you know, my time is limited. So that's one reason. The second reason is because I want people to, you know, enjoy it. I've been banging on about it for so long now. You know I want people to actually see what it's about and hopefully enjoy it, which will be really cool. The third reason is probably the least out of all of them actually but there is a possibility that I actua
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Welcome to Episode 74 of my podcast on August, the 18th, hope you're doing well. I thought I'd make a slight change to the podcast titling and intro, because I want to add the date to it because I figured that there'll be an easier way of searching in the future. Should I or anybody else want to head back to any kind of date. Then, what fun we can have, being able to go through and do that. And I also want to mark a little achievement, and it is a little achievement, but at the same time it's a great achievement and a big one. And so, the podcast software I use anchor. It gives you a stats, how many people listen to each episode, etc. And then it estimates a guesstimate your listenership. And I think it takes like the average listeners of the past 30 days or something or the average plays per episode or something like that. Anyways, I've just gone up by 25% in my average listeners. As of today, so that's big news 25% is obviously a huge percentage, and it reminds me very much of a book that I read called fact fulness, which is a brilliant brilliant book, and I highly recommend it to everybody. At its core, it basically means, it basically talks about how. A lot of people think things are getting worse in a lot of ways, but actually the facts are that things are getting much better in most ways. But obviously the media and the newspapers and everything they present facts in a skewed way to give you the wrong impression. So the book is basically about understanding and not being hoodwinked by facts, but actually kind of reading between the lines and understanding when a fact is impressive or useful and when it's not so right there I said, you know, I've got up by 25% which sounds really impressive and big. But of course, the real question is, well, the context from what to you know from what to what. So, here comes the big reveal the small reveal depending which way you look at it, I've gone from four regular listeners estimated to five. So of course, four to five in real terms is not a lot is one person. But 25% sounds much more impressive. So that just reminded me me that you know one should always make sure that one understands the context of any fact when it's been given before rendering judgement on whether it's a good or a bad thing. And in this specific case, it's a wonderful thing because you're listening to this maybe you're one of the regular four or five, who knows, but I think you massively spend your time and me because, you know, this podcast. If you read our How to make a great podcast that talks about this a bit yesterday. One of the key things that we'll talk about is the audio you know getting the right microphone etc. The other thing to talk about is, especially if you want to build the podcast up and get a big listenership its guests, you must interview people that have guests on and whatnot. Whereas I'm not averse to that in the future. This podcast the the idea behind it isn't about necessarily getting big numbers. In fact, I'd be surprised if it does get big numbers because basically it's just me prattling on and talking about my thoughts and my day and what have you. So, you know, I never really expected that many people to listen to it. I hope that in time more people will listen to it but only out of kind of a more general interest because, as my profile rises. I, you know, I get my music to more people in my writings more people and therefore more people are interested in finding out a little bit more about me or the way I'm thinking or whatnot. Then I am hoping that that will raise the listenership, but the way I always kind of compare it to and this is something I want you to think about if you're ever in business or thinking about raising your profile is the idea that any body or brand or what have you, who has quote unquote made it and by that I mean they've made a success for themselves in some sphere that has enabled them to elevate their profile in the general public conscious kind of whatever t
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Welcome to Episode 73 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest, wherever you are in the world, whatever time it is. I want to thank you for spending some of that time in some of your place listening to me prattle on. I hope that at some point in some episodes maybe this one who knows that you'll get some value from it or some tip or trick or hack or something that helps or an idea that sparks your idea and your creativity, and hopefully you'll get that, but not always. Who knows, because I don't plan these things out, as you probably know, if you listen to them before. I just kind of share my thoughts of the day really and sometimes that's more for me. As a reminder, and sometimes that's turning into some kind of lesson for myself as much as anybody else who wishes to listen or maybe has that lesson or needs it or wants it in that moment. But as I say one final thing if you've only just kind of started listening I record all of my podcasts in otter otter.ai it's free app, and it transcribes, as you're talking, and it's a brilliant app, because, because of the transcription. You can search by text for anything that you've recorded into otter, and it will find it, and immediately. Cut to the point of the audio, where that text is so you can play it back in situ so even if the transcription isn't quite right. You can hear it back the arc and I know what I meant to say, etc. So that obviously is a really really powerful way of taking notes or ideas, whether it's for a podcast or whether it's, you know, literally just a meeting or just an idea that you had and, you know, the easiest way is obviously just being able to say it and say it naturally. So, yeah, otter.ai I recommend for you, anything really brilliant also for podcasts. And then once I've recorded it. The other great thing about otter is it's really easy to export the audio recording, and I export it directly into an app called anchor, which is, I think, has been acquired by Spotify actually I'm not 100% sure, but it's an again another free app for doing your podcasts. So really easy. And if you're thinking, oh well he audio isn't very great Well that's because I'm using the hands free, you know, or headphones with microphone that came with my phone. Few years ago, because the whole point of this podcast, kind of refreshing here 73 old episodes in whatever it is, was that I wanted a way to record my thoughts, my ideas and hopefully some tips, tricks, whatever. And I wanted to do it in a way that I wasn't gonna have a barrier to entry of technology or anything like that. Like I didn't want to put that psychological barrier in front of myself of all I can't record it until I'm in the proper environment entirely my studio until I've got my proper microphone and so if you ever look up about doing a podcast, the first thing they say is, you know, you've got to get the right microphone or listen, you know, as a musician as a producer as an audio engineer when I record myself I know full well, how important it is getting a very clear, very crisp signal from the microphone without any noise and background noise and interference. And that's great when you're recording music. But when you're just jotting some ideas down well, truthfully, what matters more does it matter that you get in front of the right equipment or does it matter that you get the idea Danny, you get the creativity out. And in fact, on this riff, I can now feel myself going into a direction which completely didn't know I was going to go into, which is the idea of two things one phrase always say all the time. Do what you can with what you have right now so don't wait for the right time or the right equipment or the right environment. I am completely guilty of all three of those. But nonetheless, do your best not to wait for those things because it stops you from starting, and there is power in starting, you know, there really is. And if you carry that momentum through that can push you much further than if you
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Welcome to Episode 72, my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and the view from my nest today was very much of a family day view, which meant I didn't think about work. Pretty much all day like I actually don't think I thought about work today or at least for very fleeting periods, and I certainly didn't do anything I didn't check an email had messages I didn't check those. So I literally didn't do anything on work today, which was really nice. This morning I did speak to my mom for a couple hours which was wonderful. And I did mention about were there because she asked me, but that was about, that was about it. And then in the afternoon, sort of for lunchtime. We went out to kind of like a forest but it's like on an adventure playground type thing there and it's got one of those, you know organised kind of tree walk things, you know, and it was really cool. I mean, The kids have been there. Pretty much all week with him and have been many times A man has done the, the children's course like a lot of times, and it's a really, it's a really cool playground a really cool area. And the kids really enjoyed it I was playing guitar for the first time in a long time. Just noodling about and actually had a crowd at one point which is really cool i like few people who you know were standing around and then commented me and complimented me on my plane which is really sweet of them. So that was very nice little boost. And then I was playing with the kids on the equipment, and also playing with myself playing myself on the equipment, because you know big kid and Simona noted that my strength has clearly improved from doing you know like I know, kind of tricep Dippy type things with the legs out in front of you or whatever, you know, just like hanging, or whatever. And so that was very positive that means the personal training is working. And I'm getting, I felt stronger so that was cool. And then we went for then and then I got hailed by a guy in English, who looked Italian his name was Carlo. So, Italian name. Turns out he was born in Essex, to an Italian father English mother and I was raised in Essex basically. And he was really nice guy so we started chatting and these are let's have a beer let's have a beer very English. He's been here for 20 years he was born there lived there for 20 years and moved to Naples for 20 years. It was really nice because that was really nice to hear a an English accent be even more close to home in Essex accent. And, see, have somebody to have a beer with his last lbs. Okay, cool. So, really nice ice cold draft beer was very nice actually. And it's great that there's a cafe there that sells draft beer in the kids playground. I mean, brilliant. And it was really pleasant I had a good chat with a guy. And we'll probably all meet up and sim chatted with the wife who's from Naples and they go on and as it transpires Amina already admitted their daughter at the playground over the week and they've been playing with their anyway so connections around. So that was really good. See what happens when you actually leave the house, then it transpires that guy's brother is a blues musician pretty much professional blues musician, and he also organises. The Campania Blues Festival which is a Blues Festival for the entire region. And basically, totally connected to the live music scene so it's like you got to hook up with my brother. Wow, what a contact. So that was really really cool. And then we went walking in the actual kind of forest. Then I was really tired when we started and it was still very tired but he's such a trooper he just went through it and he really enjoyed it. We really enjoyed it. And I had another little, you know, kind of personal victory, because I was in basically trainers and very short, you know, just shorts and a lot of the paths were overgrown we're actually going to find a part of the forest where there was kind of volcanic. We didn't know exactly what but some volcanic activity is stil
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Welcome to Episode 71 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest, and it's gonna be a short one today. It's just gone midnight. And, frankly, I'm tired. If you hear banging it's because there's bunch of fireworks, because today is a big national holiday in Italy. So everyone's going bunker Rooney's slamming fireworks everywhere. Today was a spin. I thought they'd start. Well, I'll make it short one. Yeah. Today was a bit frustrating. I had three, I plan to do three things today all kind of towards my own projects. Sky experience being one of them. And I got waylaid by a client who called, and then that turned into nine on five hours of work for them. And, yeah, just, it's one of those where, you know, it's, you know, we need the money he did that one was particularly paid by the hour job so you know better to get paid and not in this exact moment, but nonetheless could have really done with just actually focusing on pushing for projects that really mean much more to me, because they're my own projects music more so than as a kind of semi frustrating day I'm in good on the one hand, you know, have the opportunity to earn some money, especially while at home. But on the other hand, you know, if I keep finding excuses valid or otherwise to not do my own projects. Then my own projects will never go anywhere. And, yeah, that's kind of that really studied Italian again this morning you know really put in the effort in this time round I'm really trying to, to actually deepen my knowledge understand the grammar which is my biggest probably our biggest weakness and practice speaking alone. So, bit by bit. I think that's gonna have a really positive impact. It's about time you know I've only been with Simona for about 12 years or whatever. So, you know, she's learning something. And that's it really, I mean it's time for bed. The fireworks back out I thought I finished, actually a whole bunch of just started. And that pretty much is my mics, my coffee well the toe is not my excuse my invite at an end the podcast is what I'm trying to say. So thank you for listening to me it's only a three minute one super super quick tomorrow I think we're gonna take a day off. So, I'll be very pleasant, Donna what we're going to do, but I'm going to try and avoid thinking about work, altogether so anything you wish to say come see me on twitter at Romeo crow otherwise I wish you a very wonderful day, night or morning wherever, whatever, wherever you are. Bye.
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Welcome to Episode 70 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest. It is Friday. Friday the 14th of August. And today, was kind of like a continuation of yesterday's kind of decline in wanting to actually do any business work, and instead of wanting to do creative stuff I just really was not in the mood I've kind of lost my I lost my flow on business stuff I think I need to recharge myself with some creative focus. And so, the. This morning I did something I haven't done in about three or four months I opened up my subscription to groove three group three is a whole load of video courses on various different audio production tools and techniques and whatnot. It's huge. There's so much there. And I wanted to sort of reacquaint myself with Cubase which is the software that I use for recording music, and the myriad of plugins that I have for it which I still don't know how to use. And so I did a little tutorial, I started that course, and then after about 20 minutes of watching. Obviously watching it about two or three times the normal speed, you know because I like to do things more efficiently. I've got inspired with this particular course Google's on a plugin called hallein. And I won't go into details but basically I was like, I would open Cubase and actually record some music I've got an idea. So I was playing around with that and I was thoroughly loving it. It was really cool. And yeah I thoroughly enjoyed it but then it was a bit difficult for me to get out of that zone and into some work for what is needed which needed doing and eventually I did do it. And, but that was pretty much you know my kind of down kind of reconnecting today with them kind of following on from what I said yesterday in my blog and my blog in my podcast about keeping an eye on the bigger bigger picture like the really big picture. Where do you want to be in your life, what do you want to be doing, what is your day to day look like etc and if something doesn't take you towards that. And it essentially takes you away from that. Then, you know you want to really question use that as a, as a barometer for decision making. And so, you know, music is entirely towards that I'm writing and fiction film and photography is entirely towards that. And so that was kind of my focus today. And as a consequence, I also did my lack of vocal practice I haven't done a vocal practice and again like good six eight weeks for funding and I could feel that my voice is already you know lost a bit of where I was at. It's always a bit of a challenge for me to get into any kind of good singing technique and habit. You know, I feel I have to work particularly hard to, to be able to sing in any kind of decent enough way. And so that was good I did a very simple, very light practice but it was good to kind of get back doing that. And part of the reason for that is because I want to finish the grip the sky experience. And part of that will probably require me plan a couple of songs acoustically and be able to sing them. Thus, so this is actually still kind of part of audience ninja because grip this guy experiences like proof of concept for audience ninja to be able to offer products and services to other musicians which will be our kind of Nisha, and record labels. So, it was all still joined together but it's now, you know, that's what I'm talking about having the bigger picture in mind and then working towards that and making sure everything is aligned with that and outside of that. I recently in the last two or three days have been re picking up studying Italian. I'm using an app called fluent forever, which is brilliant. And sort of got back on that, and then today also started reading. Like this kind of Italian bought this book for taking the Italian b1 test. So, in order to become an Italian citizen. I qualify because I'm married to an Italian, but I need to take a test and thankfully they changed the rules on that. It was like a written, and a reading and all of that test
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Welcome to Episode 69 dude of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. If you're on Twitter. And you know where 69 dude comes from there let me know, at Romeo crow. And if you don't know what that comes from just let me know anyway. So, yeah today. Basically, I woke up with a banging headache. And I just did not have the energy to train the trainer, or really even to do any work. And I think it was my body, basically just saying, dude, you need to take risks arrest you need some time off. So took a very leisurely morning chilled in bed a bit and then just chatted with Simona and the kids and really didn't do too much, and then kind of here, just just realised that you know sometimes you're going to take a bit of time off and if you don't do it, because you want to your body will soon tell you to do it make you do it. And then in the afternoon I did a bit of work, starting to prep myself to get back towards music take the small steps so I first looked at the grip the sky experience made a few changes to that started to reef familiarise myself with what needs doing to finally finish it and get it out there. So that's a little step closer which is excellent. And then I booted up Cubase which is the music production software I use, and found that there was updates they've done some new kind of semi version of it and then some other bits I need to update. So, you know I updated all of that. Look to the software again reminding myself that it's really complicated I've already forgotten what I'm doing with it. I've used it for years but you know that's what happens when you fall off the waggon. So that was kind of really my, my working day I mean it wasn't really too sunny wasn't too strenuous looked tense, actually, you know, started to get myself familiar with the different features on tense now they have over the last few years they have kind of blackout tents which is like cut out 99% of the light so basically it's just really dark in the bedroom, which is what you want because if anybody's ever been camping you know that as soon as the sun comes up. You know, you start waking up and it's it's difficult to lie and so ideally if you've got a couple of kids especially if you want them to go to bed before the sun's gone down, you know, then it's basically pitch black in there near enough and that sounds like a good plan. So looking at tense, looking at tow bars and trailers and how are actually going to fit everything together on the car. Eventually, through not gonna get attempt until we leave Ischia might well go back to Castroville in sort of October, and then spend the next couple of months or more basically focusing on outdoor stuff. So today, as the first step towards that for me that's really interested at the moment in, you know, kind of doing outdoor stuff. So, I want to encourage that and I want to as I said on podcast previously I want to get out of my comfort zone. And all of us, part of the reason for the personal trainers for similar night to get fitter, so that we can do more outdoorsy stuff more sporty stuff more stuff as a family and explore an adventure and blah blah blah. So, the first stage of that was arrived today from Amazon we had the head torch we were testing which is really cool. It was down for like 12 quid eight quid and it's brilliant it's USB powered really bright different modes got red lights so that you can wear at night, doesn't destroy night vision, really pleased with it. So we're just testing now got a compass means first compass like proper you know map compass. So, that right today, along with a flint for starting Spark, like this kind of Flint set of how to use it, but I have to learn. Because one of the things we're going to start with metre an iron sim Leonardo is to learn to make fire properly so that's going to be cool, and also what came is a lock knife. I bought for Mina. So her first knife. And so you open it and it locks and basically our rounded head, and it's obviously only sharp
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Welcome to Episode 68 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. I hope you're doing well today. I hope everything in your world and in your life is an tastic and as good as it could be. Come on, let me know. I really do want to know come let me know on twitter at Romeo Crow, you know, otherwise this is all a bit too much of a one way street isn't it. Nonetheless, I'm still going to continue down that one way street right now. So, today continuing on from yesterday. Today, I wanted to move forward with this idea of working on my business and not in it. So, in a very brief nutshell. Meaning, try not to do the day to day stuff that needs to run that business, but to do the overview stuff that will actually grow the business. And so, I managed to delegate most of the tasks that I had hoarded or hadn't yet delegated to the other guys on the team. And I decided that I would spend the first part of the day, focusing on like not even opening any messaging or anything like that, and really just focus on something important. So in this particular case, it was developing a potential, kind of, sort of product that's a bit strong but a questionnaire basically that can help out potential customers and also filter out potential customers so everybody kind of wins basically. So I was working on that. And in the questions down blah blah. And then, sort of, then mid morning or whatever I moved over to working a bit more in the business and feeling pretty good, you know, the day went and it got to about six o'clock or something like that, and I really felt like yeah you know what, I can end this day here. You know, I've got. I'm in control of stuff again basically like I really feel I mean I've got a huge inbox that I need to go through. But that's not necessarily to do with audience ninja. So I feel yeah I felt really good to relax basically like it's working, you know, I'm getting through stuff. But I did have a kind of reminder, an even bigger reminder to myself, and that's got me thinking which is not to forget the reason why I decided to kind of start this while we decided we wanted an agency, even just a month ago. And that was because we wanted to have a team that would grow our own projects, first and foremost, and those projects, first and foremost for myself would be creative ones so music and writing predominantly. And this morning I was working on this questionnaire to bring in more customers and clients for audience ninja. And then I remember this evening. This afternoon, I was like, hang on a minute. Remember that the whole reason is to free me up to so I can spend more time on music and writing things that I'm passionate about and hopefully have a slight natural talent to at least in part, for them and I want to join those together and then have a team that can help take care of the stuff that otherwise takes me ages to get sorted in the back end but actually doesn't necessarily create the art, you know, the other stuff is very very important it's packaging and marketing the art basically but it doesn't, it's not the creation and I want to focus on the creation side. And so then I remembered that the whole idea of audience ninja was also to niche it for musicians, principally, and then creative people. And I wanted to use myself as a case study by using grip the sky experience as, which if you've listened to this before then you'll know if you haven't, then it's my upcoming EP release but I'm doing it in there hopefully a bit more it's called grip the sky The EP but the grip sky experience is a bit more of an involved project and which hopefully will be much more fun for people and much more enjoyable for them to go through in order to listen to the songs. And it was so nearly finished but I didn't quite get to finish it before I was embroiled in having clients, kind of thrust upon me really or the opportunity was there to earn money and it's really important to say the opportunity when it comes but actually that's totally. You
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Welcome to my podcast episode 67 of the view from the crow's nest. And as predicted yesterday. Today was a much more work you work your day. So, not quite so much to discuss or tomorrow upon other than just do work do more work and get better at being more efficient. So I guess my focus today, or the realisation or the remembrance today was that classic idea that if you're working in your business, then you're not working on your business. And for anybody who wishes to grow their business in any kind of particular fashion, the focus should be on finding a way to work on your business, rather than in. So what I mean by that is if you are the person who is delivering the product or service you know you're kind of in operations and you're delivering that if you're the person doing the admin for the business if you're doing the the finances the bookkeeping all those things. Then, or answering customer questions customer support etc Then you're working in your business. And, you know, you're working in the day to day to keep it running, but you're not working on the business which is the owner is actually focused on the businesses and as an entity rather than the customer, obviously the customer is paramount importance. But if you're working on the business you're looking at how you can grow the business how you can scale it how you can improve things so that you know yeah so that it grows brings in more revenue etc. So, it's very easy, particularly when there's one of you. I mean, there's no other choice really when there's one of you but it's very easy to be you know to get into that, that rut, almost where you're delivering and doing everything you're wearing every hat, and the flipside is, you know, it's called a superman syndrome where you feel you can do everything or have to do everything, and very much a lot of business owners who have made the transition from employee into, you know, a business owner, but they started solo just themselves. Probably they took some skills that they've had for their employee and then they became a freelancer or a consultant with those particular skills I mean that's a very common thing to do. You take expertise that you've built up in your industry for the last you know 510 1520 years or whatever. And then you go it alone you know you go yourself and build up your own company, or it might be completely something you know completely different when I started the open mics I had certainly, you know, built up professional experience of doing open mics, and even build up an amateur experience of doing open mics, but I did see the business opportunity. And initially it was me doing everything running the open mics or delivering the service the product and trying to sell the open mics get more clients and answer or support tickets I speak to everybody who made inquiries about the open mics or the performance etc. And it's at wear every hat. But I knew that what I wanted to get to was other people doing this so that I could focus on growing the brand or, you know, focus on the sales and marketing of the actual product and service, you know, bringing in more clients, the stuff that's really going to grow the business. And to be fair, even though I knew that's what I should be doing it still took me a fair bit of time before I made that transition. I argued that was difficult find the right people I wasn't sure that either. But I'm sure I could have made moves to make it happen sooner. So with audience ninja my plan from the start, has been to immediately try and get people on board and work on my business rather than in it. And so this is the third week I think of the business, and from day one. We had two clients, more or less, and from day one, we had three members of staff including myself three months on the team. So, you know, that was really important but what I've noticed is my real challenge at the moment is in finding creating the systems and the trust and everything to delegate to these peop
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Welcome to Episode 66 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest in which Romeo realises he's made a humongous error. So, I learned a very valuable lesson today a very valuable business lesson. And that is always know what something you're using is going to cost. So, I've been doing, you know as our, our agency audience ninja has been doing a whole bunch of data extraction, for one of our clients, and that basically involves taking getting data from Google Maps. And I have used the tool that I've been using before for the last couple of years, but by now, you know, nowhere near as for nowhere near as much data you know just scraping a bit here about a bit there. And I've never had to pay anything because I think, you know, like $200 credit every month. And I've don't think I've ever gone over that and so it just never occurred to me to double check. And so, this afternoon early this afternoon about lunchtime effect. It occurred to me to go and double check. So I went and had a look at my billing and discovered that I'd run a run up a bill for about 2400 pounds, which was entirely unexpected. And basically is a pretty crippling kind of bill to run up when you know you're in not planning for or expect to get. And the moral of the story is Yeah, my legs, make sure you know what the hidden costs are so it's a good lesson for business. And, for example, our. I our business card going to be a business now just a couple of products, worldschooling hub. Part of that is based around an interactive map, which pulls data from Google's Maps, Google Maps, and we wanted to make worldschooling hub the maps, free service, and recently we've been saying actually I think we're going to need to charge people for it because basically we're going to need revenue to come in and you know there's value to what we're offering and maybe we should charge. Well now, I'm glad that we checked with the Google Maps because if we don't charge, we're going to be potentially seriously out of pocket, you know, depending on how much is used. So that was a good lesson. The upshot of the story is that I spoke to Google and pleaded with them, you know, ignorance and blah blah and they're going to recommend to billing, that I have a to the billing department that I have a refund or credit now against it. There's no guarantee. I had to spend a few hours configuring stuff in my account, so that they were happy that basically I put in place, safety precautions and child locks, so that I couldn't do such a ignorant Feat. Again, and, you know, that took quite a lot of time this afternoon to do and to configure it was really confusing for me. So I've pleaded my case I've configured it I've sent it through and now I just have to wait and see what the big g decides with Bill me. Two and a half grand or whether they're gonna let me off with, you know, with a bit of a slap wrist today, you know, know what you're doing. So either way, you know lesson learned. Hopefully not an expensive lesson learned, hopefully just a bit of a time last lesson learned a bit of a stretch but yeah, so that was, that was basically my day seminar we're discussing this morning, kind of following on from yesterday's podcast where I was talking a lot about, you know, trying to bring the world schooling, to where we are now, even if we can't travel so much and whatnot. And today I was saying to him that maybe we should go back to a place called caster billary, which is in the south, further south of Italy in Calabria, and we've. There's a, an apartment there that we can use. And we spent from about October last year to about March this year there. And we were, I mean the kids were really bored sim was bored to tears because there is just like nothing to do and Castor venery itself for the kids during the day, but it is on the edge of a very nice. National Park is the biggest National Park in. Sorry, I'm just looking at some creature that's climbing up the wall. I think it is as as our mosquito or wha
