Minimalizing and other challenges of a New Year

 New Years resolutions have a bad reputation. So much so that many people refuse to make them because they never come to fruition. Maybe that should read they are never able to do the work to make them come to fruition. I can't say that I am big on making resolutions but as a new year begins it is always good to hope that this year things might just be a little better than the last. In this year in particular many of us are hoping that things will be much better or at least return to the normal of our fondly remembered years like 2019 or even 2014. As we pasted through those years they may have seemed so so but compared to 2020 they were the best ever. Haha. 

Getting back on track. This year I have started a clean out of my home, a two bedroom unit in the south of Sydney where I live with my wife. When I moved in I was sure that this was a stepping stone to a house but 20 years on I am not really that much closer to achieving home ownership. Also over those years I have accumulated so much stuff. What kind of stuff ? All kinds of stuff. Books and magazines, drinking glasses, endless piles of paperwork and much more. Add to that my wife moved in with her stuff as well in 2012 and you just end up with more things that you have places to store them. As a result of all that you just can't get the place clean and tidy because you don't know where to begin. 

Well, I didn't know where to begin. I do now. Throwing things out. That's where I have begun. I am trying to either put 100 items away each day or throw 100 items out each day. I am going to keep doing this until I can find my home underneath the rubble. At the moment, a couple of fairly committed weeks in I have been focussing on books and magazines, today I threw out some old drinking glasses and found another pile of old bank statements and similar mail that for some reason I kept but now it just takes up space. 

Why am I throwing instead of taking it to charity? I have tried that approach before and all I ended up with was a heap of bags in the hallway that I was going to take to charity. I also figure that once I get the place orderly I will then be able to regularly take things to charities. In this early phase it is all about making a significant impact on creating a clean and tidy home to live in. The method that creates the biggest impact in the shortest time is the winner for me right now. 

I am at the point where whilst I can see some improvement in the state of the apartment I can also see where I am lacking. If I was to lose motivation now I would have got little from the changes so now is the time to just keep pressing on until significant change is seen. I guess this is the point where most New Years resolutions let us down. We start out full of running only to drop the ball before the implementation of a really good idea becomes something we can hang our hat on as a fantastic achievement. The next fortnight on this one will be decisive one way or the other. I will either have a significant change or just another idea that a lack of commitment allows to fade away. 

What are the other challenges for the New Year? Well, firstly monetising this blog for one. Actually that's probably the wrong approach. Really I should be aiming to dedicate myself to the process of putting out good quality content and then spreading the word through social media or any other method that springs to mind. 

I often wonder how fit people find the time to go to the gym every day. I suppose the answer is simple. They make exercising a top priority. I on the other hand make it an afterthought. The results are there for all to see (unfortunately). 

I have made it back to the computer for another session of typing so I guess that is a small win. Looks like I'll achieve 15000 steps as well so I am off the hook exercise wise. I also chucked another hundred items into the bin. Another 20 odd books plus some more paperwork from a decade ago. Small wins can add up over time. 

I hope.

Another thing I would like to do is start a podcast. Initially I was going to start a food related podcast as a companion to this blog and that may well happen as well down the line. However, I have been thinking this week that I may just have some fun with it. I am thinking of contacting a mate and seeing if he is interested in getting together on a weekly basis and recording for about 30 minutes and see where it takes us. Each week we would bring a half dozen ideas with us for topics of conversation and then we can both go away and do a little research on the topics. I envisage a glass of red or a nice beer in hand for the conversation and discussing nice beers or wines we have been buying or the latest from the cricket or the footy, or anything else that jumps to our collective attentions. I haven't as yet discussed this idea with the bloke in question but we shall see.

The biggest thing for me though, this year has got to be starting my own business in the food space. I would love to be giving you incites in six months time about what it has been like starting out on my own and creating my own little food production business. Just have to be sitting down over a cold Beer Chang in my retirement years in Chiangmai province in Thailand aged 65 and thinking of the great years in business selling mixed nut butters, aged vinegars, preserves and so much more. I don't want to get rich just pay the bills and be answerable to me. Ahh, the life that could be. Hopefully it starts this year.

Anyhow, I think that is about enough for now, until next time happy 2021, may we look back fondly.