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Welcome to Episode 65 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. Today Sunday, Sunday yesterday. So, I couldn't really be bothered to do much. Oh man, I was, I was lacking in Drive and energy today, which is perfect time to have my personal training session this morning when I got up and it was leg day. Suffice it to say that my legs were dealt with. And afterwards I just had sit on the couch for a little bit, and my legs and then by the time I tried to get up, they seized up. So that was a great start to the day. But um, and then, yeah, I was just tired man devoid of energy and obviously I need rest yesterday in fact taking the day off yesterday I think because I relaxed. It actually made me more, you know, tired today and more drained today just because my body actually unwell. But nonetheless, after that played with the kids for most of the morning, and was talking to Mina. She was, you know, she's been disappointed about the fact that we're not doing the things that we were hoping to do as far as Travelling is concerned and doing other stuff and visiting stuff, because this whole coronavirus business. And so, we I said to her today you know let's do a little thing let's, let's, why don't you write down all the things that you want all the things, all the places you want to go, and all the things that you want to do, and then we'll see what we can do, and I think I didn't touch on this yesterday you know do what you can with what you have right now you know I'm trying to keep that in mind, one of my big catchphrases so to speak, and think about Okay cool. Well, we want to do. I want to do camping or something and Ischia. In August, September is not the best time for camping, not the best place for camping, but Amina really wants to go camping but it's like okay what you know what can we do. And so she was talking about sort of outdoor stuff it didn't help that I just started reading a book yesterday that was kind of 100 family adventures and and most of them outdoors and most of them are very English focused or British focused adventures. And, but nonetheless so she was, she made the list and this made a quite a bit happier to kind of start taking action. And actually this is something that Simona and I had discussed before, that we wanted all the family to be able to kind of write stuff down and then we plan our travels accordingly to what people want to do, and find places to do them. So, an extreme example and obviously be, you know, if you wanted to go skiing or snowboarding then Ischia isn't the right place and certainly during the summer isn't the right place. So, if you decide on the activity you want to do, then decide on the place that you need to go to in order to do it is kind of our plan. And one thing that I've been poor on as chastising myself for one thing I've been poor on is. I haven't really been very outdoorsy with the kids, you know, we were in, they grew up in Central Illinois I grew up, I mean a seven now seven and a half, but, you know, they were born in Chelsea in the central London our flat was in zone two or something. So we're right in the centre of London right by Thames. Thankfully we had the beautiful batsy part which I think is a nicest park in London, literally right next to us. So they spent a lot of time in the park which is great but it's a very manicured Park, you know, very not outdoorsy, and I'm a bit of a you know I like my comfort so I've had my luxuries, and I don't really like creepy crawlies and I don't like getting my hands dirty. And I was thinking I've thought this before but I was thinking also recently, having the day off yesterday you know helps to get a bit of like distance and thinking about stuff. And I was thinking you know I really don't want to be don't want to have the kids grow up, not suffering as far too strong a word but not having such access to the experiences and the enjoyment of the great outdoors, because we as parents haven't instilled that in them because
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Welcome to Episode 64 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. And I want to thank you each and every one of you who is listening to this and who has listened to any of my previous podcast. It's awesome. I really really really appreciate it. And I know there's many things you could be doing with your time and choosing to spend your time listening to me prattle on is really. Yeah, something I massively appreciate so thank you very much. Today is I promise you're going to be a super short one, because I'm going to share one thing which I got excited about a couple of days ago I forgot to share with you, which is probably boring and dull as hell but nonetheless. I quite liked. And then I talk about my day, which was day off so there's not so much tell you about. So the thing that I got really excited about. I'm not a designer by any stretch anytime I've got to design anything. And it involves fonts are involves colours. And I struggle, and then a few days ago I noticed a font that I really liked i think is most seen on another website. And so I'm super happy because I've now got like a set of two or three fonts, which I'm now going to use for everything, when I can. And so, those small things make me happy but if you want to check it out it's a font called Poppins. Yep, like Mary Poppins, but without the Mary. I really like it. It's really simple and it kind of works for me. The other ones that work. Roboto, which is like robot with an O on the end. And Google product songs I think it's good, and is also really cool fun so there you go, that's a font of completely useless knowledge for you but nonetheless I wanted to share it. As for today. As I promised yesterday in the podcast or is, as I said, I was hoping that today was going to be a day off and it almost was almost in its entirety. That is to say, we went out this smarter curvy lazy morning allegedly morning. And we went out today together we went to a swimming pool, and it was pretty much just the four of us for quite a lot of the day and it's very nice pool. And we just spent the day, I'd say by the pool mostly in the pool with kids, attached to me, which is really good fun and mean it was both of the really enjoyed it mean I Leonardo very happy that I was there and loving to splash about. And we were there for four or five hours six hours, and then we went got ourselves dressed and went to Ischia Ponta where the castle is and got an ice cream and yes, I did get myself an ice cream, I figured, come on. I've gotten down to this morning. I think it was fair to say I was 81 centimetres which is definitely the slimmest waist I've had since I started measuring myself about six years ago or something. So, between that and audience ninja and all the hard work and everything I thought Come on man I've earned an ice cream. So, by golly, I took one. And it was tasty as smash that, then we came back home and we watched Back to the Future Part three so we've watched part one and then part two last week, like in the last couple of weeks I mean absolutely loves them. And that's really cool. I mean they're like my favourite films of all time, pretty much, so to be able to watch it with her was great and she's, she really watches films like Simona like totally taken, you know, just like hands to face emotions coming through every point. She asked lots of questions, there's lots of things personally film should be watched in silence, but that's just me, but nonetheless she really really loves them so that was really cool. And then the, the bit of work I couldn't escape. I did about an hour's of work or told today because I'd said I'd do something for today, forgetting that it was day off. And so I wanted to that because I said I would. And that was it. That's my day. So, feeling, feeling good feeling relaxed started actually I did start reading a cool book today which is like 100 family adventures. I bought it I think over Christmas maybe or even earlier than that. And basically it's a
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Welcome to Episode 63 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. I hope you're very well, and thank you very much for joining me. So, on today's episode, it's going to be a rerun of yesterday's episode because basically what once again all I've done is work on audience ninja for our team of our two clients, and it's just been a whole day of doing that again. But there are a couple of little things that I did do today which I thought were really quite cool and I wanted to share with you. If these might be the sort of things you'd like maybe they're not. I spend the huge part of my day in my work, no matter what I'm doing, actually, if I'm on the computer then I'm working usually in browser windows, unless I'm recording music or doing something specific like photoshopping stuff or whatever, then I'm working in browser, and a little while ago, like a month or two ago, I started using the Microsoft Edge browser, not something I would normally do I would have laughed at myself, if I thought of that, you know, a couple of months before I said I would never use a Microsoft browser. Nonetheless, I tried it and it is blazingly fast. So that in itself is already good, but today I was on a bit of a mission, as you know, always trying to find the equal or better results in less time so I'm always looking for more efficient ways of getting stuff done and be more organised. And so today I was looking at my browser extension and tabs kind of game, because it occurred to me that sometimes, and you may be like this if you're working. You know, I might have 15 2030 browser tabs open across different windows, you know, and you're flicking back and forth between them which is fine, but then you start losing track of where you've got documents open or this open although open, and I thought there must be an extension that kind of gives you like an overview so that you can just go to one extension and it shows you all the tabs that you've got open in a really useful way. So, today I managed to find that extension. And then I managed to find another extension that I'm really geeking out here and this is probably boring as hell for you so I apologise if it is but I found another extension, which gives me very easily, an overview of all my extensions not my browser tabs, the things that are open but my extensions. And what's really cool is you can group them into almost like workspaces So what I mean by that is, the more extensions you've added to your browser, the slower the browser becomes. But most of those extensions, you don't need them very often or you only use them on certain sites, you know if you're shopping or something like that, whatever it might be. So this allows you to basically at the click of a button switch between groups of extensions that you've personally grouped together so you might have one group which is for shopping when you're looking for the best deals and automatically entering discount codes and stuff like that. Or it might be research you know when you're researching something on Google and you need to track keywords and all of this or doesn't matter whatever it is point is that allowed me to now better organise my extensions and remove all the ones that I don't use every day and put them in their own groups that is and so my browser is quicker had I more organised. So that was my second bit of geeking out on the browser. The third thing was finding out you could add shortcut keys, you know like Ctrl P is print, so you can add a shortcut key to any, any browser extension that you want. So, basically those two browser extensions I just mentioned are now shortcut into alt one ought to so I can get to the really easily anytime I want without having to find them. So that immediately organise myself a lot better. And the last part of my geekery was in Microsoft Edge they've been banging on about thing called collections and I've kind of ignored it for the last couple of months and I thought well let me have a look at that
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Welcome to Episode 62 of my podcast view from the crow's nest. And this is my daily dose of my what's going on in my head, what's going on in my life to record it for posterity, and just generally share with you what's, what's happening, maybe some pearls of wisdom, maybe nothing of the kind. We'll see. If you've been listening for the last couple of weeks, you'll hear me speak pretty much entirely about audience Ninja, my digital services agency, and I've had a bit of a roller coaster time, few days guys feeling pretty low, because in short, I was overwhelmed. And in the last few days, I've been exploring myself out of that little overwhelmed pit and getting myself back in control and feeling like I'm, you know, sort of getting on top of things. And today was a continuation of that which I'm really chuffed about. So I'm feeling good today. Yeah, I was I felt like finally I'm I'm kind of back in you know, literally And now I'm transitioning the team there's a couple of guys working on the team of audience ninja and also transitioning the clients to start using the tools I want them to use. Because one it makes life easier for me. But also because I think it will make life easier for them as well chief amongst them as a team communication tool. And I'm using a tool called chante chanted and I ch a empty y.com I think or maybe dire anyways, I really like it. They've got a terrible pricing like model, which is just awful. But between you me and the gatepost I found a little workaround hack. So hopefully I've managed to bypass that. We'll see we'll see what happens in the next few months. But yeah, it just is making life already it's just making life so much easier for me and it just shows you the right tool for the job or at least the right tool for the job in the way that you envisage it because of course everybody I guess is going to attack Things like communication and whatnot in slightly different way their brains are going to be thinking in different ways, and therefore they want a tool that, you know, that does it in one way, or does it in another way that's more suitable for the way they work. And for me, I still yet to find the tool to rule them all. And I'm even considering in the future that, you know, that'd be one of the businesses I launch will be a software business to build the kind of tool since I buy so many tools of software tools, you know, to do the kind of tool that I actually want. We shall see. But yeah, so far. So that's, that's making life a lot easier, still working crazy, you know, crazy days. So another 12 hour day, literally just at my desk, breaks for going to the toilet, or very quickly eating food and then back to it. So it's been pretty intense. But I feel that we've broken the back of a lot of the things that were unknown variables in the first couple of weeks. You know, how we're working, what processes what tools such as Still loads to do loads to go. But I feel like next week is going to be a week where I can ease off a little bit of these long hours and also look at other projects that I really want to bring on board to audience ninja such as the grip the sky experience for my music and the world schooling hub suite of products and services so yeah, everything's looking good basically nothing else really to report outside of that because that's been my life. That's pretty much it. So I'm gonna love you and leave you it's 10 past 11 and now we're gonna have some downtime. Tomorrow morning, got my next session with Abdo the personal trainer, and I was very happy I was I mentioned myself this morning, and I was one measurement was 81 centimetres waist one was 82 one was 83. So I'm going to go with 82 but the only time I've ever been a to was a couple of weeks ago. And I don't think I've ever measured myself as at one in the seven ideas I've been measuring myself. So definitely I'm going in the right direction there. So that's really positive. And that's all I've got. So, thank you very much for
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Welcome Welcome to Episode 61 of my podcasts, the view from the crow's nest. And as is invariably the case, I am going to be talking about audience Ninja, and the agency that have just started with coming towards the end of the second week of the agency the second week of the client and a couple of days ago, sumana did the podcast my wife because I was just I was rude, I was drained man, totally drained. And it's been intense it's been hard it's been a bit overwhelmed, and I was feeling a bit low about it or. Yesterday was a bit better. I've been trying to take, as I said in the last couple of days, you know, when you're overwhelmed. It's because you don't feel in control. Often, and it's because it basically on top of things and so the key is to get organised take baby steps, get yourself back in organised and control etc so that's what I've been doing and yeah today. I'm starting to get back on top of things, you know, I'm bringing my inboxes down to, you know, more manageable size and getting through messages and organising myself through other tools so that I can better keep track of things it's not quite perfect yet the system I've got I need to play around with a few other tools play around with a few things until you know until I'm organised basically until I'm on top of stuff, but it's getting there. You know, starting to get a teeny bit of structure going on with the business and with clients and this is obviously, absolutely paramount. Totally, totally important. It's getting sorted so I'm feeling a bit better today it's been another intense day but um first client is really really happy with the work that we're doing, which is very good. And, you know, that's, that's obviously really, you know, good feedback and they said they what they suggested giving us a testimonial straightaway over some stuff so that's a really positive side. And, you know, bit by bit, things are starting to take shape. So I'm hoping, fingers crossed. But I'm hoping that from. Next week I'll be able to start actually putting some time structures in place to my day and not working, you know, all hours and going a bit crazy and therefore be able to spend a bit more time helping with the kids and looking after the kids and playing with the kids, hopefully a bit more time with Simona, maybe we could go out for a walk. When the lockdown ended, we went out for a walk like seven, eight k every day. You know, every every night for about a month. And now I haven't been out for a walk in about a month, no joke. So, we need to get back to that. So we'll see, we'll see. Next week guys but definitely feeling more positive today feeling a bit back on onto it today and, yeah, that's making me feel boy, I think I probably sound more buoyant to separate to that had a little meeting with my wife over one of our other projects, which is probably good it's half full lunch, the brand education by travel, which is our kind of just personal family blog travel brand thing not done anything with it but that's the name of it and then also half full, on the. Eventually, Commander worldschooling hub, which is our kind of suite of products and service tools and services that we're building for the world schooling community, principally to help the world schoolers to finally connect with each other, wherever they are in the world. So the thing that we're discussing today. The project is we've come up with an idea, a couple of months ago had an idea for a curriculum to design a curriculum for our kids and any other kids who are interested but world school is predominantly, and it's really simple. In that the core idea of it. It's to use basically places to visit so they could be landmarks they could be you know geological places they could be national parks, could be palaces, they could be ruins you know monuments whatever that places that you'd basically go visit for a day out and having them as the central subject of the curriculum, and then looking at them from multiple
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Welcome to Episode 60 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest and it is I again, Mr Romeo crow who's speaking to you after yesterday's episode that if you tuned in, if you did tune in, then you will have noticed that it was the first episode where it wasn't me speaking for the simple reason. It was so tired. And just worn out. And my wife said, Well, I'll tell you what, why don't I do the episode for you. So she did. And it was her very first podcast episode as well. So, that was, that was very cool and rather amusing in places as well. Even the intro was was was fabulous. But no, it was cool, something a bit different for you. And the reason. Yeah Yes they are. I was overwhelmed. I don't get overwhelmed too often. But really, the this last week or whatever is really gotten to me with audience Ninja, and maybe it's because everything's kind of come at once you know the agency, which requires setting up, you know, systems and processes and finding the right tools and everything and blah blah blah, to the team for the agency to people starting again systems processes and tools with them and also finding them stuff to do, which requires training as well and obviously it's not as straightforward as just please do this because they need to know how or what tools or blah blah. And then clients as well having clients for the first time, and particularly one of those clients is very much working extremely fast and dynamically and changing quite quickly and rapidly iterating. And so trying to keep up with them is, you know, is cool but it's also a bit of a challenge so between all of those things I think it was just, it's just all getting a bit much and I realised that the big problem that I was having and it's one that I've touched on, even before this agency and realised so obviously haven't learned my lesson. I have touched on this podcast before, and that is that just not being organised leads to a lack of feeling in control and when you lack feeling and control that's when you start feeling overwhelmed and swamped and whatnot. and most definitely that that was like to lead cause me and I was just getting too many messages from too many different places they're all connected. You know WhatsApp, Google Docs, emails and you know everything coming from different angles and it was just, I like things organised I like it i one of my key, key, key tenants in life is, you know, equal or better results for less time. That's what I always look for efficiency over everything else because time is that one resource that you can never replenish, and therefore it should be protected as much as possible. So for me, that means you know just just trying to be efficient with everything. And when I'm not in control of being able to keep things efficient and keep things on track that's, that was really challenging or that is really challenging for me. And of course when it's just you when it's one person you know what tools you're using systems you're using, and it doesn't matter what those systems or tools are necessarily. You know how to use them and you know how they run and it works for you but as soon as you multiply more variables of other people into it, I realised how complex it gets particularly when you're not in the same location you know sitting in the same room, or even in the same country or continent. In fact, so it's not quite so easy to just, you know, have quick chat Oh, can you sign up I'm assuming up but, you know, so yeah so yesterday I was just I was really quite low and I was just tossed knackered just taken out of me really had. So, similar stepped into the breach and took over the podcast today I spent the whole day trying to find a tool that would do what I needed to do in terms of getting our communication back on track and in one place, and nearly found it, and then literally it was putting my credit card details into by this particular tool, and I was on chat support at the same time and then I found out that they kind
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Welcome to Episode 59 of the. As you can see this is gonna be a bit of a humorous one disease Simona Roma's wife. This is my first. After 58 podcasts from a husband. This is the first one from the wife, because the manager says my husband there tonight, it cannot be bored of talking. Yeah, actually it's no they cannot be bored is so tired. So, so, I cannot. So, here we go. So I'll tell you about his day. This morning he woke up, he woke up with the girl kicking him in the belly. Our daughter, because our little one, our little boy had a fever I slept with him. And our daughter ended up in my place in our bed. Kick him through the night that ensure that very nice sleep. So that's it today is long long day work, but work interesting work. And now we're setting up our marketing agencies. There are loads of ideas are flocking to our to expand it taught me a beautiful one today that I cannot repeat, very well actually, maybe to him to do it tomorrow. But it's a great idea, I love it. No. Jokes apart there really to love it. I do love I do love my husband's plane as well, the sexiest thing to discuss. Not only the rains are so they obviously didn't sound right. It's not through you says this guy Facebook ad i think it's it's got a whole package. That's why I married him. It's got phase for stage. It's good. Beautiful. As you may already know a beautiful voice for radio. And I don't know, cold, not cold, that flowing locks that love beautiful long hair curly and beautiful face and love his eyes, his eyes. Why you laughing, just the name to my love, why not just a bit different. Episode tonight. And, yeah, I mean that love every bit of him. Always have always will. And so his day was basically going back to his day was very very stressful it's been a quite a few days is quite a few weeks actually quite stressful, but I think particularly now that we're setting up the agencies the flow, the workflow and everything. Told him and. first language as you might have understood famous light Italian accent. If you understood anything of it I said so far. You're lucky. Good. And, yeah, I mean that had a good day. And though tiring Stein is he headed, different. I was with our kids at the beach. Our daughter just learn how to swim on Saturday swam in the pool. For the first time that was very exciting for me because I love swimming and I couldn't wait for her to start swimming to. So maybe I was even more excited than she was. And today she swam in the sea for the first time that was amazing. And, and what it did but I'm thinking maybe to initiate our little boy now that she's done. Who knows, let's see. And what else and then we came home and, you know, we wanted to go for a walk but tiredness is just upon us, so we're just going to end up right now, aside the Tetris. Looking at beautiful reddish orangey yellow a moon, full moon, and admiring the view and try each other's company, and probably getting ready for bed. Very, very soon. Exciting. Then after the patent. Thank you so much for listening so far. And, yeah, talk to you another time maybe even another day when my husband wants to speak and then I just take over. That's it. Okay. Bye. Ciao.
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Welcome to Episode 58 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. If you have any questions or feedback or comments or anything, please do come and see me on twitter at Romeo crow. As always, I'd love to hear from you. So today Sunday, kind of tried to have a day off, didn't really work out, and had a realisation this morning that I won't bore you with the details but an old. My main web hosting account that I was running all my websites out of had got hacked through somebody else's site which has been annoying. And as a consequence, all my sites were taken down, and some other client sites, and that was fine, because I thought I'd covered them all and move them all elsewhere etc but then I realised this morning that one of my clients sites hadn't been moved and wasn't working. So, on my day of I'm going to try not to work today. I spent the first kind of hour and a half, two hours of work, not the first but later in the morning rebuilding a website in a new place for a client so that was fine it needed to be done anyway. Probably so. That was cool. Then I spent two and a half hours probably not near three hours in a couple of phone calls to another client and discussing their, you know to get discussed on their site and their plans and what they want to do this week, they're trying to move really quickly. So, that was about five hours of my day off and on work stuff. Sounds a bit frustrating but never mind. I did outside of that it was actually quite a relaxing day relative I had a personal training session this morning, where with my coach, and I was really chuffed to see that I've made some very clear improvements in my strength and my conditioning as well, he's a he's a callisthenics competitor and coach, so I'm learning to move towards doing these kind of bodyweight exercises and bodyweight stuff, and stuff that I couldn't do very easily kind of six weeks ago or whatever, were much easier this week to the point where he said I think we need to up the intensity and make it harder for you in all the exercises so it did make me think, you know, hang on, we're paying this guy. similars also she was the one who found in fact, she had her session before and then as my session and I was thinking, What is this, we're paying this guy to suggest to us that we do stuff that hurts us. Like, there's some disconnect here, but that was good. So that was a good start to the day, then I had all this working stuff, and in the evening. We watched family movie. Back to the Future Part Two, so it's just brilliant I'm so enjoying getting to watch these classic films and some of my favourite films that with me now with new eyes on it so that's really Leonardo. And he wasn't really watched it, to be fair, he's quite the as a little bit of a fever today so though he's more or less fine. And he was just a bit subdued by the evening I think he was tired, but that's, that's fine and so watch that and that was cool. And I had also like a kind of resurgence of creativity like I think my creativity his artistic creativity is kind of starting to really push towards the surface now so look. Come on, I've been buried for too long, you must do something with me. So, I actually woke myself up this morning, because I was having a dream. And as often happens. My somewhere my conscious brain or subconscious brain or whatever says actually, you want to write this down or you want to remember this So wake up. While it's fresh and so I was having a dream was basically a storyline or a film. So I was in the, in the film as it were, but I recognised it in my dream as a potential story. I mean there's. It's one of those things where you can't really explain. As you know about dreams you know they're so intense and whatnot that you remember them and they're vivid and they're real, and then when you try and explain them or think about them afterwards, you can't find the vocabulary, you can't express it. But the feeling remains and in some of the imagery and some of
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Welcome to Episode 57 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, once again have spent the entire day really working like crazy trying to get on top of things yesterday I was feeling particularly overwhelmed and frustrated. And you're just too much to do too many ideas trying to get yeah just I've got a team on board but I'm not using them, didn't have the time to use them, etc. So today I've really been trying to get back on top of that. And, you know, I've started to throw some tasks over yet, up until today I was very protective but I didn't want to overburden the team with stuff that maybe was a bit too complicated at first and blah blah and today I just thought sod it deep end. So, I was just throwing things over that slide right, this is the problem. I don't know how to sort it so you sorted, whereas previously I've been doing a lot of explainer videos saying this is how I do it so please can you now do it, use this tool like this, etc. But now I'm really going to see how, you know, how they follow up with this kind of stuff. When they really have to work it out themselves. So basically, not being so micromanaging, I guess is the term. I also had a reminder today, something which I really should have already learned. I spent about four hours yesterday trying to configure a tool I'd bought to do a certain job, knowing that I had another tool that my licence had run out, that if I renewed that licence, it would do the job straight away, really easily. So I pay for this other tool, I tried to get it to work. I couldn't. This morning I spent another hour or two trying to get it to work speaking with the developer. And then I kind of got it to work but realised it was still complicated and it still wasn't quite right. So I just thought sod it. So I paid my money for another year's licence to the other tool, and within about 10 minutes I've done all of that literally the entire law that took me six hours to not quite finish. And it was a reminder that, you know, when there is a easy way to do something, it's worth paying the money to get it done. Because time is the most valuable resource in the world, it's the one that you will never be able to accumulate or get back. So you want to protect it jealously jealously that one. So it's a reminder to myself that yeah it is both one delegate out to other people, which is the whole point of audience ninja in the first place was bringing people on board to help with, you know, scale these ideas that we have. So delegate out to people, and thus protect your own time. And also if there's a way to save time for cost a bit more money, then do it, even if, you know, I felt like I've made a mistake of spending, you know, hundred and 30 hundred and $40 or whatever it was on this first tool and it's not quite working but I want to make it work. Otherwise, I've got to spend another hundred dollars on the other tool. And the truth is, it wasn't worth what five or six hours that I wasted you know that hundred dollars for the second tool. Fine, take it on the chin you spent it on the first tool I'll probably make use of it somewhere else, somehow else, but for now I know there's an easy solution so just bite the bullet spend the money, get it done, move on. And so, That must be the focus, you know, the watchword folks, God, but good news. The American client has started. Officially, as a client because they made their first payment. So, that was brilliant and really needed right now, because at least pay for the two tools that I bought yesterday today. With nothing else. So that was really positive, we've got our second client on board, that's really, really cool. And that's it, that's my day you know I've spent nigh on 10 hours or 12 hours without a break, SAT, you know just focusing trying to get through stuff I'm done it's 8pm earlier than usual because I want to have a bit of an evening. Tomorrow morning, I got to get up and we got training tomorrow so personal trainer so that's gonna be co
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Welcome to Episode 56 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest and frustrating day today. I just, there's so much to do so much and emails keep piling in and messages keep piling in and my to do list this gets longer longer and I don't seem to be making any progress through it. Pretty much, was a completely redundant day of having people, you know, on audience ninja because I just, I didn't have anything for them to do I just literally couldn't get round to actually getting stuff over to them. So super frustrating. And it's 1130 I've literally just shut the computer down because I must have must shit. And so yeah hope tomorrow I'll be more, I don't know, I don't know what I'll be but I'm so behind on everything. Yes, just as frustrating was meant to be going the other way, plus points, I had a note from the American potential clients saying that they were going to pay for at least one of the two. So sort of artists that they want to do work for, which is effectively half an hour, we're going to do it today haven't received anything so still time because they're out in America. But now, it'd be good if they go through and do that. We're very good because we could really do some revenue, and some other give me a lot of personal No, I had my training session this morning, and I did it, I think, 56 burpees in four or five sets of five or six sets of eight, and each burpee consists of three. Press ups, and then a burpee. So there's about 168 Press ups, I think. And then I did another 50 Press ups over five sets of different time, press up and mountain climbers. And some other core exercises. But long story short, I sweated profusely. And I didn't feel lightheaded I didn't feel sick, completely. You know, it was fine I was completely on it. And so my strength is improving and certainly my stamina and conditioning and cardio is improving slow, really positive. So, I'm going to stick with that part two in the today's episode short one today, because I'm tired and I am drained. If you're about. I always say, but I said anyway. Go over to Twitter and see me at Romeo Crow, give me a shout, let me know you're listening, say hello asked me questions, whatever you fancy. I'd love to hear from you. And that's me done, less than three minutes must be some kind of record, take care and I will speak to you tomorrow. Hopefully with some more positive news. Take care. Bye.
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Welcome to Episode 55 of my podcast interview from the crow's nest. It is Mr Romeo crow coming into your earholes, so to speak, and. Oh, just walked outside of the moon is really bright and clear. That's very cool. Excuse me. What an episode already. And it's been lovely day today, I didn't do any work. You know the last if you've been following the podcast for the last few days, it's been really pretty intense for me. With the launch of audience ninja my new agency and bringing on board our first staff and our first client and doing all of those in the same week, and there's just been so much to do. And it's been brilliant, but I really needed to break, and today was Family Day. So, had the had a day off. And we had a plan. So we are on an island called Ischia in the Bay of Naples, and we've been here since the lockdown came in first of March we actually got here we're only meant to stay for five or six days and then we're going to fly off to Paris to Disney, and then the lockdown came in prevented us flying off, and then prevented us going on to the UK and then to Spain, which was the original plan. So we've been here. Unexpectedly, and we've been on this island for whatever you know March April May June July, all these months. And so we were going to go today for our big family day, we were actually going to leave the island we were going to go to the island next door which is about 20 minutes. Coffee away could Prachi there. We'd been there once before my birthday last year and it was a very abortive day. Because we, the kids were in a bad mood last year and they're all stripy, and then we left late and by the time we got there the kids didn't want to go anywhere. We didn't have the car at that point. So we ended up basically getting to the poor, temperature, waiting for a bus, taking the bus to a bus stop. Standing at the bus stop for about 15 minutes after dropped us off. And then just getting the bus back to the port and waiting for the next boat and coming home. It was a complete waste of a day. So today we're really looking forward to doing things a bit differently with the car everyone was in a good mood etc etc. And we got to the front of the queue for the car fairy, and they told us. Oh no, you can't bring a car to bracha, because you're residents of Ischia, and this is Italy, so therefore no logic to it whatsoever, but you can't if you're going to Naples, or if you're if you're coming from anywhere outside of the region, you can bring the car temperature. But if you live in the region you can't bring a car to Florida, unless you live on property. So, in typical, you know, bonkers Italian fashion, we literally had to do a U turn, physically or metaphorically, and so instead we went to someplace we were kind of planning to go next week which is called latimore teller allama della is basically kind of subtropical gardens. Very unique uniqueness key and probably unique in the world. And it's, it was the home of William Walton, the composer British composer, and his wife lady Milton, who may have been Argentinian I can't remember. And over the course of like 50 years or however long they had this place. He was very successful they built it up, and they loved travelling, especially like he was conducting all over the world or what have you and composing and they brought back she was very keen on gardens, they brought back all these exotic trees, particularly in plants from all over the world, and bit by bit the garden was made and grown and now it's, it's pretty spectacular place with influences from, you know, all over the world, some really cool areas and it's all very, it's kind of built on the side of a mountain says a lot of up and down steps and stuff and little grottoes to go in and little areas and sections and stuff is, if you ever want Ischia, one should definitely go, and it's now been taken over by the wildlife taken over but by the Prince's Trust, Prince Charles has certainly been here a bunch of times. As
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Welcome to Episode 54 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest, I am Crow, and I'm currently in my nest, I my bedroom. And if you're about to do come and say hello at Romeo crow I'd love to hear from you. As always, today is been, what is it, Wednesday since the third day of my new agency audience ninja. It's the third day of having our first official client. And it's the third day of having our first full time staff member, and this afternoon joined our second full time staff member, and I can honestly say it's been crazy. I thought it would be giving me more time, but instead is giving me far far less time I'm working, you know, from sunup to sundown it's 930 and I've just finished. For the moment, and she's nearly 10am and had any dinner, and been helping with the kids. I've just been, you know, working, which I'm not complaining about but just, it's not really the direction that one had originally intended. However, I'm really, I'm really excited I'm really chuffed with it because obviously it's going to be slower at the beginning because I've got to work out processes for how to work with the clients including tools and systems, I've got to work out processes for how to work with the team again internal tools and systems, how we communicate. Plus, obviously there's the training aspect, I've got to design all the, make sure I'm training these guys in tools and ideas that they might not be familiar with. And that takes a lot of time up front. But obviously, teach a man to fish. And then these guys will be able to go great guns down the line, and then take on board a whole lot of this stuff that I want to be able to pass on to them. So it's been it's been really cool it's a you know a new learning curve for me in dealing remotely with people in such a collaborative way. And I gotta say I'm enjoying it, but it is intense there is a lot going on. And we haven't even started scratching the surface of the things that I want the agency to be doing, not least, working on Simona and I's other projects, such as worldschooling hub, and the like. So there's. Yeah, it's cool but it's yeah it's been intense. And, yeah, it's just it's just a learning curve. I've been pleased with you know already the new guy, Ethan he started today where it officially starts tomorrow but he's been getting all my stuff today. He's based out in Canada, and he's already asked some great questions and show me that, you know, he's, he's thinking in a really good way that I think is going to really benefit the agency, and also Dan out in Romania, who started on Monday his again. Give him some good feedback some good questions and show me that yeah I think he's going to be great as well so you'll be awesome. You know, if we we hit the ground running with two new starters and, you know, any team that is put together always has that beginning. I don't want to call it a struggle but you know you don't know if you're going to work well together. You don't know people skill sets and stuff so it'd be amazing if we really, you know gel and start progressing straight away. Yeah, I mean, it's, it's cool but I really want to be able to get back to help him with the kids I want to be able to get back to some of these other projects and principally get back to making music, get back to you know writing and the creative stuff which is what are the creative arts, which is what I really want to do, and I've been really lacks with my members club for the last two weeks. Well, one week last Thursday I didn't put my post up, and tomorrow I won't put a post up either so I'll be two weeks behind so Friday I must put time in to get the you know the posts up to date because that's that's crucial to anything else my private member's club in the lab, and I can't be letting those guys down so I really need to put some time into that. So, anybody who's a member of the lab is listening I'm sorry I'm sorry, but you know why. And I will make it up to you, I promise it's only a little b
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Welcome to Episode 53 of my podcast, have you from the crow's nest and. First things first, I have a feeling quite a bit better. I'm nearly back to normal, my throat still hurts a bit but it's not too bad. And today, was a bit more. I was kind of half focused half not focused. The second day of having the agency audience ninja is the second day of having somebody working on the team full time Dan, and his first or second day of applying and all work is all well and good but certainly there's this learning curve which is proving to be frustrating for me from the point of view of, you know, I know I need to build things ways of working, foundations, etc. for the business. And so I'm ending up working longer. Despite the fact that I've got help that I would have worked if I didn't have help. And I know that that's part of the process. And also, now that we've got a client and I intend to that we do a good job for the client. But I kind of feel like I sort of lost a bit of my focus in what the bigger picture, you know, the grip the sky experience, and my writing, and the things that I want to get back to more music, and more writing fiction writing screenplay writing. And the idea of audience ninja is it becomes a self sustaining entity that when the team is in place and the clients are in place, it kind of runs itself with less of my input, but of course to get to that stage on has to put in the work. And so, I feel like I'm being quite reactive at the moment, which is understandable, like for example, whenever I'm doing a new task, or I'm doing something which ideally I'd like Dan or somebody else who might join the team in the future today. I'm, or even the client might do themselves in the future. I'm doing an explainer video so you know walk through so some of these videos are 20 minutes long some 10 minutes long whatnot. The irony being. If I did the task myself without doing the explainer video. I would do it in about five minutes. And I'm doing a half hour explainer video to show someone else how to do the task, and then letting them do that task, even though I could have done it myself in five minutes. But of course that's you know that's that's the whole kind of point of bringing a team on is that you empower them and delegate stuff to them and then they can run with it. So if I don't do this now, then all I'll be doing is doing the task myself and there's no point in having help, but it does mean it feels slower at the beginning. But nonetheless, but now building up this little video library for audience ninja and every day. I mean, two days in but every day it's kind of like iterating something or improving something in the systems that we're using in the way that we're doing stuff so that's cool, because, you know, now that I'm thinking about it on this, we're making progress you know we are building something every day it's getting a little bit better a little bit better, and improving excuse me a second I told you the throat wasn't fully better. And so yeah that's been my, that's been my focus really, I mean nothing much. Nothing much else had got back to training today with abdol personal trainer, and it was it evening or an afternoon session 540, as opposed to 830 in the morning, which I had been doing, and two things one, I definitely prefer 830 in the morning I never thought I'd say that but it's good to get up, get it done. Get out of the way and, you know, kind of give the energy for the day and then get on with the day knowing that I've got it at the end of the day is a bit, kind of like coming by the door I want to be able to relax at this time, or, I've got to start working because I've got training and so I'm not looking at it. I wasn't looking at it earlier with the right kind of frame of mind. However, as soon as I went in even before we started and I got there, the yoga man the fan and stuff. I had a for me quite a strange thing that I was really excited I was really happy to be training, and I realised
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Welcome to Episode 52 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. If you are about on Twitter. Do come and say hello at Romeo crow. We'd love to hear from you. So today it was an interesting day because it was the official first day of the marketing agency audience ninja. The official first day of our first full time team member, and the official first day of our first client. So, all in all. Yeah, very important and milestone type day. I kicked off the day because obviously had all this stuff to organise and all this work in front of me by going to the beach, because you know, that's the sensible thing to do. Kids were very pleased about it. And I think someone was very pleased about it. And it was our I am not the biggest beach fan but you know it was nice to get out and have a swim in the morning and then come over, though, I think we did leave a little bit late. Nonetheless, I was at work by kind of at half 10. And I quickly realised that I needed to organise stuff. I mean, it works really well to have the first client on board today. With the new starter because all of a sudden that gave me a very clear focus of what you know we can get going with, and therefore what to get. Dan teammate. You know what to set him off with, and part of certainly these first few days is going to be seeing how he handles tasks which some of the tasks, I'm going to be giving him a kind of redundant because probably I'm gonna end up doing them myself anyway. But he needs to learn how to do things I need to see how he learns how quickly learns when they were asked questions his attention to detail all of these things and how we work together so it's a bit of a test. It was funny because I did two explainer videos, which totaled about 30 minutes to walk him through how to use a particular tool or web building tool. And in that 30 minutes, I could have actually done the task which I've asked him to do for the client. So, it was like, you know, it felt like one. You know, one step back or whatever you know it felt like it wasn't really being productive but actually, I know that in the long term that's by far the best approach because I need to teach a man to fish, rather than just do it myself. Otherwise, what's the point in having, you know teammates and an agency if you're going to end up doing stuff yourself so from day one, I'm trying to learn to delegate I'm trying to learn to really have that in the mindset because that's the whole point of not just audience ninja but also, you know, everything really that we're doing is about delegating and having people help amplify. What we want to do, so we can focus on the core of our interest and skills and where the nexus of those two things are. So hopefully this will kind of pan out and you know we'll, we'll hit the ground running and we'll get some good momentum and a good working relationship and stuff will get done, but obviously we'll see over the next few days I probably would have done more on it, except in the afternoon I got a call from a mom asking for some tech support. They've got a new internet service provider in a new modem, and the computer she's using which smiled computer wasn't connected to the internet and long, long story short, after four hours we realised that a cable had been unplugged. So it's been four hours trying to do very frustrating tech support to find out that there was a cable unplugged, which I had asked about at the beginning and been told that it was fine but it turns out it was a fight. So, that was both frustrating and comedic at the same time, because you got it. But it did mean I wasn't doing anything more on you know audience ninja for the client. The client is a slob my brother's new business, which is rapidly evolving, with the it was, it's a business that was conceived to help other businesses during the coronavirus, but with a view to how they can be sustainable longer term after the various different challenges to businesses have subsided. And as a cons
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Welcome to Episode 51 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest further to yesterday's episode. My throat is still sore, but I think you can hear it's getting there better so I'm hopeful that more or less by tomorrow I'll be feeling, you know, kind of back to normal. Certainly by Tuesday. So, we shall see. Nonetheless, I was still pretty drained again today. I still found it hard to concentrate on, you know, work and stuff, but I did manage to speak to my brother at leg this morning who hopefully will be out next oil first or second Clyde for audience ninja depending on when the Americans come back to me. Then I spoke to a lovely gentleman I've worked with in the past, guy called Winston, who actually put the Americans on to me, so to speak, and that was good to touch base with him and, you know, have an update from him and vice versa and glad to see that he's all good and then maybe some more business down the line, which we'll see. And then a struggle to but eventually managed to onboard the first of our team for audience ninja and Dan who's going to start tomorrow. And one of my chief concerns today was deciding which tools we're going to use for the kind of project management projects and tasks and stuff, have picked a tool called agile, which is not beater, but it's not far out I imagine, and it's got huge potential but it's also very rough around the edges and fairly bug ridden so we shall see whether that lives up to its ambition. So we're going to test that for the next few weeks. Let's see what happens. So yeah, I mean I'd say no revelations in my mind, still reading sell like crazy. And it's basically done phase one now we're on phase two phase one is basically know your audience. As far as I can tell, phase two is basically give you know, give them something of value in exchange for their email and stage 312 headline writing for adverts so pretty. You know, it's pretty much standard online marketing stuff doesn't mean it's not powerful doesn't mean it's not effective. But it does mean I've heard it many times before, which only goes to, you know, confirm that. Those are all correct and I have, you know, fully believe that those are correct approaches. And a couple of interesting anecdotes or things that were said which I thought was, was interesting, which I will share. One of them was. If you think of all the people who might you know all the people who are available there 100%. And if you think that maybe 60% of those hundred percent aren't aware that they have a specific problem. And then let's say 25% of the remaining are aware, they've got a problem, but not really so worried or do much about it at the moment. and then a percentage of that maybe 10% 12% or something like that. So if my percentages actually add up but let's say 12%, they're actively searching for a solution. And then, 3%, or four they're researching and then 3% are actively ready to buy. And he was making a point that most businesses focus on the messaging on the 3% who are ready to buy. Whereas the smart marketers should be focusing their messaging on the other 97% because basically there's a lot less competition. And the idea is that you bring the 60% from not realising they had a problem to realising they have this problem. And then for the 25% who realised they got the problem, but aren't ready to kind of actively do anything about it. You kind of move them forward with information so that they realise they need to do something about the product problem. And then the 12%, you bring them from realising they need to do something about the problem and actively looking into it to giving them all the information they need so they're ready to buy. And of course, if you've done that with your product, service or business, then by the time they're ready to buy. It's not really open competition, they're probably gonna buy from you because you know you've built that trust and whatnot. And basically this is just funnels really. And so none of it is
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Welcome to Episode 50 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. Now 50 is quite a. It's quite a milestone quite an achievement and I wanted to do a big episode by big I don't really know what it mean but nonetheless. If you've listened over the last few days you've probably heard me deteriorating vocally, and my throat is worse today than it was yesterday so it's not going to be any kind of long episode because frankly it hurts. Today, I had the big kind of hopefully final proposal to send to the American potential clients for audience Ninja, and had a strange sleep last night, a bit of. Well firstly I didn't sleep very well at all. But secondly, kind of, when you're stuck in a loop, which is usually for me when my body's battling some little bug or something. My dreams get a bit weird and so I had that last night so I really was not on it today. And it was very difficult for me to concentrate on anything else feeling really drained so putting together this proposal was was definitely difficult but I got out the door. I said I do it today, and I did it today I probably could do it tomorrow but you know when you say you're going to do something particularly well actually regardless when you say or do something by a certain time, then you really should try and deliver. So I've got that adores that was good and that was basically the only thing I really managed work was although I had been reading. As you may know, I try and read at least one kind of business book one nonfiction book and one fiction book at the same time, and the business book I've been reading recently was this is marketing by Seth Godin, and I'm about 40% of the way and it's slow going, and the reason is exactly as I feared when I introduced the book previously and said I'm about to read this. Seth Godin is after all these years he's got so guru, with his, his ideas and teaching that is now like, it's like reading Chinese Proverbs, you know, it's you have you read it, it sounds great and then you think actually I have no idea what he just said, and then you've got to kind of really decipher it you need a Rosetta Stone or something so it's not really so practical per se, though he would argue that it's immensely practical, I'm sure. But it's not really it Yes, tough guy. But I saw an advert on Facebook for a book. And normally I wouldn't respond but nonetheless I did to this one, by a guy called Sabri sushi or something like that and Australian guy, and it's called sell like crazy, I believe, and I looked on Amazon and the reviews are actually really good so I can try that. And immediately, it's bang on practical. Most of it so far is stuff that I've already heard but that doesn't mean it's not valuable because, as always, people can say something in a slightly different way and finally the penny drops, or it just reminds you have the validity of an idea or the power of doing something. And I'll probably talk about the book a bit more in the coming days because I think there's a lot of value in there, but none enough to say you know I read about probably about 20% of that already and it's just starting today, and it's good. You know, it's already got me thinking or reminded me in different ways so that's really positive so I'm glad about that. And at some point I'll get back to Seth Godin book, but I'm not really looking forward to it. So that was my other bit of work. The other thing I did today we had a family movie at the end of the end of the day, and we finished watching. Back to the Future. That is such a joy to start for me who loves films to start being able to re watch films that I love with my kids, specifically with me Natalie and it was a bit bored. She loved it. And it's great obviously we've got the next two films to watch as well. But I've said it before and I'll say it again. Back to the Future, pretty much the most perfect film ever made as far as I'm concerned. And I will go into detail about that another time or if you wish to ask me, come
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Good hellos and welcome to Episode 49 of my podcast interview from the crow's nest. If you're about on Twitter. Come and see me at Romeo crow Say hello. Tell me what you like, what you don't like about these podcasts ask any questions you want. I would love to hear from you and it'd be super cool if you came and said what's up. Today's episode is going to be another quick one. It was family day today and Family Day, generally pre COVID meant that we'd go out for a whole day in the car, we'd go visit places we never did before, etc. Now when you're on an island where one of you grew up, and you've been here together, 20 plus times and you spent months and months here, there's not really so much more that you can do to discover the island, but we managed to do something we went to museum on this gear today. And it's actually well put together. The, I say back to the exhibits however we're. That's a rather heavy on ceramics pottery, and maybe not ceramics but pottery and rocks. So if you'd like pottery or rocks, then you're in for an absolute treat. If you don't, then a bit boring, but at least we did something new. And that was it feeling pretty drained still yesterday I was saying I wasn't feeling too good. Had a good night's sleep last night. Either fell asleep during the day today for 10 minutes which is hugely unlikely, but that's not shifted out but you can hear that in my throat. So, yeah, just just feeling a little bit below par at the moment I think maybe more rest is needed. And that's pretty much all I got. Hopefully I'll be feeling a bit stronger tomorrow be back kind of at work tomorrow. I have a big brief proposal. I don't know what you'd call it but for the American clients for audience ninja. I just need to send them basically you know how to pay. And I want to send them more details of exactly what's entailed so we're on the same page, literally, before we commit to anything either but so the expectations are set and communication is clear. And then that way we can just get on with doing the best job and working together the best that we can. And hopefully not let anything else get in the way. So fingers crossed. I need to do that tomorrow but Fingers crossed it all goes well they, you know, they're happy with it and next week, we've got the first team members joining on it's ninja and the first client so happy right exciting so hopefully tomorrow have a very exciting day to share with you. But for now, two and a half minutes in, that's it for the day, nothing to share nothing else to think of hope you're well. And I'll speak to you tomorrow. Cheers. Cheers. Bye.
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Welcome to Episode 48 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and it's going to be a pretty short one tonight because I got a sore throat. And it kind of hurts to speak, which for me is pretty challenging thing to be able to speak too much and bang on. I think I've been wearing myself down a bit. And it's ironic so I don't really feel like I've been working that much this week but I've been going to bed too late certainly and I wouldn't say I'm stressed, but I would say that I've sort of got a lot of new variables to contend with. With audience ninja the new agency the new clients coming on board and grip the sky experience and do a few other things is quite an important. I think moment in my current timeline. So I think there's a lot to going on so the combination of not sleeping. And these extra things and where I usually my weakness comes, especially when I don't sleep in the form of mouth ulcers, particularly, and sore throat and stuff that's like my Achilles heel or Achilles throat. So I think that's where I'm at today. And this week, I've been. We experimented with the personal trainer where instead of one of us going one day and the other guy the other day, someone and I both did back to back on Tuesday and back to back again today. And it just takes too much in the morning by the time we finished by the time we're showered and Barlow is basically lunchtime. So there's like hey let's do lunch and then by the time we finish. So I have not been starting work until kind of mid afternoon and by that point I'm really not in the mood to work, combined with the tiredness and whatnot. So, I've done important work. This week, we've hired two people to join the team for audience ninja our first proper. onboarding hopefully to clients for its ninja. You know, trying to get money for an old client who hasn't paid up. So my first experience of the county court system in the UK for people not paying their debts and chasing up some payment, which was always going to come but needed to be waited until the pumps were back open in the UK for work that we did back in March. So, I've done important stuff even if it hasn't been quote unquote busy a lot of work but nonetheless. I don't feel like I've made. I mean I made you know there's there's good stuff in is doing. But um, you know I have worked on grip the sky experience particularly haven't done this or that or the other. So, I still feel like I'm not really worth that much this week. Tomorrow is a family day out so I'm not gonna work tomorrow maybe that's exactly what we need an actual day out, where I'm going to switch off from work and then on Saturday, have to supply what will hopefully be the final kind of proposal for these for these Americans this new client. The first client for audience ninja four bits of work that we're going to be doing for them, four separate kind of bits of work and I want to be very transparent and very clear so there's no misunderstandings. Before we start working together and manage expectations and all those things, so that we can be free to simply get on with delivering, you know, delivering the work and the client, getting the benefit from it. So that's going to be a big task on Saturday the first kind of one and hopefully I'll find somewhere blueprinting or templating it for future use. But it's gonna be new for me doing it like that and then you system and putting it all together so that's gonna be cool. But yeah, I think just needs some rest so I'm currently making the bed because earlier today we discovered something was leaking leaking milk chocolate smoothie or whatever the seven made for the kids was leaking all over our bed. So, wash the sheets. This is such an interesting podcast, isn't it, and now put it on, while I'm talking to you or me or whoever's listening to this. And that's all I've got for you really, other than personal training session this morning, we sort of upped the ante a little bit and he said it was a bit more towards c
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Welcome to Episode 47 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest it is i Romeo Crow talking in your ear holes. So forgive if you hear a bunch of noises because I'm going to the car to pick some shopping up so I'm strolling through the street everything was so slogan my my act together today and by the time actually I don't even know I did this morning but by the time we got around to working it was like four o'clock in the afternoon. so dumb by one then funny. So out the window is redonkulous nonetheless, I had a couple of kind of main tasks and I guess it's Okay have, you know, if you do the couple of things that really matter, then it really moves the needle forward. And actually, that's more important than simply being busy or simply doing work. Although there's a lot that I could have done, would have liked to have done if I pull my finger out. But the couple of major tasks, one of them. I had mentioned before that in my business, UK, PR Mike, we had one client, only one client in NY on eight years of business who have refused to pay us and had to work out how that works, you know, trying to clip money off people that won't pay you and whatnot, and there's a process and so I applied to the county, the county court, etc. And they've put a judgement in my favour. So now he has one month to pay or else it's a problem for his credit or something. So I sent an email to him today with some more details to say, Okay, please can you pay out now. So that was important on account especially that we really do actually need money because you caper mic is not working because There's no open mic because the Coronavirus so you know, any income is gratefully received at the moment. And the other major thing was doing a, an interview with potentially the second person to join the team for our new agency audience ninja. And this time I was chatting to a Canadian guy. And one second better yesterday was a Romanian guy who's going to join us on Monday. So that's great news. And today was Canadian guy who is still very keen despite me telling him the situation so that's a good sign. And yeah, hopefully, I'm going to let him know in next couple of days gonna let me know if he's definitely still up for it. And we'll have our second team members so whether he starts on Monday or he starts the following Monday, one of those two, but that is super exciting because as mentioned previously, Being able to qualify those shopping is having, being able to get a team going, is hopefully what's gonna stop us being, you know, having such a bottleneck with our plans, particularly me being the bottleneck, and you know, be able to amplify what we're doing and scale up what we're doing on pursue opportunities to pursue ideas. And in fact, on that note, you just want sweatpants Wow, it's pretty heavy. And I did have a think an interesting one yesterday I had two video calls using zoom and I haven't used them before really. And I seem to be very late to the party because it does everything. And again, my thinking was, well, you know, again, late to the party, but you know, one on one video communication is so powerful and I knew that video communications you know, the way forward etc. And I've been doing a lot more video for everything I've been putting out for Romeo Crow, you know as a company videos and But they will broadcast, you know, to camera, but they're all broadcast. And so I really appreciated the power of the one on one video one was me speaking to the Romanian guy to potentially hired for the team. And the other was being shown around a software product by the founder. And that was really useful and, and very interesting. And I thought to myself, you know, I really, I think it would really benefit our businesses if we could work out a way of integrating video, one on one video communication moving forward, and there was a tool that I bought a year ago, something like that, which is for basically running conferences or events online. So the idea is
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Welcome funky chicken to Episode 46 of podcasts slamming doors, also known as the view from the crow's nest. How you doing, whoever you are, whoever's listening. If you're about come over to Twitter and see me at Romeo crow because I want to know who you are. Not that I'm particularly nosy but I just think it's really cool to know who's listening to this, so please do come say hello. So today today today today. I did a little bit of work on watching it where it did. I had my first viewing of the grip the sky the fabled grip of the sky experience, which was my wife. And so I unleashed her upon it, and immediately saw problems by watching how she browsed it, and realised that there are a few things where I could have made it clearer what one must do. So that's give me a couple of design things there was also one little spelling error which hadn't caught up on and a couple other little things so I ended out most of those bugs, but there's a couple little design things I need to finish. Tomorrow, ideally, but it's it's it's nearly there, it's it's so nearly there. The basic of Is there a home. But this morning we had our personal training session and by the time we'd both done it, because someone had it first then myself. And then it was kind of like early lunchtime and then dinner so I didn't get working until after sort of two o'clock so my done by one then fun is right out the window it's on its head. So by the time she looked through the grip the sky experience and by the time I sort of tried to get working, and it was already sort of getting on into the afternoon. But what I did have today is despite not doing that many hours of work. And I did do something incredibly productive. I had a video interview with the first person who might be joining the team for audience ninja. And that was really cool. A guy called Dan, who's in Romania, and it went really well. I like the guy. He's, he's interested in likes the idea of what we're doing. So, pretty sure that in the next day or two, I'm going to confirm with him, that we'll start with him on Monday, and that'd be really cool because that'll be part from the first time I've hired somebody full time to join the team, or to join you know, anything that I have created or that I'm working on. It will hopefully give more capacity for similan II which means we're going to be able to start moving that leap faster on some of the projects some of the businesses some of the ideas. And that is really the name of the game. And I really hope it sort of goes according to plan, because, frankly, this, this could be a huge turning point in, you know, in, in our future and how we're doing and that's a really exciting thing. After that, I had another video call this time with a tool a software tool that I use the guy behind it wanted to walk through a few things and pick my brains on a few things. And that was really cool very helpful. I gave him. He I mean, show me some really cool functionality with it, and I gave him some ideas that he was pleased with and said he's gonna try and implement. So that's really positive, and I love that about sort of not startup software tools but certainly very near startup software tools that the founders are very close to the action, and very keen on implementing positive change and feedback as quickly as they can. So you really can have a bit of a hand in shaping some of those tools, and I've used, I mean I've bought hundreds literally hundreds of software tools. Over the last sort of three, four years, and used, you know, a hell of a lot of software tools. So I've got a bit of an idea of what helps you know, what makes them more useful and whatnot so I'm very glad to be able to kind of share that. Look at that knowledge and experience and be helped try and shape it to my design because you know at the end of the day you want to talk to do something to save you time, generally, and being able to shape how that works is brilliant. It's a real privilege, because t
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Welcome to Episode 45 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest and I have had a day, deeply deeply nose down in the grip the sky experience, the thing won't die, it just won't die. I've got such little still needs doing on the surface by just is taking so long for anybody who's technically inclined, is a little thing. I've been trying to get something to work and because of a couple of little nuances in the system, it doesn't quite work properly. And there's a button which says add to cart, but actually it's not an add to cart. It's actually a live view more info kind of thing. So all I want to do is change the text of that button. And on most other buttons you can do it no problem on that button. So which is good. I believe that means cascading Are sheep but I'm not sure. But basically, it's a way that you can change how a website shows the information, even if you don't necessarily have access to the website's code. So it kind of changes it on the fly as it's coming in anyways, point being, I've been faffing around with that, and still not still not achieved it. I'm getting so close, but it's just not there. So I really truly hope that tomorrow, or the next day that I work on it, I'll be able to tie it off. And what I was meant to do is tie it off today and then recruit the couple of people for the team for audience Ninja, the new marketing agency, and then look at a quote and or look at a brief rather and then quote for the brief for hopefully our second client. First one, hopefully we'll come back in next couple of days. And I didn't do either of those. So those have to be done tomorrow, ahead of finishing the greatness guy experience but by hook or by crook, one way or another The two should be done in, you know, in the next few days, because I'd need to work on something else, I really need to work on something else. I've spent far too long on this thing, though, I must remind myself that it is meant to be, you know, if I get it right, it's a blueprint. I mean, it will need tweaking them no matter what I do. But once it's right to blueprint for both my future releases, and also for other musicians that, you know, I can help them with their releases. So there's a lot of potential in this thing, and it's worth getting it right. But my goodness, it's taking, it's taking its sweet time. Outside of that, I also discovered right at the end of the day, which I really didn't need to find a problem with the worldschooling hub site that I built. And it was just, I can't work out exactly how to fix it. I don't think it's going to be a quick fix. So I've had to take the site down, just to As a precaution, and I'm gonna have to have a real second look at that, although I'm hoping that I can bring on board, somebody in the team for audience ninja and they can look at it with a fresh pair of eyes and hopefully far more skilled than my own skills to get that sorted. So it's just more website, hell, website dev hell, but that's the joy of websites and businesses. Speaking of businesses, I've run the UK open mic, which was until the Coronavirus, our main source of income and that all changed when the pubs shut down and you can put live music on anymore. And in about the seven or so years that I've been running that business, amazing. We've never had any client refused to pay or not pay. A couple of clients have been slow to pay. You know, one client, they'd shut down but they still honoured their debt. Anyway, there's this one client, my first ever who is refusing to pay and it's But the good news, I had started the process of taking action against them. And, you know, it's only for a piddly little amount as well. It's just but it's principle, you know, it's the principle. And, anyway, that the letter came through today from the court that basically says he needs to pay. So that's nice because it means that I can actually move that forward and close it off. So that's kind of, you know, on principle, it's, it's made me happy. I don't I
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Welcome to Episode 44, I believe, yes 44 of the view from the crow's nest my daily podcast and I welcome and thank you for choosing to spend the time with me. It's gonna be pretty short one because it's midnight now, and I didn't want to miss an episode but I'm quite tired, it's time to get to bed. Why is it so late well I just watched a film love wedding, repeat, which is English comedy British comedy from this year, I believe, and it feels to me like somebody has really just tried to replicate Richard Curtis and Hugh Grant's efforts of 20 years ago. It's kinda like let's just say love from Love Actually let's take a wedding from for Weddings and a Funeral and let so repeat. Kind of makes sense. Let's get a, you know, a young not anywhere near as good actor to try and replicate Hugh Grant, and it was good, it was kind of funny, it was funny in places but didn't really have the spark there was something kind of missing to it, I felt it was entertaining enough. Outside of that, I have nearly finished the grip the Skype experience. I did the intro and outro videos today haven't double checked them but I have edited them uploaded them they're on the pages. So that means tomorrow I just need to sort out a couple of things with the checkout flow and the basic things done. So, hopefully I'll be able to get that out into the wide world this week so I'm super looking forward to that. Also this week coming. I will be wife and i will be interviewing a couple of people for a couple of roles for audience ninja our new marketing agency and hopefully, therefore bringing on the team to super exciting because that means we can move forward on some projects of our own. And also, it means we can now bring on some of our first clients. So, hopefully in the next day or two. The American potential American clients I've been speaking to have last week, and will be coming back to me and let me know where they want to work with us or not. And I had another brief from another potential client this afternoon, which is actually my brother's new business that I already helped out on and they've been pleased with the work done so far and wants to continue. So, that is really exciting. And that's all I got. Tony's gonna be a short 120 off today don't really know. Can't remember, I was doing stuff but the day just seems to go. That's it. So, I've got nothing else, new week, very excited to see what's going to happen in this week I had so much opportunity so much possibility ahead, roll it on. So thanks for sticking with me today for this three minute one, and I will see you tomorrow at doodle BIP.
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Good day and welcome to Episode 43 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. And today, was half a day of doing. I think doing nothing of not working, it's not exactly doing nothing. In fact, I got up and first thing I did was, private training session with the personal trainer. So that's definitely not doing nothing It was leg day a huge amount of squats. And after that, pretty much, then I really couldn't be bothered to do very much had lunch, but then I had to get my, My took us in gear, because after that was, I had a call this afternoon or later this afternoon with these potential first clients for my marketing agency audience ninja. So this time is with a couple of them to discuss advertising side of things digital that digital advertising side of things. So, a few days ago I think about two days ago on the podcast. I was talking about, that I'd spent a fair portion of that day, really trying to detail out the process of doing digital advertising because it's not quite as straightforward as one thinks it is, if they haven't done it before, certainly not to be successful at it. And, as is often the case. Something that you know how to do because you've done it a bunch of times and you've spent hours and hours learning how to do it and trialling and erroring and getting your skills and experience up becomes kind of second nature and natural to you. But when you have to, particularly if you have to teach it to somebody, but certainly if you have to, as I felt be in a position that you can succinctly explain it to somebody or maybe not necessarily but at least in detail, then it means that you really got to think through the process, and in thinking it through you have to systematise it and be quite methodical and it really helps you to understand exactly what you're actually something that you do naturally or without too much thought, you know understand it from a deeper perspective. And thank goodness I did do that work because one of the questions that came up is well Okay, why, why are we, why would we be paying you to do this you know what are you going to do for our money. And I was very well prepared because I done this, this prep work few days before. So in the lead up to that I was looking at some advertising, I bought a new advertising tool that I'm going to check out that specifically that helps you target audiences or Facebook, ones that are maybe a bit more challenging to find no idea if I'll use it or if they'll be any good or not but we'll see. And I was just reacquainting myself with some of the previous tools that I've bought and doing a quick bit of watching a few videos about one of those tools, just to see, you know, just to see what. Just to remind myself see what came out and actually an interesting thing did come out if you're into digital marketing or in fact any type of marketing really but this was an interesting point, it was to target people who aren't necessarily an obvious or related target audience. And you think, Okay, that makes no sense. So let me give you an idea let's say you're a restaurant, and you're close to a sports ground. Obviously, you're not one obviously but you're not necessarily a sports restaurant and you're not going to target sports players or sports fans, necessarily, but obviously you're close to the sports ground so you might target the local sports fans well that's kind of obvious, but what's less obvious is, you might target sports fans from completely outside of your area for teams that you know are coming to play at the local Stadium, but it's local to you. So, this would be an idea that you'd be targeting a market that's unrelated but he's actually kind of on point. And another idea was to target layers, so at least within Facebook, you can find somebody who's in Category A, who also is in Category B. So, you know that Nexus in the middle between those two. If you imagine two circles one circle is a, an overlapping a circle B, where those two circles overlap that
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Howdy Doody and welcome to Episode 42 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. And today is the first time, it's such a rarity that it's the first time in every one of these daily podcasts for the first time and at least 42 days that I took a day off, and didn't do any work today, had a day off with the family. So this morning we went on a glass bottomed boat around the Bay of Ischia Pantera so if you don't know, I'm currently staying on an island Ischia in Italy just off the bat Naples, and it's the island where my wife's from so we stay with my mother in law. And we wanted to have a day out but my wife grew up here we've been here together. 20 times at least. So we kind of know the island pretty well. But we managed to find something new that we hadn't done before and this was a glass bottom boat. So there's a lot of archaeological heritage to the island. And there was this, these guys who have put together like an audio visual presentation with an archaeological reconstruction video and in Rome and then you go and get on a glass bottom boat and they take you to an area of the bay that's got boys around it or boys whatever, however you pronounce it from the archaeological museum in Naples, and you know other boats are allowed in there. And under the water you can see, you know, archaeological stuff skins. So on old Roman villas and stuff like that that were down there. So that was really really cool, we saw something new there. And then the boat, because a little bit across the bay to start very big Bay to the castle. So, iski is most famous or prominent landmark and tourist attraction probably is the Paragon AZ castle castella agonism, which is a very spectacular. Well castle and buildings, that's built on top of a with cliffs and the rock. That is just apart from the island so it's its own island basically and it's it's really spectacular to look at how we look on the internet. In fact there is actually a camera, an HD camera project that's all over the world where they instal HD cameras. Static cameras that are just facing one place. And you can see things like, and they're all live so you can see things like some Marks Square Venice or New York or whatever and one of them, focuses on the air organising castle. So if you really want to see it you can see it from that. But anyways, so we took the kids on the boat this morning and that was great. And then we got off that we came back to the quick bit of shopping and then Mina had her first offer first class of a workshop we'd signed her up to. So again if you don't know we are world schoolers, which means we homeschool whilst travelling, and we're now trying to find certain workshops and things that Mina might be interested in that she can do online. And so she started one on space today which you really really liked that was good, we got back in time for that. Then we had lunch, and then we went back out to the castle itself. And the last time we'd been in the castle was about 12 years ago something like that. And this was the first time with the kids. And as I say it's a, you know, it's a it's a lot of steps is a lot of climbing the whole day is basically climbing. So I had a look later we did seven and a half, kilometres of walking but that doesn't include the continuous up and down, up and down to how high it is but 100 200 metres I guess I don't know exactly, but it's pretty high. And me, that means she's seven and a half nearly eight so it wasn't a problem for her, but Leonardo. Not quite three and a half, or no he's about three and a half now. And he nailed it the whole day it was really really good he didn't do anything complain he didn't you know you find absolutely fine. So that was really cool because apart from the fact that the kids really enjoyed it was the fact that one, we now know that you know we can do walks in the country or something like that because Leonardo is totally Up, up to it. And we kind of thought anyway but you know this was a good provi
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Welcome champion to Episode 41 of my podcast view from the crow's nest and the view from the crow's nest today's square i'd saw brained head, and brain has been into marketing and getting my head around things and planning and whatnot, for the day. Not even planning specific marketing, but actually just planning a framework for which for adverts for advertising digital advertising. So to fill in the details. My new nascent marketing agency audience ninja potentially has its first couple of clients, which is very nice they've been inbound I didn't do anything they contacted me and that's forced me to kind of move quick more quickly on plans for starting up audience ninja. And one of the conversations was about websites and web rebuilds and emails and all that kind of thing. And they want to have a second conversation about advertising, specifically Facebook ads and Instagram ads and stuff like that, and marketing as a subject is really broad and wide. And obviously you niche down, bit by bit, or layer down bit by bit, then you get into digital marketing or, you know, looking at online side of things, and that encompasses loads of stuff as well from SEO search engine optimization to get your page rising in the ranks on Google, for example, through to content marketing and in influencer marketing etc etc. So, advertising digital advertising is another subset of that. But then when you get to digital advertising, it's not as simply just boosting a post on Facebook, there's a lot more to it than that. The thing is doing it for myself, is one thing, because you know you just do it yourself, you don't really think through the process too much, but when you need to cost out the process in order to charge somebody for the service, obviously you want to make sure that you're not, you're being fair to them but also you're being fair to yourself, because there's no point in undercharging and then realising that there's all these little things that you didn't realise were part of the process because you never really thought it through before but once you've actually got a client who's expecting results and breathing down your neck. Then you'd better make sure that you've covered all your bases, you know, and that you know what's involved at the outset rather than halfway through when you're too far gone to actually make changes. So today was really getting my head around the actual process the general process of Facebook. This Facebook of online advertising. Then I have a specific methodology and idea when it comes to advertising, particularly when it comes to advertising musicians and musicians using ads. And I think that the traditional music industry is appalling at their marketing and their advertising, and they still use old school techniques that worked fine when we didn't have the internet, but they try and transplant them to the internet with very limited success. And that's the traditional music industry, most independent, musicians, they haven't a clue where to start and that's understandable. And it's very easy to waste a lot of money, very quickly on ads that don't work. If you're not operating within a framework that is, you know, methodical etc etc. And that framework is more in depth, and more connected to other elements such as websites landing pages funnels and other concepts like this. Then, people who haven't looked into marketing and studied a bit. Understand, so to be the challenge is to one get one's head around that, to start with two is to systematise that but then to a framework, three and this is possibly even more so, is to be able to explain that to a client who thinks that most likely. Oh, I want to spend some money on ads so that that would give me an immediate result and immediate return I spend 10 quid or hundred quid or whatever it might be, and I'll immediately get leads or get traffic or get sales or get plays or whatever it is that the goal is, and there's so much more to it than that and it's so much mo
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Welcome to Episode 40 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest fort is a bit of a milestone so I'll give myself a little pat on the back. Like so. Thank you very much for joining me. Thank you for listening. If this is your first show welcome. Thank you for tuning in. If it's your not your first rodeo with me then you're an absolute champion I really appreciate that. Today, if and if you're a new person joining the. This is called the view from the crow's nest, and it is kind of part journal part tips and tricks part ideas part thoughts. Part, Part of this part it's a bit of a Frankenstein's monster as a podcast goes. And so, a bit of a reflection of what I've been up to. And today is a follow on from yesterday so yesterday, I spoke to the first kind of potential client for my audience ninja agency which is marketing agency. And the idea for audience ninja has been in my head for many years. In fact I bought the domain name for it probably about five or six years ago or something so it's definitely been a while. And it was always my intention to help other people, particularly musicians by testing things out for myself. And once I've got things at work be able to help other musicians, to be able to build a fan base and build a career, sustainable career off of direct to fan relationships off of having fan base that they contact directly they have their data, and they build relationships with, and those fans become supporters of them, such that they can have a career because underpinning it all. I really get disappointed and I think such a shame when people who love doing something aren't able to pursue it because it's not practical from a Gemini from a financial standpoint. And that happens a lot with artists, obviously musicians and writers, but also people who have ideas for tools or software or things that were basically things that make people's lives better. And they have a passion for it and it could even be you know being a coach or being an educator or some kind of specialist. Help or some kind. So, the idea for me for audience ninja kind of ties into all of that and that is, I want to empower people to be able to pursue an idea or a passion that they really want to be able to pursue. And for a lot of people. The, the first problem they run into is I have no idea where to start. It's like, maybe I think I need to get a website or people talk about I need to be on social media and. Okay, I need to do. And the problem is, once you start Google searching this kind of stuff, especially if it's not particularly when it's not something you're familiar with. It's like a rabbit hole that once you go down it's really getting lose your way very very quickly, and the overwhelm that that causes often paralyses people into not taking action it's like us too much hassle, or they do take action, but it doesn't work for them and yeah they spent a fair amount of time or money and resource on, for example, building a website or going through processes that are actually unnecessary or over complicated or what have you. And so, for the last, you know, however many years I guess 20 years probably. I've been reading, and then in the last 10 years more thoroughly putting into practice and in the last, you know, 765 years, five, six years, six, seven years. I'm not really putting into practice. All of these kinds of different ideas and concepts and I come from looking at it from a marketing standpoint, online marketing but also having worked in advertising sales for probably about a decade. I understand what making things work in business in a big business and want to take those skills and those ideas and as I say apply them. So this is the idea behind the audience ninja agency, it's for kind of the normal person you know the person who doesn't consider themselves a business, yet. And yet, I would say that you are a business as soon as you're doing something that you're eventually wanted to transact in transact financially. And so few day
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Good hellos and welcome to episode, 39, which is my age of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. Thank you very much for choosing to spend some time with me, if you're about on Twitter, then come over and say hello at Romeo crow. And if you've got any comments questions feedback, anything at all. I'd love to hear from you so please do let me know. Today's episode definitely not the same techno rant, that I had yesterday was rant techno geekery that I had yesterday with my new toys. And if you missed the episode, I just bought a Google nest hub, which is basically a very nice digital photo frame it does other stuff as well but most importantly it streams directly from your Google Photos albums that you select which is just brilliant. And I also bought the Alexa firestick 4k so that we can actually watch. You know, Netflix and whatnot on TVs that are old and don't have any of that stuff which is good because then we can finally basically watch a film on a TV after or since August we haven't done that so that's great, and a bunch of them really delve into if you don't use them but also if you do use them hacks for speeding up your workflow. When, when working in Google Apps for any apps and searching things through a browser, very exciting stuff. If you're interested in that, save your time then listen to yesterday's episode. Today, and didn't work on grip the sky again. So that's still so close to finishing but not quite finished, because I was focused on just getting some other bits done that just needed to be done, you know bits that I have kind of not dealt with organising myself a bit more, try not to think what actually did, I did do stuff I worked for many hours but I can't actually remember what I did, particularly what I did do towards the end of the day was have a conversation which turned into an hour and 40 minutes with this potential client for audience ninja and music aid music record label in the States, who have two artists that they want to promote and it looks like. Hopefully, I shall be, along with my nascent agency audience ninja shall be doing that work for them so that's very exciting got another call with him on Saturday, I think, to discuss today we discussed the web build and all of that side of things on Saturday, we'll discuss advertising and that side of things which two very separate things are obviously very linked. So fingers crossed that that comes through. It reminds me that I really need to pull my finger out and start bringing on board. The team for audience ninja because audience ninja is a marketing agency, whose clients at first, will be similar my wife and I, as other projects. So, from the UK open mic, which obviously isn't running because of the COVID at the moment but nonetheless, it was the biggest open mic company in the UK, not that hard to do, but it sounds nice. Prior to coronavirus, and hopefully we'll get straight back there as soon as we're legally allowed to provide the mics in pubs again. But also, world schooling hub, which is a whole suite of tools and things for the global world schooling and homeschooling community. It's, it's a market where there isn't really any plain clear leader because there isn't really anybody who's really making it a business. There are a couple of people I noticed in the last six months we're starting to try and launch businesses in the space. So hopefully we kind of collaborate or won't be too competitive, but we're very confident that we've got some really good ideas some cool products that we've already built a couple of them. And, you know, we want to get somebody on board who can help with that side of things, and also main creative projects in terms of music and writing and whatnot. So we want to bring on board team have them in audience ninja working on these projects, and then with audience ninja start working with external clients wasn't expecting to work with external clients for a while but looks like we'll be doing that sooner hopef
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Welcome champion to Episode 38 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. And I'm excited today. I'm excited because real geeky stuff, total geeky stuff. So I ordered a couple of things on Amazon a little week or two ago and they both came through today and I just love it when things that you get work, and a really cool, so I just got a fire stick, which if you don't know is from Amazon, And it allows you to plug, basically, a little dongle in the back of a TV, so that you can get the apps. So that basically turn TV into a Smart TV and you can get Netflix and Amazon Prime and stuff like that. And it is exciting. When you're in a house where the TVs are quite old there's definitely no smart TVs, and you know we watch stuff occasionally on our phones and stuff like that but they haven't watched a film on TV and, you know, on a TV screen in. Since September last year August last year, when we were in our flat in London. So now that we've got that. What it means is we can steal the TV from the lounge plug that in, put it at the end of our bed in our bedroom and Simona and I can lie in bed and actually watch a film, which is going to be such a treat. So that's one little bit of geekery which I thoroughly liked the second was a surprise that I bought for sumana, though for us. And, and I highly recommend it to all and sundry. We will take photos on our phones. And if you've got an Android phone, the chances are, even if you got an Apple phone chances are that you have them uploaded automatically to Google Photos. So, we have thousands upon thousands of photos on Google Photos, and what happens, they're up there you occasionally go and have a look at a few of them but basically they're kind of. They're like dusted you know you don't you don't look at them again or not for every so often. And years ago we had one of those digital photo frames in our flat which we absolutely loved. But the problem was you had to faff with SD cards to get the photos on the SD cards but then they're always too big for the SD cards in the wrong format and then you had to deliver it in another. And of course, once you plug in an SD card it goes through the photos are on there but it doesn't go through any new ones and etc. So I thought there must be a photo frame digital photo frame that syncs with Google Photos wirelessly. and it turns out, Google makes one called the Google nest hub, not to be confused with the nest hub Maxi, which is I think does video call your stuff. But basically, it's like a touchscreen, Google Assistant device that can control your Google Home stuff so if you have Google Home stuff like you know lights and TV and stuff you can turn them on and off and whatever with the, with this little, it's basically like a tablet, but fixed to a standard, a small seven inch tablet or something like that. And it can do Google Assistant stuff you can talk to it it's got this enough speaker on it you can have it play music and I think you can watch YouTube videos on it and stuff and all well and good, but I bought it because it had this promise that it would sync with whatever albums you wish in Google Photos, and it arrived today, and it works and it works really really well, and it's wonderful to have it on my desk. So at the moment, my desk, I have my laptop, which is the screen on my left, then I have a monitor in the middle of my desk which is quite a bit bigger, and runs off the laptop so I have two screens and now I've got a little Google nest hub or whatever it's called. On the right, so I've got three screens, and it just cycles through, and whatever albums you choose. And that in itself is just wonderful because straight away already today you know we've been stopped and look to some photos as they're going through garage you remember they assaulted you remember that and so I was laughing so I said to Simona that, you know, the real marketing of it is not, it displays photos that the real marketing is, you know, you get to relive memor
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Welcome to Episode 37 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. What a view what a nest. It is Sunday and I had been nested at home all day ensconced in two projects project number one to surprise you, is a project called grip the sky experience. And I will surprise you again. I have nearly ironed everything out for, it's so close now it's so close. I have the intro video to do in the outro video to do. And then I need to configure the store, just tweak a couple of bits and make sure that all of the checkout flow and all of that is working. Other than that, it's done, I've, I've done. I don't wanna give too much away because I want it to be fun and a surprise. But I've configured a whole bunch of stuff used a few extra tools, yada yada yada and so yes, it's going to be ready this week coming hundred percent hundred percent in the next few days, it'll be ready. The other thing I did was work on audience ninja which is my new marketing agency. And there's. It was on the agenda actually for getting it sorted, more or less, after I finished building the grip the sky experience because the next stage is marketing it, and the plan, my wife and I had was for, we've got so many ideas and in order to grow and get those ideas to completion we really need to put team in place. And rather than just hiring people to do freelance work for us on our various different projects. We decided that we'd hire people to join audience ninja as an agency, and then use audience ninja as the agency that does our projects, which is tantamount to the same thing on the beginning, but in the long term. Hopefully it means we build a really good team and expertise within audience ninja that we can then help other clients external clients with, and the grip the sky experience is a marketing experiment, probably more than anything else that may serve as a blue plate blue plate, a blueprint or a template whichever you want to say, for my future music releases, but also for other musicians amaze or. Coincidentally, as luck would have it last week I was put in touch with a small record label in the US who have a couple of artists they want to promote and they want me to help do their marketing, and it's literally like they were built, or the the brief is almost perfect for audience ninja so I've brought that forward a little bit because I said I'd get back to them with a proposal and an idea. I have just started reading. This is marketing by Seth Godin, which came out a couple of years ago. And there is a connection here. And as I was expecting. I don't know how far through I am probably about 15% or something like that. 10 15%, and as expected. It's kind of classic golden in the sense of. It sounds really good because he works very much on the top top level, but he doesn't go much into too much into strategy and pretty much not at all into tactics so it's, it gets your mind thinking but actually, you've got to do all the work kind of thing off the back of it, which is fine you know it's very principle centric, but it does remind me of you know the basics. The so far I mean I'm only shortly into the book but you know the basics of marketing and the fact that you know you're building stuff or you're trying to help other people solve a problem. And that's so far the key takeaway from the book is that marketing exists to change, you know, change the world by by helping people to get or achieve what they want. Effectively, and so it's very audience centric, it's very much about, you know, be remarkable in the sense of delighting the audience and what have you. So how does this actually equate to what I'm doing with audience ninja. Well, in the past I've done web design for clients, and I've built clients websites and in the past I've done consulting sessions with clients, particularly music clients on their marketing. And so it'd be very easy to just go okay well the cost of doing a website for this new client is x to pick a figure out the air. What I think my tim
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Welcome kinda person to Episode 36, I believe of my podcast, the view from the crow's nest. I hope things are all rocking and rolling with you. Well, guess what I've been doing today. You're right. I've been working on the grip this guy experience, because that's all I've been doing for the past 700 years, every single day, it seems. But news, I nearly did. Like really, really nearly finished it. I have the intro video to do the outro video to do and a last bit of configuring of the store to make it a bit smoother because at the moment, it's not quite working correctly. And then the last thing is just to make sure everything is actually functioning, the tracking and all of these things and I've got an Easter egg hunt in there as well and I need to make sure that that is all labelled up correctly, etc. But basically it's It's really nearly now I've overcome pretty much all the technical hurdles. So most definitely next week, it will be ready for people to go through. And first it'll be released to my wife, she'll be the first person because he'll be banging on about it for so long that I think it's fair. And then after that, it will go through to the people who are members of the lab. And then after that, my private member's club if you don't know what that is, and, and after that, and it will start getting released bit by bit to everybody on my mailing list. So if you're on my mailing list, then you will be seeing it in a fairly short while and after all of that, then it will get released to the general public. So yeah, we're nearly we're nearly there, which is, oh, it's gonna be nice when it's done here really is. Literally, that's all I did today. worked pretty, pretty hard on that, but I'm pleased with how it's going. I'm pleased with how it's looking. So so that's good. After I finished that product, product Project, the next project, we'll be looking at the marketing. And it's fortuitous timing, because I'll be looking at the marketing for that, but also the marketing, and generally putting together my marketing agency audience Ninja, because it seems that well, I need to send a proposal tomorrow to a potential client. But it looks like we might be moving on with our first client. Yeah, very shortly next week, or certainly soon after that. So ideal time to be getting team together, looking at marketing, etc. So that's really cool. And on that note, I've been reading. I've been trying to find books about basically getting stuff done. So you've got ideas, that's kind of easy, you know, but ideas aren't worth anything if you don't do stuff with them. And as I've mentioned many times before, one of the areas I'd like to improve on is my ability to get stuff out there to get stuff done. And I think team is a massive part of that. Getting a team on board and By the time available, but also structure and methods of working and focus, discipline. I mean, I'm very disciplined but maybe lacking a bit of structure or had been the model. So I've been working on that, and I've been reading a few books on it. I read. I'm currently reading a book by I think Scott Belsky called Making ideas happen. And I've got to say, I'm 34% of the way into the book. And pretty much the only thing he said is make action steps. Now, I'm sure he said a few more things than that. But if that's all I can really remember after 34% of the way through a book, then I think that the book is fairly light on real meat and content. And so I'm going to do something which I did with the book before that, which I believe was Pamela Slim's body of work, which I was hoping would give me a you know, a kind of insight See the what ties the thread between all the various different things that I've done over my life and various different interests and again, 39% of the way into that book, and I've had to park it, which I really hate doing. But when there's basically nothing coming at you for the first third of the book, you got to think Well, there's probably not going to
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Welcome to Episode 35 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. And right now the view from the crow's nest is me and my back in bed. Absolutely knackered at 10pm. So today, I was tired when I woke up, which isn't a new thing but I was quite tired. And then I had my personal training session this morning and I think it was the fifth session. And today was the first day that definitely can be categorised as leg day, and I haven't recovered the whole day. My legs feel like lead weights, the doms hasn't set in yet I imagine that will come tomorrow the next day. And I imagine a click burglary and. In short, I was so destroyed by it, so tired that I was like, you know what I'm gonna take a day off. we had planned to go and visit the castle in Ischia the castle out of the way is a, which is the kind of main tourism tourist attraction of su or certainly the main thing it's kind of famous for. If you ever seen the film The Talented Mr. Ripley. There's a 1950s beach scene and a lot of it takes place on an island and they filmed it on a scale, because, basically it still looks like 1950 here, and the castle features in one night or at least in the backdrop. However, Simona was also absolutely knackered because she woke up at 4am and then Leonardo was up at 5am, and that was that. And so, as the day wore on, neither of us really could be bothered to do very much at all. And we were laughing because what we wanted to do is just kind of lie down and maybe sit down watch TV or something, which we didn't do. But we were laughing because we realised that that's what a lot of people kind of do in general at least once a week on their TV on their TV on their weekend you know they have a day off, they relax they chill they don't do anything they don't put pressure on themselves to do anything. And we're so used to constantly putting pressure upon ourselves to work or do stuff with the kids for the home education or did an editor that it's really rare that we give ourselves permission to actually just chill. So today was just literally doing nothing. My mind was blank I can be bothered to think about work particularly, and the, we did, I did put some shelves, the shelving unit together bookcase for me now that arrived today off for the kids room, and then proceeded to tidy the kid's room. And then this evening we had promised Mina that we would have a family film on a Friday, but it got so late. But we had promised and we tied it up the room and got the new shelves and everything so we did the TV and from the lounge. And we started watching Back to the Future, and we didn't start watching till like 930. And I had actually told me the story of Back to the Future maybe a year ago maybe a bit more. Literally kind of remembering it and then making it up as if it was, you know, Part A story and multiple parts I just kind of take a scene or two. And that would be the nighttime story and she loved it. And since then she's been asking for more stories about Marty McFly and Doug Brown. And I said to eventually we you know it's actually a film I, I didn't make up the story. So I want to see the film. So tonight we started watching it, and we only watched half an hour just got to 10 o'clock, super late. We're knackered and Tyler, didn't sleep. Although Leonardo had a two hour nap about four o'clock this afternoon, which he doesn't normally do and now he's fresh as a daisy and, but Mina loved it loved the film and also Leonardo are three years old. She's seven he's three, and he really related to so that makes me happy because I believe that the future is and kind of you can put the trilogy in as one film almost is the best film ever made honestly think it's a perfect film. Everything about it is just came together so perfectly. And it starts with and if you've heard my podcast before you know I'm quite a stickler for plot, and the screenwriter, taking the time to iron out plot holes, and to pepper, the right details in and just make everything as tight
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Good hellos and welcome to Episode 34 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. And I bid you a very good morning a very good afternoon, evening night wherever you are, wherever you are in the world, and listening to this. If you're about on Twitter, do come over and say hello at Romeo crow would love to hear from you. Any questions, any comments. Any ideas anything you want me to cover would always be very very welcome. So, I almost don't want to mention the grip the Skype experience because I feel like, you know, I've beaten that horse too much as a reason for not getting on with other things, but nonetheless I will do so. I'm so close to finishing it. Oh, I'm so close, and to echo what I said yesterday, the irony of ironies is that the more I tweak and the more I work more hours it takes me to make something function more slightly more almost invisibly, the less the user will actually notice it. So, you know, you can work so much on something to make it right, quote unquote, and the net result is that the other person who's using it won't notice, whereas if you don't work so much on something and it's not so good, then the end user will notice it will feel clunky or it won't work properly or whatnot. And they'll think it's a bit rubbish. So, I just think that's one of the ironies of life that you put the time into make something good so that people don't notice you put the time in to make it good, but there we are. Today I was working out shipping options which is more confusing and more annoying and challenging than, then you would expect, because I have multiple products and multiple variations of those products and they go into multiple countries, and the way that my. The way that it's set up so I'm talking about merchandise stuff it's all print on demand. And it depends what items are getting shipped if there's more than one if there's blah blah blah. So that was a bit of a headache, but I've managed to sort that I'm sure you'll be very happy to know. And so now, just got a few more bits to finish and then I can still have to add it, add the extra content, the intro and outro videos. Predominantly, but it's closing in is closing in and that's going to be a nice feeling when that's done for sure. On a semi related note, and I've talked in the last little while about my, my digital marketing agency audience ninja and then I'm very very very soft launching it as in. I'm now taking it a bit more seriously as an agency I'm going to be looking for getting in some building a team for it. And the idea is that the audience ninja agency will work across my wife and I's projects. So, my own art Romeo crow stuff, but also world schooling hub. Also my other business UK PR Mike and other projects that we've got in the pipeline, and also to have a team working through audience ninja doing those kinds of things. And then the ability to then help other people, other businesses and other artists through audience ninja as an agency in its own right, and funny how the world works because I had an email just over a week ago from a guy that I've done some work with a lovely guy who wanted to put me in touch with a girl woman that he knows who runs a small record label and has a couple of artists she wants to promote. And so I spoke to her today and she's very, very keen and very, very keen to work with me, which is fantastic. So, I think it's, yeah, it's funny, just in the time that I'm ready to kind of take this on and move this forward. A client comes in, which is, which is potentially great so it's also particularly good because once I finished the grip the sky experience build. I'll be focusing on the marketing plan for it and which I have quite a few ideas but quite an idea of what I'm going to do but I haven't solidified into a proper plan and lined up all the tools and blah blah blah. So this gives me a perfect excuse. And so, and also the particular time I've spent in rebuilding or building the sky experience has given me even mor
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Welcome, fine, folks, Episode 33 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. Part One, do that again. And Firstly, thank you to all you wonderful champions because I just hit the hundred plays or downloads or views or whatever the status of this podcast on the actual podcast as it goes, it also gets put into YouTube everyday as well automatically the podcast get turned into little videos without any actual video and sent to YouTube. And on YouTube, there have been quite a number of years, I think a bit more than 100. So that's also cool. So thank you to everybody who's been listening to any of my episodes, even if you've only listened once, I appreciate it. Thank you for spending time with me. And I really appreciate it. It's awesome. Today Today I'm feeling as you can tell, I'm feeling pretty buoyant. I'm normally pretty buoyant but a few day about a week ago. I was feeling pretty blue. And so for a few days, I was feeling a bit low. And then I focused to get myself out of it I was focusing on organising myself better and taking small action and basically trying to feel like I'm in control of things again. And I think that's one of the key components to when you feel low. In fact, I think, clinical depression, I could be completely wrong here. So the other thing, but I think clinical depression is also a feeling of hopelessness, a feeling of not being in control effectively, of not being able to do anything or so it kind of therefore stands to reason polar opposite of that might be a positive thing. And I feel it is and I think it's often overlooked. So I've been trying to get back in, in control, doing simple things like organising photos that we have, you know, 12 years of photos, thousands of thousands of photos, and they're all on Google Photos, which is great, but they're also on backup drives, external backup drives that have been backed up three or four times and have duplicates all over and then internal drives on the computer and then Internal drives on the other computer, and then cloud storage and blah, blah, blah. And so I've been on a bit of a mission to organise all my filing system, my digital filing system to D, dupe everything, deduplicate everything, put everything into the one, place one folders that are on cloud storage, and then backup that cloud storage onto an external hard drive. So that way, it's just simple cloud storage, external hard drive job done. And then as you know, with your phones, you take photos and videos that get uploaded to Google, which is great. But I always like to backup the originals to the computer as well, because the uploads to Google aren't in original quality number one, and number two, I think it's always good to have your own backup of files that are really critical. And for me, photos of the family growing up are really critical. So I definitely don't want to I don't know be locked out my Google account and all of a sudden lose, you know, all those photos. And so just working on making sure that my phone is automatically backing them up to a another cloud storage drive. In blah, blah, if I've lost you if you're bored now, I'm sorry. And you're totally right, I'm gonna move off that subject of cloud storage and backups. But it's just a way of saying, Yes, I'm sort of getting back on top of things. inclusive of the fiendishly annoying grip, the sky experience, which is my EP grip, the sky, put into an experience into a microsite. So you can visit grip the sky.com, you can go through it yet, you can put your email address there, if you wish to be notified when it's live. When it's live, I will say on the podcast and on social media, and you can go and view it, you won't need an email address to view it, just go ahead and enjoy it. And I've managed to sort out a technical problem, which was just slowing things down. I found a solution not quite as good as the first but in some ways, but it works, which is the main thing. There's still one more technical problem. And then when
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Welcome to Episode 32 of my podcast interview from the crow's nest. I am Romeo Crow and I welcome you and I thank you for listening and joining me, if you're on Twitter. Do come over and say hello at Romeo Crow, because I love to hear from you. And if you got any questions or anything like that, then please drop them there. Today's episode, a little bit of a breakthrough. If you've been listening for the last. Seems like my entire life but it's probably only last few weeks. I've been a bottleneck to by the grip the sky experience which is the EP music EP release that I'm working on, and I'm trying to do something new that I've not seen before and I've certainly not done before. And it's been just dragging on and on and it's hold everything up. And there were two technical problems which I won't bore you with, but one of them has to do with a third party plugin I'm using on the website. And I've been, I've spent countless hours trying to configure it trying to make it work it's not working, the code doesn't work very well, blah, blah, blah. I've got the developers of the plugin. They're looking at it, they're giving suggestions is just not working. And then, tonight, I remembered that I had bought a another piece of software that does something pretty similar pretty much the same I mean it is a bit different, it's not quite as good in some ways, a bit better in other ways but pretty much the same. So I thought, I bought that about two weeks ago, three weeks ago exactly in case this thing didn't work out so I thought let me, let me try that. And I'm not joking within three minutes I had it working on my website is brand new thing three minutes of setting it up working out how it works, putting it on my website and making it work. So it just goes to show the lesson to be learned from that is, if one tool is really causing problems and not working, it's probably worth using a different tool, basically. And as much as I wanted the other one to work it didn't work and I wasted countless hours, days trying to configure it, and it doesn't work. So, the Yeah, the new tools there, and I just did a little test with it just to see if it works, it does so now I need to spend an extra like five minutes if that configuring it properly. But basically, it's there and it's ready to rock and roll so that's really cool that leaves one technical problem hindering the sight, which I'm hoping will be sorted tomorrow. And a couple of bits of content sought out, and it will be ready so I am going to finish it this week I am, I am I am and what I also did today is because, as I say that's been bottlenecking everything. And that is for Romeo crow for my, you know my grip the sky experience, but also have other projects in the pipeline, and in the fire. One of them is called World schooling hub. So, if you don't already know my wife and I are my family we are what are classed as World schoolers so that basically means we homeschool our kids, whilst travelling. Obviously, coronavirus has put paid to the travelling part of that for a bunch of months, but that doesn't mean that that's not how we normally proceeding. And there is a big world schooling community as you can imagine all over the world because it's a big place. But one of the main problems that we found straight away when we were trying to find our way is that you want to have other homeschooling and world schooling families to meet up with, because you want company you want your kids to meet other kids, etc. And it's obviously lovely to meet people as you travel. The problem is is quite difficult to find people because there's no central kind of place. So early this year I built a website that enables you to search for World schoolers on an interactive map. So imagine Google Maps with pins, but instead of pins being places pins are people, and the initial interest in the project from the world schooling community was really, really positive, which is great. And I implemented it then the lockdow
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Welcome to Episode 31 of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest, which at the moment just feels like a bit of a journal, more than anything else because I'm almost living Groundhog Day. And today, would have been a day of working on grip the sky, but HSBC a bank in the UK froze my account without telling me, and that caused all sorts of problems and I have spent an hour and a half on the phone to them and blah blah blah and between that and other things, meant that I had about half an hour to work on grip this guy experience, and I say one that thing done if you've listened to my podcast at all in the last 30 days you'll know that that is just, it's a bottleneck that's stopping everything else from progressing. But I did in that half an hour I did manage to make some progress, which is very good. So I'm, I'm pretty close now to actually sorting out all the technical issues. And once I finished that I've got tiny bit more content to add, and then be ready so any any day now, any day I'll be done. And so yeah, that's, that's that had my third personal training session this morning, and he upped the ante. It was a lot of press up based exercises. Probably about 45 minutes of doing press up based exercises. But it felt good. It felt good I was, you know, I was able to get through them. I didn't pass out I didn't feel like I was gonna pass out so that's encouraging. And it's funny that you know I'm working towards doing, you know, eventually, doing handstands and handstand push ups and you know all these things and by the time I get to them I'm 39 now so by the time I get to them I'll be in my 40s, and it will be. It'll be quite an achievement for myself and pat on the back I think if and when I get to that point that you know only took it up in my 40s more or less so just shows you can start anything at any time if you, you know if you put your mind to it. Of course, I haven't finished it in terms of I haven't done those handstand push ups. So let's see if I get to them first and then I can be happy with myself actually I'm happy with myself now anyway because I'm on the path to getting more healthy. That's it, that's me done, it's, it's a short and sweet one. Once again, even shorter than yesterday I got nothing to share I started a new book, I started a new book, I was reading Pamela Slim's body of work, I've got about a third of the way through it and I think I'm gonna have to put it to the side for a bit because it's just boring frankly not telling me anything new. But I have just started reading, making ideas happen by somebody who I can't see on my Kindle doesn't really help does it Scott Belsky Scott Belsky. The idea being that it is very easy, more or less to come by in whatever fashion, but the difficulty is in making them happen, which is definitely my, you know, one of my weaknesses over the years, and something that I'm really trying to work on different you know getting different ideas in excuse the pun. So the irony, so that I can start bringing things through to completion including this damn grip the sky experience. But, yes, so basically I can start producing a lot more, and ideally start getting some of these ideas out into the world, because I have so many but they're all sat there. So, I am 17% of the way into this book, and I think if I remember correctly, he breaks it down into three things. The first one is, you need to be organised and structured. Things are action steps and things like that. The next one is something about community I haven't gotten to it yet. And the next the third part is leadership so I think he said he interviewed and followed with his company and whatnot thousands of creative people successful Creative People and found that these are the three commonalities organisation community, and leadership, not sure exactly in what ways I will report back when I have more information, but that's, that's where he's at. That's where I'm at. So, let's see. Outside of that, I'm still ploughing th
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Welcome to my 30th episode of The view from the crow's nest and yesterday's was short, this could be even shorter. I've finally worked out a way to make the episodes shorter each day it's very simple. I just don't do anything during the day. And then I got nothing to say. So, today was a day off. I, we had some drinks with a video call with friends last night went to bed quite late. I was quite drunk. Then I remembered to do my podcast so yesterday's was a quick drunken ramble for five minutes. And today, as bit hung over I was tired, but moreover, I thought you know I've been so stuck in this Groundhog Day of grip the sky experience that I thought it'd be good to take a day off. And just Mung went out for a walk in the afternoon, it was a shortish walk but the kids to get ice cream. Very impressed and proud of myself and my lovely lady wife Simona because we didn't get ice cream despite how tasty it is because we're both committed. Without you personal trainer to get ourselves in shape and keeping our diet. Good, which means also this week because it's Sunday means I've done a whole week of not eating anything bad no chocolate no bread no cheese. None of the things I love. So, pat on the back edge of the earth, it's a bit of an achievement. And that's pretty much it for the day tomorrow I will throw myself back into the grip the sky experience I will get it finished in, you know, it's happening now I'm done with it. It's going to be finished this week. It's already taken about 700 years or something like that. And I will be sharing it with people, and then working on the marketing plan and sharing with lots more people is the hope. Outside of that, the pumps back open in the UK, but UK open mic mic, the mic company and the source of main source of income is not operating because we're not allowed to do live music in venues. So that's a bit of a, an annoyance. I think in the next week or two I really need to put some extra thought basically once I've launched grip the sky experience and turned on the marketing and you know let that run for a bit and then make changes. I'll then turn my attention to other projects that can stop bringing in revenue because Leonardo keeps complaining that it's rubbish here, it's rubbish it's rubbish it's rubbish. And, unfortunately, all our travel plans were completely destroyed by coronavirus both because of the virus stopping us travel, and because we've got no income. So that's also stopped us travelling. So, I will be working on projects and ideas to get that moving because we do need to get some income, and we do need to, you know, get our cells moving it'll be nice to travel again and take day trips and move about and do stuff. So, that's me that's my thoughts, that's everything. I hope that you're well whoever you are, wherever you are and if you are on Twitter then come and say hello at Romeo crow. I would love to speak to check it out. That's why I'm a songwriter because I can just ride. Take care, y'all. Bye.
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Welcome to Episode 29 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest and this is going to be the shortest episode ever because it is still frickin Groundhog Day after the last what seems like all my life but it's probably only about six to eight weeks of working on the grip the sky experience. Something I realised in the last few days that I haven't actually specifically mentioned as to why this is taking so long is because there's three parts to the grip the sky experience. The first part is collating all the assets, which means recording the songs, getting the visuals ready, etc etc. The second part is designing all of those and putting them into a cohesive effectively a website into a cohesive system where you can enjoy it. And the third part of all of this is marketing so making sure that people actually know that it exists and getting out there to people. So the first part is kind of the fun part, hey this is creative I've made songs and it's all fun, etc. The second part which is the part I'm in now is putting it into a website is is the thing that is just killing me because it's taking far too long. And the third part is the marketing part which will be coming up. After this, and the whole thing is, as a user, you click a link, and the link takes you through to what you expect it to take you through to and you have the experience anything yet. That's fine, you probably don't even think anything, it just takes you through today experience and that's what was expected, but what you may not understand is as a web designer, working in the back end that click might be eight hours of work to make it function like you expected to function. So the worst is, the more time I put into this the more time that it is taking me to do this. Ironically, the user will probably notice less because it means that it works exactly as they expect it to it works in the most fluid and the most effective and efficient way. So I've just spent so long on this and no one's even going to realise it I swear, no one's ever gonna realise it, because all it needs to do is do what it needs to do. And as soon as it does what it needs to do for the user. You won't even think about what's happening between. So I'm still working on this damn thing which is taking so long, I love it, I want it out there when you to enjoy it. My goodness I'm ready for it to finish. Outside of that, man, nothing else has chatted with me today about trying to find as I was talking about yesterday trying to find stuff that is more interesting for me and her that we can do together so that when I'm looking after the kids. It's not just me being bored or them being bored, but actually something that we find a middle ground because I want to spend more time with them I want to do more stuff with them. But I need to be engaged with it. Just like any human, just like Mina does just like Leonardo does need to be more engaged with it and then in that way. We will have more fun we will learn, etc. So I had a chat today and we came up with a few ideas so hopefully we'll find a way of hitting a common ground so we'll see in the week ahead, had no fallout from my personal training session yesterday, doesn't even feel like a good one. Whereas, I'm still feeling in my triceps, the pain from Monday's session. So I know that Monday session was definitely more intense, which was the first session so my next one should be monday so I'm looking forward to that I imagine this Monday coming is going to put me through my paces and probably failure on Tuesday or Wednesday. Outside of that, had a social evening this evening or video call with friends. And suddenly that occurred to me. After all these years of the video cause accompli that only just occurred to me, but I'm going to share it with you in case you haven't thought of it and it might help you when you do video causes like tennis. You have to do your, your Say what you want to say and then wait for the other person to respond and say it back. A
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Welcome to Episode 28 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest and given how the last few days and week has gone. I think I'm going to rename it. The grip the sky experience. Groundhog Day experience thing again and again. Basically, I've got nothing really to report my day has been spent my working hours was spent on the grip the guy grip the sky experience, still just catch it, it's still redoing work that I lost when I transferred it over in the back end from one structure to another structure. Few days ago. The long the short of it is, it's currently. It was built as a separate effectively a separate website or a funnel to my Romeo crow website. But then what I wanted to do is have the lab membership from my Romeo crow website on the grip the sky experience. But to do that, it, the funnel had to be put under the Romeo crow website. So, kinda like structured file structure basically but what they didn't tell me is when I moved it, I would lose a lot of stuff that I did in the back end all the images that uploaded and pop ups that I'd set up etc etc, not the end of the world but it's taken me about three days to redo all of that work and get it ready so it's our gosh it's so close, it's so close. Now I've re. I've got a technical problem with another pop up which I solved a couple of weeks ago, but now I have moved it over it's not working again so I wanted the developer about that. Just to be so simple, it'll be so nice. It was so simple. And then I'd have it done. Anyhow, that is basically been my day just nothing to report really no insights no ideas no creative meanderings and wanderings of the mind just simply slugging away, building this website and trying to get it done so I can move on with my life and talk to you about new things, because I'm doing new things which will be awesome. So that's it, that's all I got for you today, super short super sweet. I hope that you are super well, wherever you are in this super world, and hopefully tomorrow I'll have something different to tell you, or they'll pretty much probably just be the same or I did have my second personal trainer session today it was meant to be 830 this morning, and 832 I woke up look to my phone was left Baka. So we rescheduled it for the evening, which was very nice of him to allow me to do that. And I didn't pass out this So why didn't pass out last time but I had to lie down and I was sweating profusely and feeling very very lightheaded. This time around, it was absolutely fine. But as he said it was quite a low intensity workout. So, I imagined it will get harder as I get fitter, but it was good. I feel good a few new exercises for me. And it's nice to be on a, you know, be on a programme towards something. So the personal trainer. He works bespoke Lee with the client he sees where they're at, he designs or uses exercises specifically for them and for their goals, but his expertise is callisthenics. So we're working towards doing callisthenics which is bodyweight exercises basically the planche the human flag, the handstand press ups with claps, he can do so literally enhanced and do a press up was controlling your whole body, and then shoot up clap your hands and land in the hands down again. I think I'm a little way away from that. But it's nice to have a dream, it's good to have a go. So that's all I got for you. Take care of yourselves if you're on Twitter. Don't talk to me My name is Romeo Crow and you will find me at Romeo crow. That's all I got. Mic drop speak to you later. Bye.
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Welcome you champion to Episode 27 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. And it's almost like it's a repeat of the last few days or at least the last few weeks I feel like I'm in Groundhog Day. All I've done today pretty much is just work on the grip the sky experience. Long story short, I discovered that or not discovered I re experienced that wonderfully painfully annoying sensation that often happens, particularly when it comes to web development work, whereby. You've spent hours and hours days and days doing some work, only to discover that you needed to scrap it, and it was redundant because you had to change something which rendered it basically obsolete or different. So today, was one of those occasions, which was a bit frustrating. Literally, days, days are spent on certain functionality and certain design, and that's had to be thrown out, which is a bit frustrating. The flip side is that making changes to this particular part of the grip the sky experience is now much more streamlined and much easier and future changes won't require too much work as much work, and that is useful and important considering the idea behind the grip the sky experience is that it will serve as a template. Both my own future releases and for other artists as well. So I can be more streamlined with making changes and amendments and make it. Simplify in the backend, then obviously that's good, in the long run and probably will save me time, and the, possibly more important, other side effect or the main reason for doing it was the experience for the user is cleaner, better bit easier, a bit more fun. So I was hoping to have more or less finished it today. But that has been delayed, so I'm tentatively gonna say tomorrow but realistically, knowing how these things go, it's probably gonna be Saturday or even Sunday but I'm determined that it will be finished by the end of this week and next week, I will move on with a new project, although the new project will basically just be a replica of the last only focusing on marketing. So the next project will be focusing on how to get people to listen and enjoy the greatness guy experience and effectively, bring in new fans and, hopefully, turn some of those into strong fans and customers and monetize it and turn it into a profitable product, which is the idea, because if it becomes a profitable product as I mentioned in other podcasts. The idea is if I can make one pound and 10 p from it. And I spend a pound of that on advertising and that brings me back one pound 10 p, then I just put more money into advertising, and it's like a virtuous circle, and you can scale it up. So I know the principles are sound. Let's see if the actualities of it are, if they work. So yeah, that's basically been my focus today. So I feel like a bit of a bit of a stuck record you know just repeating myself. But other than that, feeling good. I've got my next personal training session tomorrow morning. And my triceps are still aching from Monday's first one. So that's gonna be interesting to see how that goes. I still haven't quite recovered. And one of the other things that I want to focus on is, you know, I've been working, I haven't done my done by one then fund. Recently I've just been just focused on getting this thing done and out the window, but the idea was that I would then have more time in the afternoons, and I'd give myself permission to chill a bit more, and also to do more stuff with the kids. And I really am struggling at the moment with we homeschool if you didn't know where we are, what, what are classed as World school as pre pandemic it meant that we were planning on travelling, and we were travelling and homeschooling our kids on the way. Post pandemic. We are my mother in law's, and have been for the last four months in Italy. And so we're, we're not even homeschooling really because proper homeschooling is actually going out and doing stuff meeting other families, etc. We're mostly staying in. And
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Welcome, wonderful person to Episode 26 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. And I'm feeling better than I was yesterday. If you listen to our podcast yesterday. And the last couple of days I was feeling a little bit blue, this will be down. But I am feeling more upbeat today, a lot more upbeat today which is great. And the reason that I would mention it is because if you haven't listened before these podcasts are also a bit of a journal for myself so I can see my thoughts how they change on things see ideas, and also over time recognise patterns. So, I want to make note of these things, because then I might see some patterns that I can help us to improve myself further on. So today, what have I done well it's kind of the same as yesterday which is ironic because yesterday didn't seem to fit the bill today it did. Maybe I had better sleep at night it really didn't have better sleep. I think I had about five and a bit hours sleep so no it wasn't sleep. But I worked on the grip the sky experience exclusively today, put a lot of hours into it, and it's, it's so nearly done. So I had a technical problem yesterday which got solved in the evening that was holding things up. And then, I had another problem, which is that I'm building the grip the sky experience on a platform called sim Valley, and I have my website on that platform, and I'm building this experience as a separate entity. The problem is I wanted to share something from the website onto this entity. And I wasn't able to. And the longer the short of it is I spoke to them and they said oh well what you can actually do is you can effectively place this grip the sky experience in a subfolder, more or less, from your main website, set up brilliant, and then it'll share the stuff. Excellent. So I did that, and I should have asked what were the downsides first, because what I discovered was that I basically lost all of the, it didn't it didn't transfer over images and pop ups and all this kind of a lot of work basically that I had done to make it function as I wanted to was lost in the transfer. And the good news is, I had cunningly made a backup of it. Just before I did the transfer so I was able to look at it and go, Okay, I see what needs doing and long the short of it is, it's a few more hours of work that I'll have to do but nothing is irreplaceable be broken or anything like that. And nothing is lost. So the upshot is it's delayed me by probably another day on where I was at. But I'm so nearly there now Hmm So closing in on it and I cannot wait to share it with you. So if you do want to, you can go to grip the sky.com, and you can drop your email address. If you wish to, and then I will let you know once it's up and running. There's no need to drop your email address once it's up and running, it's free. You won't need to register anything to enjoy it. So, that's put me in a better mood I think I'm feeling like I'm actually getting somewhere and I'll between you, me and the gatepost. I cannot wait to finish this thing and move on with another project and move on with something else, because it's just it's taken too much time it's been probably about six weeks now, I've been working on this. And when you look at it when you enjoy it. It won't seem on your end like it's six weeks of work, but I assure you it really is. So, yeah, I'll be glad when that's done outside of that. Nothing much doing really that was, that was my day. I worked and didn't quite do my dumb by one then fun that I had been doing. Previously, up to a couple of weeks ago that was working really well, and I probably work till about three o'clock. So, I would like to re discover my discipline, on that side of things and you know get this project sorted get it sorted in the morning and finished by lunchtime, so that I can be a bit more relaxed in the afternoons and spend a bit more time with the kids, etc. So that's my plan moving forward hopefully I can get back to that pattern. Still aching very
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Good hellos and welcome to Episode 25 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. If you are about on Twitter. I'd love to hear from you if you've got any questions if you want me to cover anything if you want to give me any feedback if you want me to stop doing something. Come over to Twitter say hello at Romeo crow love to have a chat, why not. Today's episode is gonna be a lot is gonna be today probably fairly short. I mean, I'm still in a bad mood I've been in a really bad mood all day and I can't seem to get out of it in the last couple of days. I think it's because I'm not doing anything, quote unquote, creative, I haven't done anything properly creative for a few weeks now I've been focused on building the grip the Skype experience and helping my brother with his business launch, and neither of those are, you know, artistically creative in terms of music or writing or what have you. And I think that's starting to tell on me. So, I'm making a note of that here in these podcasts. If anything because I'm hoping that over the course of the days the weeks the months, even the years I might start seeing a repeated pattern and a predictable patterns maybe every three weeks I feel like this or every six weeks or what have you. So I'm noting it down more as a note to self. But, yeah, I'm just feeling I'm feeling grumpy. That's it. Just feeling grumpy. workwise, today I did actually manage to spend a fair bit of time on the grip the sky experience. There was a technical bug which has been annoying me for the last week or so I can't seem to clear it it's kind of the last technical hurdle for making it work and it's such a kind of a small thing in and of itself it's just having a pop up that then when you click on it has another pop up the second pop up comes underneath the first pop up, which means you can't do it, which is frustrating. However, I just read an email about 10 minutes ago from some developers and they've managed to fix it. So, actually that's good because that's kind of a bit of a bottleneck. I did build out the rest of the pages today. So now I just need to have the intro page, and the exit page so to speak. So there's a little bit more work to do but it's it's nearing completion so feel free to go and register at grip the sky.com, and you won't need to have an email or anything to view it when it's live, but if you want to know exactly when it is live. Then, you know, drop your email there or head over to Twitter, follow me there, and I will certainly be letting people know, once it's ready for your consumption. That's pretty much all I did today. You know just just frustrating I wanna, I think I want to get on with something that's more. Yeah, fun, maybe just more fun and also possibly getting a bit, bit bored of being kind of at home all the time you know obviously we had the lockdown here in a nice gear in Italy, and I didn't leave the house for two months. That's about six weeks ago that that finished now maybe a bit longer, maybe even two months ago. So we've been here for probably about four months and it's still not left the island, it's not very big. There's nothing to do really, other than go to the beach, when it's so hot, nothing to do but there's not much to do. So, yeah, Maybe I just need to get out and have have some days out, you know, away from everything. And lastly, I guess I'm a little winging, though this isn't to wind but this is kind of funny. Yesterday I had my first personal trainer. First personal training session ever, and nearly passed out and this was just him working out, where I was at with my fitness and today I have Dom's delayed onset muscle syndrome I definitely have an ache in parts of my body I didn't realise that I had muscles and. So, I guess that's a good sign. I think that it did something is working next session is on Friday so we'll see how that goes. But I'm looking forward to it. I'm feeling like you know this is gonna be good. He's a specialist in callisthenics. So, yo
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Welcome to Episode 24 of my podcast, the V from the crow's nest. And today's episode is going to be a bit of a review of a few things that I've been reading or watching recently. And as you know, if you've listened to this podcast a few times before. Part of the reason I do it like this is because I want a record of, you know, my daily thoughts and what have you. And I figured that if I make a note of the books that I've read. Then I'll have an index the database I can search through by keyword by the name of the book and find out what I thought about it and indeed if I've read it before, etc. And my thoughts on it which may change over time. So, to get straight down to I just finished the book 1 million followers by Brendan Kane. And I found it pretty good. I think that he. I think that he assumes too much technical detail from the read like I think you need to have a bit of a grasp of general social media marketing and advertising before you'll get the full benefit from it. I think he kind of gives you tactics for most of the social and the main social networks, and some general tactics and ideas, rather than necessarily a plan in terms of, you know, do this week one do this week two, etc. So it's more of a not disjointed but a collection of different chapters here's one on YouTube here's one on Snapchat here's one on Instagram, etc. But, you know, it goes down to a bit of a nutshell, you can kind of compress it into the idea of to grow rapidly, you need great content. You have to grow rapidly to grow, followers rapidly or your audience rapidly you need great content, you need people to want to share it. You probably want to pay for ads in order to boost the number of people who are seeing the various posts that you're doing. And you want to leverage influencers or people who have a larger audience, and this is general business principle you know joint ventures, or the like. So pretty much that's what you can condense it down to. There is some value though for individual tactics so if you're interested in social media marketing then should probably check it out. And then after I finished that I just started reading body of work by tammana, Pamela slim. And the reason for reading this I wanted to find a book, and this is part of my new kind of approach to books I read quite a lot. And oftentimes, I'll read something which makes total sense and seems really cool, but actually is not of massive practical use to me in that moment because I'm not necessarily working on whatever the subject the book is covering so now it's taken me enough years to realise this but now I'm focused on reading books that solve a current problem that I've got or I'm about to tackle. And that might involve me doing a Google search or an Amazon search to find the best book in that category etc so that's what's led me on to body of work by Pamela slim and the concept of it, is that one of the things that often, you're told when you're building particularly again social media posts and audiences and what have you, but generally in business is to find your kind of authentic self to find your story to find the mountain of value that you're sitting on the thread that weaves through what you've done, so that you can start presenting yourself as a, you know, as an expert in that particular niche, which only you are in because only you have led your life, but it's kind of slightly like focus on the one thing you know, find your one thing niche, and I've always found it a bit challenging because I have so many different kind of outlets and I don't want to choose between them you know one day I'm a songwriter. Another day I'm an author, another day. I'm a CEO of a business and other day I'm a marketeer. And I love all of these things you know I really do another damn a world schooler and what have you. So, I wanted to see if there was some way of connecting a thread of my story, so that I could understand that kind of path. And what makes me tick. Even more, and
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Welcome to Episode 23 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. Thank you very much for tuning in. Today's episode is going to be quite a relatively short one. I'm gonna start with how I'm feeling right now which I don't usually do so much but hey it's that day. And then I'm going to tell a funny anecdote which will, you know, I think you'll find interesting amusing but also potentially has an interesting twist, who knows. So, I'm feeling pretty low today I gotta say I'm fitting in a bit of bad mood. The last three days I've been working but focused on admin really crappy boring admin tasks. And the previous two weeks to that I got. If you've been listening to the podcast. I've been helping out my brother launched a new business that he just launched, and it wasn't something I wanted to get involved in, but he asked and it's my brother and you know I've got certain skill set in certain areas that I could help him with so I did. And the problem was, it's really been to the detriment of my main focus. Now again, if you've been listening to the podcast you'll know that I have this mantra that I've been kind of building over the last month and it's been working really well which is done by one then fun, meaning I've done all my work by about one o'clock in the afternoon and then I'm having the afternoon. What I say off. I may still work, but also I might take the kids out, I might go, you know, do something relaxing do so. And just took the pressure off myself and it's been working really well, and the focus of my Dumbo one is to focus on one project the most important project that I've got on at the moment that I've deemed the most important and really bring that through to completion. And that project at the moment is grip the sky experience grip the sky is an EP of mine, and I wanted to release it, but I wanted to release it in a way that people hadn't seen before. Do something a bit different do something a bit cool. And so I'm putting together the grip the sky experience. And the problem is having worked on my brother's project and been really kind of drafted into that. It's completely been to the detriment, not only of my own grip the sky experience main focus but in also my Dumbo one in front of your work in the afternoons evenings. And so, I realised that when my my wife pointed this out to me it's very obvious one, but I needed her to point out to me. Previously, but now recognise it. If I haven't worked on something important and felt like I've moved forward with something. Even if I've been really busy and got things done. Then I start to get a bit cranky. After you know a few weeks, especially if I haven't done anything creative, if I haven't written songs written music, worked on a screenplay or a story or done anything kind of from the creative area. And so, I recognise that I'm feeling a bit blue I'm feeling a bit low. And so this week coming. I'm really going to redouble my focus back to my project grip the sky experience which is really nearly finished. There's more I could do with it but I want to get it out there so I will finish it this week I budgeted two weeks for it it's now going to be in four weeks, but you know that's that's where I'm at with it it's very nearly done. In fact, if you go to grip the sky. COMM, you won't see much because it's a holding page but you can fill in your name and email if you wish to be notified as soon as it's live and ready for your enjoyment. So that's going to be my focus tomorrow, or so. I am doing for the first time in my life I have a personal trainer, I'm starting with tomorrow morning. I've always trained in martial arts, principally in the last 10 Plus, his traditional Chinese martial arts. And in the last year I've not really done too much I've been a bit sporadic, but I'm pretty good at kind of training myself when I have time, but I realised I wasn't making time for it and my health isn't where I want it to be I'm in my healthiest fine but I want to be more fit an
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Welcome friend to Episode 22 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. And today's podcast is going to be a double bill, very quickly an idea for something that came this morning and the story behind that. And secondly, something to do with business and a mistake, which I think so many people make with their businesses, even seasoned business people make the same mistake. And it's a real shame because it really cripples so many businesses, and I hope I can help you avoid that mistake potentially if you're in business or if you work in a company and you want to help them avoid that mistake. So the first one, an idea. I had a dream I had a dream last night. And I very often have very vivid dreams, which, oddly enough, usually involve me having to battle creatures or people kind of like zombies or something like that usually they're very violent I don't know why, but in this particular dream. It was, I was going through some very realistic, process it was, I think I'd walked onto an estate or something something like aristocratic estate and just kind of like decided to have a little wander around the house, even though there are people in it and then I got challenged when I got in the house. And the funny thing was in the dream I was remember thinking, hey wait a minute, what's happening here, because there was a bit of a twist which I'll tell you in a second but as I what's happening here we'll make a really good story maybe a good film. And quite often I'll have an idea in my dream. And then, my dreams, and then wake myself up from the dream, so that I can write down the idea. Sometimes it's musical sometimes it's a story. But it's really annoying when I wake myself up because, obviously, I then have to go get my phone turn it on, write it down whatever and then try and get back to sleep it always wakes me up. And for the first time, I think ever. I had one of those dreams or I had a dream. And then I came, I was like hey, this could be a good idea if. Wait a minute. Am I dreaming or is this real no I'm dreaming I'm pretty sure I'm dreaming so I want to remember this and I want to write this down but I don't want to wake up. this is what I was thinking to my dream. So, when I wake up, I'm going to remember this and then write it down. And the first thing when opened my eyes. The first thing I remember, or thought about this morning was this idea. So I was really chuffed with myself with my subconscious for allowing me to carry on sleeping, whilst having this idea, and the idea isn't anything. Amazing. But I think it's pretty interesting it's kind of a funky twist. So, I will give you a I mean it's obviously not developed at all but I'll give you a very quick pitch, it's a boy probably an American probably around about the age of 14 something like that 15 is on a school trip to the UK, and maybe he's on a tour of royal place or an aristocratic house Buckingham Palace, I don't know, something like that. And it's a bit cheeky is a bit rebellious this boy. So he grabs his best mate. And he goes, quick. Let's duck out and they kind of run through a side door where they're not meant to be, you know, going or what have you. And, you know, they run around the palace or the house or whatever it is, and they've been a bit cheeky and then they get stopped by, you know by a butler I don't know someone like that. And here's a little twist the button is kind of like, ah, we didn't expect you back here for another like two months or three months or something like that and the boys like cool. And basically the twist is that the boy is the spitting image of the grandson or the son of the family who lives there or whatever. I'm stretching reality here I know. And basically the boy assumes the identity of this aristocrat who just happens to be on study leave in America. And it's a, you know, it's a comedy it's kind of I'm thinking kinda like Goonies a bit of adventure maybe not as much as Goonies, but very much a Disney, you know, Disney type
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Welcome to Episode 21 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. Thank you very much for tuning in to listen with me on this fine day whichever day it is. This is going to be the shortest episode I've ever done because it's going to be the simplest episode I've ever done. So we're three weeks in I've been doing this every day so a little milestone there on the 21st episode, and it's a even bigger milestone and hence why it's going to be short episode. Today is my 10th wedding anniversary. 10 years ago today. We married and married my wife, on the island of Ischia where she's from, and about a year ago we were thinking oh what should we do for our 10th wedding anniversary we had grand ideas to do big party. That was our plan to have a big party in different places, regionally we're thinking in Eastern Europe somewhere. And then, earlier this year we decided to move to Spain for a few months, south of Spain so we can be in Spain. And then the coronavirus happened. And we were instead just happened to be visiting my mother in law on the island of Ischia, when the lockdown came in and. So, here we are, 10 years later, and I'm back with my mother in law and he were on the island of Ischia. So today, I did no work, I was super tired today actually really really tired and I didn't know work. I, you know, we just had the day off chilled went for a little pimble around the island. My mind was pretty blank as far as ideas and anything business orientated was concerned and inshore just had a very chill day, I think I needed it, and we were laughing because you know, we were looking at pictures if you want to see pictures, by the way, from our wedding I did share some from today, or today on Instagram at Romeo crow. So feel free to go and have a look at that. But it's funny, of course anybody's had children, and if they got married before they had children, you just look back at those pictures and you remember your life then in your life now. And in fact, I haven't shared the picture yet but my life now was my three year old having a tantrum on the floor. And then my seven year old being bored because we were just driving around the island not really doing anything and she was right. The how very different life is when you have kids how wonderful, but certainly not quite the same as when you're just a couple, especially the day you're getting married. and I've got nothing really to say other than it's been the best 10 years of my life and I imagine the next 10 years are going to be even better. You know, I hear a lot of people say oh we've had our ups and downs, I can honestly hand on heart say we've had our ups, and our ups and ups, and even more ups, and it just keeps going up. So, this episode is dedicated to my wonderful, beautiful, amazing, sexy wife. So Simona. This is for you. And hopefully you haven't fallen asleep putting the kids to bed, probably what's happened. Radio guys told you that was a short one. Thank you very much for sticking with me tomorrow we'll be resuming normal service, I'm sure. Have a wonderful morning wonderful afternoon wonderful evening, wonderful night wherever, and wherever you are in the world. I thank you for your time. All the best to do Pip.
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Good hellos and welcome to Episode 20 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and I hit a bit of a milestone two milestones in fact Episode 20. So that's 20 continuous days nearly three weeks of doing this podcast every day. And also, I just crossed my hundredth. Listen, so 108 listens in total actually across the podcast places and also across YouTube because all my podcasts go on YouTube each day. So if you're any of those hundred and eight listens. Thank you very very much I massively appreciate it. And, in fact, It's kind of good to be, in part, the subjects of today's podcast, what I've been thinking about. So in terms of the work that I've been doing recently and I have been focused on my brother's project, which has just launched, and also the grip the sky experience, which you've heard me talking about, if you've heard the podcast previously if you haven't heard the podcast previously, then it's, it's kind of like distracting my monkey brain it's it's halfway between a journal for myself, and something that might be either interesting or valuable for you guys listening, and it can go from me talking about homeschooling or world schooling through to business ideas through to talking about my music or what have you, so it's not always going to be for everybody and not every episode is going to be the same or, you know, on the same subject or have a theme or anything like that so it's kind of in the middle, it's a way for me to yeah get ideas down, because one of the things that I do with the podcast I record it in an app called otter.ai, and that transcribes everything that I'm saying, and makes it very easy for me to be able to search by keyword. So my hope my idea is that as the days go into weeks into months into years. I'll be able to track my thoughts and my progress and my ideas on things. My own interests as much as anybody else's. But of course, if you do find that interesting. That'll be awesome. And hopefully I'll have some tricks and tips for you along the way. So, yeah, not much to report on the work, flex, as it were. Recently, except to say that the grip this guy experience is now fairly nearly finished in mark one so next week, it will be ready to be marketed, and that's the next project for it. Which brings me on a loop back to the beginning mention of the hundred and eight listens and the kind of theme of today's podcast. Today's thoughts. So, knowing that I'm going to be embarking upon a big marketing quest, with the grip the sky experience. This kind of ties into a bigger idea, and that is very often businesses in any shape and I'm classing musicians as I always do, and artists as businesses because at the end of the day if you wish to make a living from your art, then you are a business you must think of it as such. So, so many businesses make the mistake of focusing on product, and not on marketing. And this is probably one of the most common problems with a lot of businesses, people have a great idea or they've got expertise in something and they start trying to sell their expertise and they package it up, and they turn it into a product, and maybe they become it consultants because they used to do that for a company and now they've gone solo through to, you know, anything and everything in between people who open stores physical stores or shops or restaurants, maybe their great chefs or the good cooks. What have you through to musicians. And what happens is people create the products, and then they think, ah, I better do something with that and get it out there to people so they put it out there to people, but generally in a way that's far less involved than it took them to create the actual product in the first place. So, I've talked about the 8020 rule before parados principle, and it applies just as equally to this as it does to pretty much anything in the world. And in this context. A lot of people most, the majority of business owners, put 80 or 90% of their efforts and resources into cre
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Welcome to Episode 19 of my podcast interview from the crow's nest. And in the crow's nest right now it is off 11 in the evening. And frankly I'm super tired, but I wanted to make sure that I didn't miss one of my daily podcasts because it's a habit that I had forming for myself as much as anything else. And I wanted to be true to myself and make sure that I didn't succumb to missing especially when I'm so close to getting to the 20th, and that's gonna be a master. So, today's one's very simple, I again have been working on my brother's start up a slot code at UK and helping out his team, and also working on the grip the sky experience for myself. And I am super happy to say that, though it's not ready. It's certainly getting much closer to ready, so much so that you can now go and visit grip this guy.com, and you'll get greeted with a sign up page because the rest of the website is hidden, because it's not still not ready yet but it's certainly getting there it's very close to being ready for public consumption. So I'm really excited because it's something that I think is gonna be fun it's gonna be interesting it's an experiment for me, because I want to see if this new format of this new idea will resonate with people if it will have people listening and enjoying it. I think it will but. We'll soon find out. And also, it's a pat on the back or it will be a pat on the back for me because it's a project that I wanted to do, and I've seen it through to completion and if you go back over certainly some of the earlier podcasts I did of this new podcast. I was talking about a new system a new idea to enable me to actually complete stuff which is one of my more weaker points I have great ideas and I'm great at starting things, but not so great at Navy finishing them because I get so distracted by other great ideas. So, once I get this project completed I will be really chuffed that also, it shows that my new system that I've adopted, done by one then fund and working on one main project every day. For the first few hours of the day to the detriment of everything else works. So we'll soon find out but I'm closing in on that so right now if you want to go and visit it you can. And once it's live you won't need to enter any email address or anything like that I'll be totally free to go in and look at an enjoy. But at the moment, the landing page for grip the sky.com will ask you for your email address if you wish to and that's only so that I can keep you informed when it does go live outside of that. That's all I've got for you for today really, that's all I've got for me. And, yeah, that's it. That's it, so short is one I think I've ever done coming in on three minutes Wow, I'll let you get back to your day. Thank you very much for listening. Thank you very much for following. If you wish to come and say hello, please do come and see me on twitter at Romeo crow. I would love to hear from you. I'd love to hear who you are what you're up to. What I can help with what I can't help with anything. Take care of yourselves, thank you very much for listening and Toodle Pip.
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Welcome to Episode 18 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. And today is going to be definitely a short episode, because I am very tired. For one, and for two I don't really have that much to share with myself or with you. I spent the entire day like 10 hours straight pretty much beavering away at the computer and working on behalf for for my brother's startup. And then for myself and both both of them were basically the same task which was web development. So for myself for the grip the Skype experience. And for my brother for his business. The interesting couple of interesting things that happen though that's given me some thought is my brother, very and and so my brother's brought on. He's got a business partner for this startup and he's brought in two guys that used to work with him in another business that he sold. And then myself as well plus a developer so as a team of, I guess, six or seven of us, and the others including my brother have been really really impressed and really really pleased with the work that I've done to their website and keep saying how much value it is and blah blah and I really should be, you know, doing that and selling that service and selling those to other businesses to other people. So it was already my plan to launch an agency, and that's definitely going to be coming, and he did give me a very good idea about it though today. So the agency I bought years and years ago, I got the brand audience ninja audience dot ninja. And the idea was to actually create an a, an agency, more focused probably for creatives and musicians. But nonetheless, and I've had that brand kind of like five six years. So that was always my plan with it and I had a logo I designed a bunch of years ago which is kind of like a ninja. And my brother said that is a very good idea. And he said, you know, if you just productize. Some of the services that you've got which is something that, again, I would do anyway and productize effectively, rather than you saying, you know, we'll create a website for you you create a product, give it a name, and that product includes creating a website, but it's just, you know, all brands do it all successful companies do it, they productize anything even if it's a service, they'll still give it a name, give it its own identity, etc. that separates it from what the company does stands on its own feet, and he made a really good point he suggested you know you should offer like yellow belt. Green Belt blue belt and play on the audience ninja idea that you're a ninja and have the dojo like maybe like the training dojo because I was making training videos, as I was. As I was working on the site I was making training videos for the team for my brother's company so that they could take on these tasks, etc. And I thought that was a really great idea so definitely already we're planning on launching audience ninja. And now we're gonna launch audience ninja with, you know, with products that are, you know, yellow belt etc etc so I thought that was very cool. It's very good idea, and it was lovely to get that feedback that you know you're doing something that's really high value for other people. And this ties into something that I've covered a fair few times are mentioned and spoken about on the podcast, which is, if you can provide value to people if you can do something that really helps other people, whether you're doing it for money or not. That's a huge, huge benefit, and you might be sitting on all these skills and all this experience that enables you to give value to people in you might not even realise it because to you. It comes quite natural or you've trained so well in it that you can do it really quickly and easily. But nonetheless, if you can provide value to people, then that is the best way to build a business, you know, rather than trying to sell somebody something that they may or may not want, if you provide great value to them. They're going to be very eager to buy it. So t
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Welcome friend to Episode 17 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. And I am Romeo Crow and I welcome you and thank you for listening in. With me today. Today I'm gonna do a little review of my day. A couple of thoughts that I had. And then I guess some takeaways that I was thinking of off the back of it. Today, I will in fact last few days, I got roped into helping my brother out with his new business. I had actually mentioned this about a week ago and I had said on the podcast that I wouldn't be helping because I had other projects on. And he asked me, and lent a bit of emotional pressure on me, and I relented and said Yes I'd help, but that leads on to the kind of second part, and the third part. So, he has put together a team in fact he sold his business a few years ago, and a couple of guys that used to work with him on that business have come on board for this one, along with his co creator of this business. So there's now kind of team of four of them. And they've got some excellent skills and experience between them so very high level skills and experience, and they've got some external developers working on the website whatnot, but what they lack is some skills and experience with specifically with regards to marketing and digital marketing. And so that was where my brother had asked me to help out and the problem was one his brother so of course I'm going to help him, but to, he's absolutely right. I have certain skills in those areas, and therefore it would make real sense for you know I can help out a lot more quickly than other people can. And this got me to thinking today that all of us have again a unique set of skills a unique set of experiences that have given us some expertise and some knowledge in something. The problem is most of us, most of the time don't realise that, because we either take it for granted or we we've had those skills for so long, or those ideas for so long that for us. They just seem normal, but what we forget is to other people that are so beyond normal they're so highly valuable and something that might take us, you know, 10 minutes, half an hour, an hour could cost somebody else a hell of a lot more than that in terms of both time and investment to learn how to do something again it's that classic case of the plumber comes around, stops the leak in three minutes by turning a screw and invoices bills you for 100 quid and you say well hang on a minute you only have three minutes so he scribbles out the invoice changes it, and he said, Okay, here you go. It's one pound for turning the screw it's 99 pounds for knowing which screw to turn. And you've probably heard me tell that anecdote before, but I love that story because it's so true, all of these years that you've spent the I've spent, we've spent in various different jobs, even if those jobs seem unrelated in our various pursuits or hobbies or interests outside of that in our own businesses if you've started your own business. They may seem unrelated but there's a certain thread through everything that you've done everything that I've done, which might not be so obvious to ourselves, it's like the wood for the trees you know you can't really see it because you're standing on it in fact I heard the anecdote put by Daniel Priestley who I really really like and I suggest you check out if you're interested in entrepreneurship, and he says you know everyone's standing on a mountain of value, the problem is you can't see your own mountain, because it's like when you are climbing a mountain, everything else, you look at is on the horizon. Other peaks are the troughs valleys, etc. You don't realise exactly how high you are or what's underneath you. And again, that's another good analogy because we spend all our time climbing our own mountains not realising and not maybe seeing the path or the thread that links it through etc. So, it's worth taking a time to reflect on your own skill set your own expertise, and one pat yourself on the bac
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Welcome to Episode 16 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest, and I'd like to extend a massive Happy Father's Day to all the fathers out there, whether it's Father's Day in your neck of the woods or not. Happy Father's Day, and may you've had a beautiful day. And more importantly, a wonderful family day, and I think what we should really have is happy family day, every single day. Because let's be fair it's lovely to be celebrated once a year something special Mother's Day, etc. But really we should be celebrating every day because the most beautiful thing to have a wonderful family, and we'll certainly take it for granted too often I think we take our spouse for granted, we take our kids for granted. And I think we should all remember every day how lucky we are, if we have a family if we're fathers. If you're not father, you're still lucky anyway, because you're alive. And that's a great thing. Today, I was thinking about on that wonderful little cul de sac today I was thinking about something new of concept that I wanted to, to share, partly as a note for myself and partly as a idea for everybody listening. I started reading a new book I finished my business. If you. This is the first time you've heard it I usually have three books on the go. One of them is a fiction book one of them is kind of a personal development book, and one of them is a business focus book, and I recently just finished a business focus book and now I've started reading 1 million followers by Brendon Cain 1 million followers I'm literally like I'm just in the first chapter so intro and first chapter. I don't know whether the book is going to be good or not, I've got to confess. When I read the title and the blurb. I was kind of like, certainly the title it put me off quite a lot because I thought here we go is another, you know, rubbishy book, frankly, that's all. All smoke and mirrors you know talk no trousers and during the introduction, the guy spells out his credentials and actually the guy has a Brendan Kane seems to have very very good credentials working for some massive multinational companies couple of TVs film studios, you know, blah blah blah and he also talks about working with Taylor Swift Taylor Swift. At the beginning of her career or relative beginning so certainly as somebody who's actually paid his dues so maybe he's got some good stuff to say I'm looking forward to it. But the thing It reminded me of. Because a lot of things a lot of concepts a lot of ideas aren't new when you first hear them or when you hear them when you first hear them they're new, of course, but when you hear them they're not necessarily new, but sometimes you need to hear something 2358 times before it really hits a spot, or you need to be in a certain period of your life or in a certain headspace and all of a sudden, it makes far more sense to you than it did the first time round or at least, if not making sense you really understand it better or it, you know, you have a eureka moment kind of thing. And that kind of happened today with reading the intro to this reading a little story or anecdotes about Taylor Swift. Whether you like her music or not Taylor Swift has always been very very good at connecting with our fans and building fan base. And although this book 1 million followers. You know it's focused on obviously building a fan base. So, although this is totally applicable to building fan bases, one could argue it's not so applicable to business as in business to business communication. Although, I would argue that in the modern. As you know, the modern world and we're moving into the way in the 2020s businesses no longer can really afford to hide behind anonymity. So, the businesses that are going to thrive for the businesses, where the owner or the CEO is very visible and actually building their own personal brand. So even though you might have a business which sells to other businesses, you still nonetheless, no matter what part of the departmen
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Welcome indeed to Episode 15 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest half a month, through the podcast. I'm doing well. I'm gonna kick this habit up today's podcast is just a reflection on something I was thinking today. And that actually came in two different ways, which is the idea of never be worried. To change your opinion on something based on new information. So, so many of us, you know we form an opinion on something, and especially if we publicly declare that opinion or we tell other people about something, and then we feel somehow maybe it's subconscious maybe it's conscious, we feel that we need to stick to that because otherwise we, I don't know, we will be going back on our word or somehow otherwise we'll be seen as lesser than we were, you know, quick to change our minds or what have you. And I would like to suggest the opposite, not changing your opinion based on new facts or new ideas that have come to light is basically being stuck in the past it's meaning that you can't innovate, you can't improve on something, because you're going to be stuck in the old ways the old ways of thinking and it's a really restrictive mindset to be in, and it's something that's going to give yourself limitations that you really don't need, there's enough out there to battle with, you know, as we're as we're overcoming our challenges and we're solving problems that we don't really want to solve them internally inside their own heads. So the couple of examples of that. I was speaking to somebody today, and not three days ago maybe four days ago I'd been extolling the virtues of the brave brave. The brave browser, which you've probably never even heard of. But everybody's heard of Chrome is the browser the most popular browser on the internet or Safari from Apple, and a lot of people have heard of the Microsoft browsers and Firefox. And there's a browser that I started using about nine months ago called brave, and I think it's I think it's built by the guys behind Firefox Mozilla, but I'm not entirely sure, or at least the team behind that not necessarily the actual company. Anyhow, one of the key things of this browser brave is that it's faster it's faster than all the other browsers out there and so I tested it and if you don't know there's a thing called switching costs you may have come across them before maybe not, and switching costs, basically refers to the, the hassle of having to move from one supplier to another supplier or from one product to another product. And for some things the switching costs are really easy and quick and for others. They're really high. And oftentimes, a vendor who's selling you a product or a service, they might rely on the fact that the switching costs away from that product or service, make it such a pain to even consider moving to a competitor that you just don't bother. So, a browser can be really I mean, it's all, it's all relative costs but can be fairly high switching cost because one browser has got all your passwords in all your saved browsing history all the websites you go to all the cookies etc etc. So if you switch to another it can slow things down quite considerably. So I've been using the brave browser, and as I say, one of the things is is very fast. A second thing is is very secure. And the third thing is you get paid. When you see advertising on it as opposed to the other way around and I like all of these ideas they're great. So a few days ago I was telling somebody are brilliant I've been using it for nine months it's great, it's great. I think literally the very next day I turned on my computer, and I had had a Windows Update. And as part of that Windows Update. It had automatically installed the latest version of the Microsoft browser edge, and I never use Microsoft browsers Internet Explorer or anything like that they're terrible. And I was just about to get rid of it, and then I actually got caught by their claim that it's like the fastest browser out there, you know, a
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Welcome one and three to Episode 14 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest 14 that is two weeks in. I have completed a little milestone there. And why do I say one and three. It's like one and all except one and three on account that my estimated audience according to anchor is three people. So, I have think I've managed to lose a viewer on anchor, although on YouTube, it seems to be gone up so who knows. But, I mentioned that one because I'm massively grateful to all three of you who are listening into my podcast and I think one of them is my wife's and it might only be two of you. But nonetheless, that's awesome. Thank you for choosing to spend some time with me. And I also love it because I had an email from somebody and they referenced the podcasts they referenced done by one then fun, and that was just super super cool because it was just real yeah felt really cool like wow somebody is actually listening to this this is great. And, and trying to use some of the ideas which is even better. But the reason I mentioned that as I say, I'm super grateful to you but also because as I said in I believe the very first episode. One of the reasons for me doing this podcast is actually, because it's very very quick way and I've said this a few times. It's a very very quick and efficient way for me to effectively keep a journal and be able to go back and track my thoughts or ideas. You know, over time, and another kind of byproduct of that is by putting it out publicly, I kind of make myself accountable. So when I'm talking about new projects and I'm working on new ideas. My hope is that people kind of pull me up on it in either just checking in, you know, how's it going with the sky experience for example or people saying, Ah, you said that you're going to be doing this in two weeks or three weeks or eight weeks or whatever, and it's not done yet what's going on. Because when you're doing when you're working on your own, you're kind of working in a vacuum. And it's very easy to push deadlines back or just go do that later and not get around to it again and not finish projects and stuff. So, part of the reason for doing this was also for that accountability to other people to myself, etc. And so, as a result, two weeks in, I wanted to effectively give you give myself a bit of a recap, or a report on where, where I'm at. So a couple of weeks ago, along with this podcast I started a new routine which you've heard me talk about before, which is done by one firm, meaning that I focus my work in the morning and then effectively try and take the afternoon off, but having that boundary of time means that I really am kind of more focused because I seem to be more productive, because I don't have the you know the irony being that when you have less time to do something you tend to actually get it done. The more time you have it, Parkinson's Law something, the more time you have to do something, the more the task expands to fill that time or something like that. And in that time period I've been trying to focus on just one project my most important project, and really start finishing. I keep saying it's by the book stuff finished that I've read recently was by Chuck, Chris Gill kids nice Charlie Gilkey, but I'm sure you found anyway. And as a consequence, the, the project that I've been focused on for the last two weeks. Every morning, Monday to Friday, has been the grip the sky experience. And I also at the same time, I got this new software which is product, project management software and I put a milestone, two weeks to finish this part of the grip the sky experience which is basically developing on the back end. and it's been going really well, but my estimate was too short. It's gonna take me three weeks, I think, so I'm saying that now here by publicly and also for me to find later to see whether my estimate is accurate or not. And this brings me on to kind of another point. Well I just finished the grip this guy experience it's comi
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Good holidays and welcome to Episode 13 of the view from the crow's nest unlucky for some But lucky for all of us that we're in this place here right now. Today's episode is going to be a kind of a secondary part yesterday potentially a little caveat or a different way of looking at things. And I think that the, and I'm sure I'm not alone, that there is so much opportunity in the world there's opportunity to do so much and the problem is having enough time to take full advantage of all these wonderful opportunities that we have personal opportunities business opportunities growth learning opportunities travel opportunities. All of these things. And I'm going to focus a little bit more about business opportunities today, in the sense of how it can be quite overwhelming, with all of these opportunities for people, especially people who aren't so experienced or ofay with business or certainly have a mindset which is maybe a little bit more challenged by all these things that can be done so Case in point A few days ago I was talking on the podcast about speaking about limited mindsets and victim mentality. And I was speaking somebody particular, and they were saying yeah well I'd love to be able to do this with my business but I can't because you know it's just all beyond me and blah blah blah. And that person is very typical of I think a lot of people particularly people who have maybe given themselves a professional skill, and they're leveraging that skill for, you know, a bit of a higher salary. So an example would be my mom, this was talking about yesterday. She's a counsellor, and she's got professional qualifications she's trained herself up and she works and I was talking yesterday about leveraging your time. So, if just a quick recap on yesterday, if you couldn't get another client. And let's say your finger in the air. It gets you 50 pounds for an hour. Then, much better to have that climb at 50 pounds an hour and spend 40 pounds. Paying other people to do other things that you don't have the time to do might be just chores like cleaning the house or walking the dogs or whatever it might be. But if you can pay somebody or pay a few people 40 pounds to do a bunch of jobs that would normally take you two hours. And in that one hour, you can make 50 pounds. By using your professional skills in whatever capacity, they're not only have you made 10 pounds overall but more importantly you've saved an hour of your time. So you've actually almost doubled your hourly rate, in a sense, and it's all about increasing your hourly rate. So, don't think about how much you make overall think about what you're worth per hour if you work for an employer and you get paid annually. Work out your hourly rate it's a really good exercise, and then look at ways that you can increase your hourly rate by leveraging your time and getting other people to join the team and do things on your behalf, or increasing your skill set so you can get paid more etc etc. So listen to yesterday's episode if you want to hear more about that. But the kind of Flipside to that is, well that's all well and good, in theory, but it's a bit. It's a bit overwhelming if you haven't kind of gone down that road before about well okay how do I start getting paid for these professional skills that I've got How do I leverage my time How do I do all these things. And the first thing a lot of people will tell you will be okay well you've got to get a website together, and you've got to get them, you know, funnels and mailing lists and client prospects of leads and deliver and all of this stuff and blah blah blah. And this is really overwhelming for a lot of people I got friends who have started businesses where a lot of people do. They have a profession, they're working for others. They've grown their experience of growing their skill set, possibly even growing client base on behalf of their employer, and then they decide to start their own business doing more or less the same th
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Welcome welcome you find folk to Episode 12 of the view from the crow's nest with me. The Crow, Romeo crow. Today's little episode. Takes a form of some thoughts that I had on speaking to my mother earlier today. I had a video call with my mom, and she is a counsellor, and she has recently taken or recently studied harder and invested into becoming accredited in a certain way I'm not entirely sure why it is, forgive me. But the net result is that she's now able to take on clients through insurance, and as it transpires she's now starting to get quite a lot of clients coming to her through insurance and it seems that there's a lot of work there. And she said to me that she, you know she's taken on a few clients but she's going to, you know, have to sort of turn down some work because she's just too busy. And I said well what too busy with what kind of stuff means she is busy but I wanted to get to the kind of the crux of it. And she's like well you know between doing the housework and they moved house last year and the garden isn't sorted in the garden it's pride and joy, you know, getting the garden sorted and walking the dogs every day. And she works three days a week. In another office, and x y Zed blah blah blah. And I said, So, and this is the point of today's podcast is. She's kind of thinking about it the wrong way around because if she's turning down work which is very well paid work because it's a very professional job. She's turning down work so that she can do chores like you know mowing the grass and taking the dogs for a walk, which she enjoys but she does find very tiring, you know, especially the dogs every day take them out for an hour, and she's got lots of other bits and bobs to do. And I said, if you think about how much you earn for the hour to do an hour of counselling, and then compare that to paying somebody else to do some of the chores that you currently do that maybe take you out for example, paying someone a few nights a week to take the dogs for a walk. would be one, you know one example of it. And she was well yeah so you mean did it. Sit but the the important part of this idea is not thinking of it as you are shirking doing stuff you don't like. But it's actually, you are. You kind of owe it to yourself to, to, to get as much from your time as possible with everybody that's the one resource that we all have the same amount of. per day. And we never know how many days we're going to have, and you're never going to get it back time is the most precious resource that we can have. So, if you have two hours of chores that you do in a week. And you have the opportunity to work. One more hour to earn enough money, simply to pay even if it's just simply to pay less let's say for ease of mass, you can hire somebody to do these two hours of chores per week, and it will cost you 20 pounds 10 pounds per hour for each of those hours, and you're able to do something out to do your own work and bring in 20 pounds for one hour of your own work, then you're far better to do the extra hour of work get paid 20 pounds, and then spend exactly that 20 pounds on paying somebody else to do two hours of chores, or other work for you, so that the net result is, you're working one hour. Instead of working two hours. So you've claimed one more hour backfill life, and obviously I'm simplifying it here. But this is an absolutely key fundamental idea, and certainly one which I've really held front and centre in my mind, and I've referenced this quite a lot in different ways. But one of the ways is that I've said it before, is to get the same or better results for less resource, particularly time. So, I'm always looking at how I can leverage my time how I can be more efficient with my time and sometimes that might be paying somebody else or bringing somebody else into the team to take on some work. So the amplify the amount that you can get done in the same amount of hours. Sometimes it might be very often it's finding a new proc
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welcome welcome welcome to Episode 11 of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. First of all, shout out to the estimated three people who are listening to this, there's actually more than three people, because the app isn't exactly correct in in its assumptions for example one episode has had seven listens so unless one person is listening to it multiple times then it's more than three people. Plus, it's on YouTube as well and episodes where I've got six or seven listens and again, and less people are listening on both platforms, then I think it's more than that. But what's really super cool is that I've already spoken to a couple of people who have been listening to this podcast so if you're one of those people. Thank you so much. It's awesome to hear from you and know who those people are. And the other thing I want to say is I don't expect people nessus I don't expect this to be a very popular podcast, because it's just me babbling on about my thoughts and my ideas but it's not a structured podcast I've not done anything about creating great sound you know I'm a musician. I know recording techniques and whatnot. And I'm just using the hands free on my phone. You know the earbuds to record, as I go. And the reason for that if you look anywhere in any kind of marketing, they say, you know, if you can do a podcast, you should have a great sound, and also you should be focused on bringing value to the listener etc etc. And they're absolutely right and if I expect my listeners to listen to every episode, and to grow the listenership, then I should absolutely be doing that, and I hope that what I say. On occasions does have some value for you but it's kind of really it's part it's a daily blog for me but without writing it's a way to get thoughts and ideas off my chest more of a journal really, because as I always say I can search through it by keywords and it's really super helpful. Right now it's Episode 1111 days in, but when I fast forward that two weeks and months and years. It's going to be such a body of of my thoughts going you know going back in time, literally, that I think that's gonna be a really useful, really interesting thing for myself in a great experiment. And I hope that in the future will be that much more interesting for people as I also complete. Let's say more properly crafted work and art, which is actually for you guys so my albums my, my books. You know screenplays and photography and whatnot. So, thank you very much if you're listening, it is every day. Some of them are quite long, so do not feel bad if you're just dropping now and again I don't expect anybody to listen every day, you know, that's too much, but if you can that's obviously awesome, but yeah so thank you very much to anybody who is listening, and you know dip in dip in occasionally see where I'm at. So that'll be cool. And as I always say you can visit me on twitter at Romeo crow. If you wish to, to say hello and please do give me any feedback and whatnot, sort of asked me any questions but something that is really cool about questions is, if you go to the root of this podcast on anchor, I think you can actually record a voice message, which will get sent to me that I can then insert it into the show so if you want to ask me a question you could literally, ask a question, through your phone, you don't have to have any, you know, microphone or anything I just ask it on your phone, and I'll be able to use that in the episode and I think that'd be super cool. So, easiest way of finding that I think is if you go to social dot Romeo crow.com slash podcast, and then that takes you to the homepage on anchor, where you can also find links to listen to the podcast on Spotify and apple and all the other various places. So I just want to say thank you to everybody who's listening, and I really really appreciate it and if you do have time to come and let me know that you're listening and say hello. That'd be brilliant if you've got questions do d
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Welcome to Episode 10 of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and I promise this will be a short one for two reasons. One, because of the subject that I want to cover, and two, because it's 11pm in the evening. And frankly, I want to go to bed. But what I did want to share with you is something I want to share with myself so part of the reason for doing these podcasts is so that I have not just something I can share with you guys but also a record for myself of my thinking, etc. And, as you may know, I've mentioned quite a bit I read quite a lot of nonfiction, and fiction as well but a lot of nonfiction, and sometimes I wonder if I've even read a book before because it might have been a bunch of years and I never wrote down which books I read and which I didn't, and what I thought of them, etc. And so I thought I can use this as a record of also the books I read because there might be some books that you haven't heard of that you think are worth reading or that you can give me some recommendations. And the way I put this podcast together, is I first record it into an app called otter dot, excuse me, otter.ai. And then I transfer the audio into an app called anchor, which is anchor is a podcasting app, but otter.ai is an amazing note taking app from voice it transcribes as you're talking, and one of the great benefits of it is, you can search by any keyword that appears in the text through any of your notes or any of your monologues In my case, which means I can always search for a book title and see if I've ever mentioned it, and I thought, what a good useful thing to have. So that's the purpose of this episode, so I just finished this week. A couple of days ago. I finished a book called start finishing, ironically, by Chris Gilkey, I believe his name is and effectively. It's a bunch of strategies and techniques to get you refocused on finishing projects that you stop and in fact that's one of the fundamentals of the book is to stop thinking of ideas or stop classifying things as ideas and classify them instead as projects, individual projects. And the idea is that you organise yourself, so that you're able to get projects, finished and move on to the finishing line and that is something which I have certainly struggled with in the past, and really want to improve upon it and that's exactly the reason why I read that book. I think I googled books to help you finish projects or something like that. So that made sense. And as it goes I have used something from that all of last week. I spent the week, I have the first part of the day is a block, he talks about blocking your time and a lot of these concepts aren't new or you've heard elsewhere. But he puts it in a particularly focused way. so I blocked out my mornings a couple hours each morning to focus on my most important project, which is at the moment the grip of the sky experience which is my music EP release that's coming out very shortly. And I found it really beneficial. And also, I, at the same time, have been using a project management tool or piece of software called nifty dot. Something might be.fm. COMM member. And so, organising myself around blocks and around shedule at around this product management or project management software has really freed up my, my brain because I know that actually I'm going to get to all these ideas and projects that I want to do. But first, I'm going to keep focused on getting the first one out of the way that's the most important. So, I finished that a couple of days ago, and I found it useful. Again, a lot of it is just common sense a lot of it is stuff that you've heard before but like a lot of advice or a lot of things you read or a lot of things you hear that have an impact on you. It might be the fifth or sixth time you've heard them that they just happen to hit the mark just at the right time and that's when they have the effect. So, start finishing by Chris Gilkey. And then after that yesterday I started reading a new book,
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Welcome to episode nine of my podcasts The view from the crow's nest I am Romeo Crow and I am going to be in your ear holes for the next few minutes. Thank you very much for joining me. I want to say a big shout out to the estimated for people who are listening to my podcast, this is a say episode nine ninth day of my daily podcast, and apparently I've had about 30 plays estimated of the podcast, though, that doesn't include YouTube where they're getting uploaded to each day, of which there are a few plays on there. So, one of the show's parents had six people listen to it. According to anchor so I don't know how that's estimated as for people But anyways, I want to say thank you to each and every one of you guys for listening, and whoever listens in the future. I'm really grateful. So thank you for spending your time with me today I wanted to talk about something, a conversation actually came up with my mom. Earlier, and it was about limiting limiting beliefs, and the, the crux of this conversation was based around the problems that people are having with the coronavirus from the point of view of financially. You know people are not working, they're losing their livelihoods etc etc. Now, we've been very fortunate in that on the one hand, we've entirely lost our income, because our main business our the business that we'd really been focused on for the last little bit is UK open mic puts on open mic nights pumps will shut down overnight on March 23 all our open mic nights shut down that same day. And so we have no revenue coming in. So that's obviously not great but we've been very fortunate because we just happen to have been visiting my mother in law in Ischia when the Italian lockdown came in. So now we've still on Sq you're not allowed to leave the island. Still, but as a consequence where my mother in law's house, and this is the old family home that they've owned for generations. So there's no mortgage there's no rent to pay. So we don't have rent to pay so we lost our income, we don't have rent. We do have bills. You know we bought a car last set. Last October, our first car. So we took out a big loan for that, and we still have to pay that loan we still have our general living expenses, we still have credit cards to pay. So it's not that we don't have, you know, a fair amount of bills and with no income that's obviously a potential problem. And how did they how does this relate to limiting beliefs, so I was saying that it is a terrible situation but as long as people have got their health. Then, you know, money, you can always find again you can always rebuild. And she didn't think it was that simple. And I disagree i think it is that simple. However, I would agree with her that it's not easy. And this led into a conversation that she was saying, Well, you know, you find it easy and you know you're fortunate in your situation but other people, you know, might lose their houses and whatnot in their homes and and obviously that is a terrible situation, but I guarantee you there are going to be people out there who have got a more who are people who invest a lot of energy resources in their own growth, starting with their own mindset, and eventually that might manifest into starting their own business becoming an entrepreneur what not, it might manifest into doing what they do more effectively for their employer and increasing their, you know negotiating increased pay. There's all different ways that that could come through, but it starts with having the mindset of growth, it starts with having the idea that you could do better. Not externally in terms of, you could do better with your you know your money or whatnot internally in terms of, you could do better with your skills with your talents with whatever. And I was saying that you know you'll have people who have that kind of mindset and they might have a real financial kicking. During this period, but they'll come out of it, and they'll regroup and they'll come back a
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Welcome to episode eight of my podcast The view from the crow's nest, and I want to welcome and thank all of the estimated for people who are listening to this that's 25% more than yesterday. And as I always say, or very often say, I'm really massively grateful for each and every person who listens to this at the moment it's four people. Yesterday it was three. I was talking about, well be great if we get to four. And I will thank that fourth person and it looks like it happened. And because I think it's really important that you anybody acknowledges and is grateful for any attention that they get from people that don't necessarily need to give them attention. Even if they need to, you know, it's still grateful because we live in a world where everyone's super busy and to have somebody decide to spend their time with you in whatever capacity that is and giving you their attention is something not to be taken lightly. so thank you very much to all of you people who are listening, or four of you and any more that follow, I'd very much appreciate it. If you hear some background and outside noises that's because right now I am getting the washing in from outside. Because it's nearly time to put the kids to bed and their sheets are on the line. Thankfully dry so apologies if that's in the background but you know multitasking, as I've said many times before leverage. Getting equal or better results in less time is something that I'm a very big proponent of, so that's what I'm doing, getting multiple results, today's podcast can be a little bit different. And it was inspired by something we did last night, which was have a video call have drinks and a video call with some friends in London. And amazingly throughout this coronavirus business it's the first time that we've actually done that first we do video calls in my parents all the time, but this is the first time we put the kids to bed, and cracked open a couple of bottles of Prosecco and chatted to some friends in London, and it was really really really pleasant and we're definitely going to do a lot more with people so there's my first little tip of recommendation. You know, it's so used to seeing people that's great if you're not able to see them or, you know, if you normally find people turn it into a dinner date. If you can't meet up with people you know often meeting with friends, trying to get your diaries out when Can people meet, etc etc. We'll actually just have a video called dinner date works surprisingly well, and certainly the booze helps, so that was good. But one of the things we were discussing is education. And that's what I want to talk about today so I'm not sure if you know this, but my wife and I are homeschooling our kids. We are we've now found out what are called World school ism and world schoolers are a subset of home educators in that you educate whilst travelling and in fact you look at travel as being the world is being the classroom basically and travellers being the mode of educating you know going to see different places, obviously different cultures, different people, different foods different smells sights and sounds, but also to embrace history or to delve into history by visiting places that are significant to whatever it is you want to study or vice versa, you know, studying the places that you're going to visit before during and after because then it brings it to life. So, the conversation we were having our friends are their kids are at school, and they are very much not wanting to homeschool anyone is locked down like a lot of people they've been having to homeschool their kids or at least have their kids at home and it's bonkers in the UK, it's probably the same in many many places that the schools have given so much homework, and curriculum and stuff for people to follow while they're at home for the parents to follow. And it's like, almost full time curriculum, but of course the parents also have their own work to do if they can know if
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Welcome Welcome to Episode Seven of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. And it's Friday night, and it is episode seven so that means I've completed a week, the first week of my daily podcast. So I want to thank everybody who's listened cording to anchor the app that I recorded into. There's an estimated audience of three people. And so to each and every one of you three I say thank you very much for listening I massively appreciate it. And I really don't take it for granted, and maybe in the future somebody listening to this episode will be the fourth maybe there'll be the 400th. I don't know but each and every person, I am very, very grateful for. So thank you very much for listening, and as I said in the very first episode, a week ago. I jokingly said, This podcast is the view from the crow's nest, aka distracting my monkey mind. And the reason being, the monkey mind is the part of you that just wants to be busy and if it's busy then it's happy because it's doing something but perhaps it's not doing the thing that you actually really need to be doing and we've all been there. So I have this kind of, oh I need to be busy I should be doing something bla bla bla and this monkey mind mentality and doing these daily podcasts was my way of distracting the monkey mind itself and going Hmm, I am doing something and I'm keeping you busy, but it's also a way of keeping a record for myself of my thoughts and ideas and how I'm thinking on things as I progress and as they change, and also hopefully, giving you a little bit of, if not entertainment, if not something interesting ideally, something of value some things to think about some concepts some ideas, maybe something that will help you in business or help you with your family or help you in travelling I don't know because I don't know you. Exactly. But whatever it is, if I can help in any way even just by planting a seed of an idea then that'll be awesome. So, this episode I'm just going to talk about a few seeds of ideas that I've been thinking about this week and maybe some will resonate with you maybe they weren't so let's get into it only gonna be a couple. In no particular order. This week I have been trying, I've organised myself in a different way. I've been working on an idea of done by one then fund basically my morning, I focus for the first few hours, purely on the most important singular project that I've got to do which at the moment is called grip the sky experience which is a music project that I'm working on for an EP launch. That will be in a couple of should be ready in a few weeks. But, so I do that for the first couple hours every day before I check email before I do anything after that it's an hour of, so of admin which is checking replying to emails and messages and also by admin and talking also about web development and stuff as well you know, making sure that this websites running or adding this thing to that website or what have you. And then it gets about one o'clock lunchtime. And then after that, and here's the here's the key part after that is fun and by fun. That could mean doing more work it could mean doing no work it could mean doing anything, but he's really important thing and after a week of doing it something I'm really am appreciating and didn't expect. I feel so much more relaxed, by taking the pressure off myself that I don't have to achieve so much with every day. Previously, I'd have a day schedule, which would be like, you know, wake up. Do 1520 minutes of Italian practice. And then you'd be 15 minutes or an hour or practice, you know, ear training exercises for music, and then I would get up and then I would do exercise for an hour and then I would you know have breakfast. and then I'd get into work and I'd do emails I do all this stuff and then my work would last pretty much all the day. And then I think are but I haven't practice guitar I haven't practised vocals, but I. So I was always under this constant pressure from myself. A
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Six of the view from the crow's nest. And today's episode is going to be fairly short, I will try I promise I will try and make this short, and it's gonna be a bit different to the last five days episodes, because I'm going to talk about specific projects I'm working on, and specifically music. And so today, that's gonna be the focus. So, I have, as you may or may not know lots of different interests. I have a couple of two businesses that I run, and I've just finished my first screenplay and I love writing I do photography every year. I release a wall calendar of landscape photography. And I really want to make films, I love films and I want to make films, but the passion that probably most people know me for is music. But what you may have seen over the last couple of years is I've been quite quiet on the musical front. And that's not to say that I've lost my desire to do music. It's just to say I've been a bit distracted with other things my little boy, Leonardo is now three and a bit so those first couple of years. Once he starts moving about him. You know, they're, they're some of the most fun and some of the most taxing years I think anybody's had children know that between the ages of about one and three and a half. They're on the move. And so you. So now I'm kind of focusing back on music, and, particularly, if you've listened to the podcast the last bunch of days. I've been talking about structuring time and better organising myself to work to my strengths and help get help with my weaknesses and to effectively start getting projects done I'm thinking about everything in terms of projects now it's not an idea it's not, it's a project and if it's not a project, then it's not really to deal with. So my current project, my project digital is grip the sky experience and what is grip sky experience. So grip the sky is an EP. And that means it's comprises of five tracks and it's actually six tracks, but one of them's on there twice because it's an instrumental version, because it actually changes the track quite a lot to have an instrumental version. So it's six tracks, but rather than do what everybody kind of seems to do nowadays, which is Hey guys, I've got an EP and I've just released it on Spotify go listen. As an artist I don't think that does the artist any real favours unless they've got a very sizable fan base waiting for it. Or, you know, they've got backing that's going to amplify their message to a very large fan base, a you know they're signed to a record label who can propel that message a bit harder. And for the listener. I don't think it's, it's a decent way to listen to music it's the way that we've all kind of got used to listening to music you put on a track and then it rolls into the next track, and so on and so forth. But I figured, because I like doing things a bit differently and I like trying things. I think that there's a different and hopefully more fun way for both of us to do it. So I've been working on the grip of sky experience for for this past week and I've worked on it again next week and then hopefully it'll be finished. And it will be its own micro site its own website its own place. And I'm literally trying to think of anything and everything that I can that will make listening to that music and understanding the context of that music as interesting and fun and immersive as possible. So, an obvious thing is you know, adding lyrics, so that you can see the lyrics. Okay, great. That's the lyrics are on there, less obvious things are, you know, are be sharing the guitar tabs I actually wrote out the guitar tabs for some of these songs for the riffs, so obviously it's not gonna be for everybody but anybody plays guitar, or even other instruments as the chords on there as well. The project files the actual recording files the individual files for each part are all there for people to download. So again, more geared towards musicians, but you can remix that if you wish to, you can download the
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Welcome to episode five of my podcast The view from the crow's nest. And I want to thank you yes you for listening to this. It's awesome. It's absolutely awesome so I'm doing a podcast every day. This is Episode Five therefore it's the fifth day, and I can tell you there's an estimated three listeners to this podcast, and I honestly I'm really celebrating that because I just want to remind myself, and anybody listening to this, that when you do something that is more towards the art side of things. You know it's subjective. Some people like it. Some people don't like it. No one has a need necessarily for it, arguably, of course an emotional need for music and things people may have etc but I'm not going down that road, but just to say that if people have taken time to everybody's really busy and if people have taken time to listen to what you're saying or to listen to your music to watch your videos to read your stories, whatever it might be. That is an absolutely awesome thing and it should really be celebrated and treasured, and it's something which maybe in the past. I hadn't been so you know so grateful for and mindful of so I just want to say thank you to everybody all three of you guys and anybody in the future who may be listening to this podcast. Thank you so much for spending the time listening it really means a huge amount to me and I've massively appreciate that. So, what I wanted to talk to you about today is about your strengths and your weaknesses, something, something happened to me in the last few weeks and today, that really made me also be grateful for a few things. And if you've listened to the previous few podcasts, you'll know that I've been recently in these last few weeks, particularly, I've been really focused on. As I guess as I always am on how to do things better, trying new things and effectively just trying to increase the enjoyment I get from my life by getting more satisfaction from some things that I love doing and spending more time doing things that I love doing. And being more efficient about everything. And part of that, I've been looking at routines, and I've been looking at structures and systems and how I can better organise myself, so that I do more things I love and I get more things completed. And on that note, I realised I realised for a while but I really embrace the fact that I have a very high level of strength I should say in coming up with ideas in vision in big picture thinking as some people might call it, and I'm very good at starting things. But my weakness is in following them through to completion, not getting distracted by other things. You know I have all these great ideas but when it gets to the nitty gritty I've got very high attention to detail, but actually nonetheless. You know I don't necessarily follow or It seems that I don't necessarily follow through on things. And it's easy to beat oneself up I certainly beat myself up before about our man you never finish anything you know you start things I've finished a little. And what I've been realising recently is actually it's not the right thing to beat yourself up over it, because it's not that you can't complete things it's not, I can't complete things and I complete songs I've completed GPS on completing an album I've completed a screenplay, and plenty of other things that wouldn't come on the list of things that you'd even consider completing you know completing getting a driver's licence completing, you know, moving furniture around a whole bunch of rooms so that the rooms have more livable and you've got more space. These are still important things that you No one can complete, so it doesn't have to be are, but at the same time. You know this thought is really not very true. And it's counterproductive that you don't finish things. What's a better way to look at it and I'm realising is I have strengths in one area, and I have weaknesses in other areas. So, it's much better to work to your strengths and than it is
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Welcome Welcome to Episode Four of the view from the crow's nest, I thank you very much for joining me. Today's episode is going to be probably a bit shorter than the previous three. And it's a question that somebody asked me that I wanted to, to answer. But before I do, if there is anything that you want to ask me if there is any feedback you want to give me if there is any encouragement or support that you want to, you know, just drop over to me then please do. Please, I'd love to hear from you. Come over to Twitter's probably the easiest one at Romeo crow on Twitter, and just ping me a message you can also find me at Romeo crow on telegram. And you can go to my websites etc etc. So, we'd love to hear from you. Anything that crosses your mind, then please do ask it the reason I say that is because I am quite aware that I don't think necessarily too conventionally, and I certainly don't have dreams and aspirations and run my life from love with my wife we don't run our life like kind of the majority are normal people we're kind of a bit bonkers in some ways, and one of those ways and leads me on to this question if somebody was saying, Well, how can you afford to travel and not work. And the so so I just wanted to address that just very quickly, in case mostly because I want to give anybody listening to give you some inspiration that you might use go, Ah, I didn't really think of it like that maybe I could change things around my life because everything. You know everything one does should really be working towards in some small way their ideal dream of how they want their life to be and by dream I'm not talking necessarily about, you know, your dream house or your dream possession, although that could be part of in fact yesterday or the day before I did it banging on about a house, but I'm talking about how you want your, your days to be you know everyday because there's only so many things that you could buy. If you'd like buying things but generally they're really pleasurable things that we have in life are really simple spending time with people going for walks. And, you know, some food we eat, having a nice meal together. It's generally not, you know, experiences, that, that, really, we tend to remember rather than the purchases or what have you. And so, in my mind, I have created, and then with my wife we've created together, our view of our future out perfect kind of lifestyle. And part of that is actually Well, this is a when good in the future but how can you achieve as much as you can have that today with what you've got. So, the perfect lifestyle for us was oh you know we'd go for a walk every day together, and a few other things, you know, and that's a really simple kind of idea now when we're in London. When we're living in Battersea we could only go for a walk in Battersea Park, because you know London's obviously a city and there are lots of parks, and we're by Betsy parked a beautiful park, so that's great we went for what during the day. But what would be really nice is to go for an evening walk after dinner, but do not really go for an evening walk in Battersea it's not exactly the place to do it. And so, you know, you work with what you've got. When we're in this gear as we are now an evening walk is beautiful. The weather's good people are out the restaurants are open, it's all that pizza culture you know people out sitting in the street drinking coffee and whatnot. And so, you find what you can do with where you are right now and then you do your best with that and then you make the small incremental changes and they might not seem like a lot within themselves, but over a period of time they really do mount up. So, to get to the question of how can you afford to do we, you know, to travel and whatnot. Well, the first thing I would say is, what we spend our money on you know there's essentials that we spend our money on food and rent and things like that. And then there's obviously non essentials and I'm n
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Welcome Welcome to Episode Three of the view from the crow's nest with your host, Romeo crow. And when I say host. I mean, it's just me it's episode three. And I want to thank the possibly two people who have been listening to the last two episodes, and you guys are awesome. According to my app anchor it says plays three listeners to estimated. So, that's great, but actually the reason I mentioned it is because I started this podcast like three days ago this is third day and it's a daily podcast, and I have been very guilty in the past of not celebrating wins in the sense of, you know, I might hit a threshold, which to me might have been amazing. years before I got there, and by the time I got there. I've already got my eye on a future threshold. And so, I might achieve something and then I kind of don't really give it the the gravitas and the value and the tap on the back that it is. And to that degree. And the reason I'm sharing the fact that I've got all of the three lessons from two listeners, is because there's two people out there there's two people in the world who have decided to spend their time maybe you're the third person maybe you're one of those two people maybe you're the 25th person, but who have spent their time chosen to spend their valuable time listening to me babble on. And so in whatever you're doing, whether that's, you know, business creatively whatever. Even if you've just got one person listening to you that's, that's really great that's an achievement and when you've got two and 10. This is a really valuable thing so I really want to remind myself never to take that for granted, whereas in the past, I probably have been a bit guilty of that by just looking at the numbers and forgetting that actually these are real people who are spending their valuable time and so I wanted to kind of share that with you and say that I'm not going to do that in the future. I'm really grateful for each and every one of you who are listening to this. You know that's that's really awesome. And I hope that I'm able to make it at some point entertaining at some point interesting and at some points valuable. And on that note, the thing I wanted to talk to you about today, or the idea or the thought that I want to share. If you listen to yesterday's podcast I was talking about the fact that I want to be a bit more accountable to myself really. So, as much as anything else. So I'm going to share with you, not just things I've done, but things I'm doing, and also future plans, they may fall apart completely they may never happen. But, at the very least, it's something that I can look back on and other people can look back on and go Okay, I see what you did there and you change there or you didn't change there or so fingers crossed some of these pan out and the one I want to share with you today something I started today and I can think about the last. Well, few weeks really I've been leading up to this but this is a new routine. A new habit a new system. A new structure for running my day. And it's. I always want to put far too much into the hours that I've got available and I kind of forget that there is also something called life, you know, that also needs attention, and I want to put attention into and I very easily could slip into working 25 hours out 24 hours and I kind of have to remind myself or be reminded that there are other things that I could or should or might like to be doing. And so I'm on a mission at the moment to re address this kind of work life balance to re frame, all the projects that I want to get done and actually finish stuff and really move forward with stuff. And one of those. One of the big changes that we're going to be making my wife and I, is the idea of bringing on board a team and working with other people in various projects because certainly I've been massively guilty of doing too much myself and not getting help from other people over the years and that I'm sure has slowed down my progress o
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Welcome Welcome to Episode Two of my podcast. The view from the crow's nest. Before I continue, thank you very much to the one person who watched know what watched listened to episode one yesterday, whoever you are, you are a champion. Thank you. And so, for those of you just joining us, which may be just the person from yesterday, maybe somebody else it's you that I'm talking to my podcast of you from the crow's nest is my daily effort to record my thoughts, my ideas, some tips and tricks. Anything that basically I'm thinking of in this, in this moment. And the idea is that I want to document my Yeah, my ideas and my journey and whatnot. Half of myself and half for the listener. So, I will say right now I cannot guarantee that any episode will give you entertainment or be interesting or give you value, although I will try to, but I expect that over time, there will be a theme or there'll be a style that will naturally evolve from these podcasts, well that style is what that will be I don't know but thank you very much for sticking with me if you decide to and. But speaking of records. So, I am using an app called otter.ai to record the audio for the podcast, and I've literally just got my hands free stuck into my phone, and I'm trying on that yesterday I use the little lapel microphone which was really cheap one. And the sound wasn't great it was all right. So I don't know what the sound is going to be like for this, but I will try a few different things but the idea of this app, otter.ai, is that you can record your audio and it will also transcribe what you're saying on the fly or do it live. And the great thing about that is that you can then search by doing a keyword search for any words that appeared in the text. So my hope is that over the days and weeks and the months and even the years, I can put in a keyword, and I can go back and find all of the references to that so I can see what my thoughts were on a particular subject or how they might have changed over the years. And so if you ever even just want to have notes for your own personal benefit, then otter.ai is, it's free, and it's a really great app. And then the actual app that I used to do the podcast. As I found out yesterday after I recorded it. I export from otter.ai and the audio straight into an app called anchor. So if you've ever thought about doing a podcast anchor is the app that I'm using it's a free app. And it's really super easy and it's really cool and anchor then pings out your podcast to all sorts of places so I got a note that my podcast is now available on Spotify, which is very exciting. And I imagine other places will come soon. So there you go, if you ever thought of keeping notes, then otter.ai. And if you ever thought of doing a podcast then anchor. But the interesting thing about that is, accountability, and I talked yesterday about that I struggled, over the years, I'm very good at starting things I'm great at coming up with ideas of vision but I'm not so good at finishing things. And one of the reasons potentially is, you know, no accountability I work with my wife and, you know, we do stuff, but basically we're our own unit our own island and we don't. Up till now we haven't had a team helping us with stuff. And that's probably been something that's held certainly held me back over the years is not having people to help, basically, not having partners people to bounce ideas off etc. and that's something that I want to improve on moving forward I think that'll be the key that really unlocks my projects and my ideas and ambitions. Over the next rest of my life. And part of that is accountability if you're working with someone, then obviously you're already have something that you're accountable to you have to deliver your end of the work. And, funnily enough I speak into my brother today, and my brother is is very successful guy, very focused and he is brilliant at finishing things he's very systematic if he says I'm going to do somethin
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Welcome to Episode One of the view from the crow's nest, also known as distracting the monkey brain. So I decided I'm going to do a podcast, and I'm probably going to be date daily but We'll soon find out whether I stick to that or not. And the whole point of this podcast is I have, like, my probably anybody who's listening to this like all humans. I have so many diverse interests and ideas that come to me constantly and whether that's in music or whether that's in writing fiction or nonfiction or photography, down to the business. Business Ideas for other businesses already have or businesses I want to have a start, through to schooling and homeschooling our kids through to world schooling and travelling because that's what we do, moving about with our kids, and all these ideas constantly coming to me, and something I really struggle with is finishing any particular project and anybody who's followed me over the last few years will know that I say something's coming something's coming and then it takes that bit longer a new song or screenplay or what have you. And it always takes me longer and that's been the story of my life and the reason is because I always get like distracted by things, relatively easily a new idea comes along with like the bright shiny penny. And I'm like, Oh, this is a great idea, let me do this. And there are a multitude of reasons for it. Someone realised some I don't realise some I realise and still fall for so you know when you're doing something that's really meaningful, a meaningful project it's really important that you get finished, that's often the kind of the hardest thing to finish and then you find something to distract you. And then that takes away a bit of time and then you lose your momentum and it's harder to get back into that project. And then you have this kind of self fulfilling prophecy of oh I don't finish things, etc. And what I realised is while I this is my monkey brain, what I what I call the monkey what not what I call a monkey brain what a lot of people call the monkey brain, which is that part of your brain that likes to be busy likes to see you busy doing busy work is busy work but busy work isn't always the work that fulfils you or actually moves you forward in any way. And so rather than pretending. I don't have a monkey brain. I've decided to go one up on the monkey brain and fight back. So rather than letting the monkey brain distract me, I've decided I'm going to distract the monkey brain. And I'm going to do that by recording these podcasts, where I'm literally going to spout out whatever is on my mind that day maybe it's a new idea. Maybe it's just some thoughts on a particular subject, who knows, who knows when it's going to be. And my hope is that by doing that, I channel all of that kind of distraction, and potential procrastination etc into the podcast and leave myself far more space mental and emotional space. Outside of that, to be able to focus on the projects that really matter so new albums or music or a new screenplay or what have you. I don't know where this is gonna work or not, it's an experiment. And so for those of you who may or may not be listening to all who are listening to this.
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