Frustrations of working for the man

 Sometimes we find ourselves seeking a way out of the rat race but don't know if we have the courage. Substitute to word "I" where you just read we. Do you ever feel that I am working hard all day and at the end I can't even get some level of appreciation from the clown acting in the roll of manager? 

Of course, you should be careful in assuming malice when in reality it's probably just incompetence (partial or complete). I was listening to the Random Show which is part of the Tim Ferris Show Podcast. The random show is a lengthy chat between Tim and his friend Kevin Rose that they do from time to time just chatting about what they have been up to and since they are well known enough to release it as a podcast they do. Maybe I show do that. Just sit around and talk with a mate about whatever comes to mind and release it as a podcast. If we have no listeners then really it won't hurt anyone. 

That however wasn't the point I was going to make. The point I was going to make was that I think Tim mentioned that he had a word of the year as like a theme. I think in place of a new years resolution you sit down before the end of the year and think of a work that can be your theme for the year ahead. For me I think 2021 could be "Change". What will that entail? More importantly how do I keep it central to my daily doings? I guess I could put the word as a screensaver on my computer or go old school and put it under a fridge magnet. No one would even need to know what it means to me. 

Take the word "change". For me right now it mostly relates to to starting my own small business and with that my lifestyle with it. Maybe it could mean in the short term just changing my daily routines and maybe my eating habits perhaps. It could mean as many things to as many people who read it and meditate on it. 

I am sitting down to type this on a Tuesday evening after altering my weekly schedule in the hope of becoming more productive. Lately I have lagged in my daily studies and wanted to reignite my afternoon activities. 2 days in it's a winner. I have nominated 8 areas of study or focus, yes I think focus areas is a better term. I will try to put in 30 minutes on as many as I can each day up until 7.30pm. From 7.30 I will unwind and watch some Netflix and maybe a little big bash before getting ready for bed and fire up for another day of life. 

Whenever I make a list of focus areas I always end up with things I want to do but don't have the time. Hypothetically, if I won the lottery I would be able to expand the time spent on each area to maybe an hour a day and do that every day which would be amazing for self improvement but I don't see unlimited income arriving soon. So, I guess for now it is all about using as much of my time to better me as I can. That's an average sentence. Maybe I need to do a bit of English study as well. 

Anyhow my 30 is almost up and what started as a disgruntled employee going off to start a business turned into an idea to replace or add to your New Years Resolution and a study plan for you free time. Hope you find something in amongst the weeds and until next time it is about time I threw some food on the stove and made some dinner. Happy living!!!

New language learning method

 Exciting news on the language learning front. I was listening to an episode of the Bangkok Podcast from season 1 way back in 2010 and came across a great tip for improving my language learning. The idea is to tweet in your new language each day as a way to improve your skills. Okay I admit I haven't as yet tested the theory but thought that it could be a great way to use my language skills and over time build on the foundations that I learn in my lessons. Obviously I will make some errors along the way but think that this could be a great way to improve my basic communication skills.

Twitter allows up to 280 characters per tweet which is enough to make a basic statement in the target language. Initially I think I may create a couple of new twitter accounts. Maybe one for German and another for Thai. The original Bangkok Podcast episode was episode 32 from season 1 and featured Thai language speaker, blogger and tweeter Hamish Chalmers. I have just set up a twitter account called TweetinginThai and will set up another called TweetinginGerman to get me started. If I start out with some simple tweets just constructing simple sentences I can see where it takes me. 

As I think I mentioned in an earlier post I am a strong believer in having an outlet for you language skills and I hope that this will provide me with just that. Some would say that I could just write a couple of sentences in a diary each day and that would have the same effect but I am hoping that but making my writing public there will be a stronger pull to continue ticking away at the task. 

Only a brief post today but hopefully one that sends me on a pathway to improved Thai and German language communications and with that a more open view of the world. As always happy learning!!!

Podcasts and Audiobooks I've been listening to lately

 

Yet again I sit down to add an entry to my secondary blog and think what am I going to write about? That's it Podcasts and audiobooks. More precisely, the podcasts that have been grabbing my attention and the ways that I listen to audiobooks. 

First things first. When my alarm destroys my hopes and dreams (well actually just my dreams) I struggle around to grab my mobile phone and my headphones, activate the headphones and go to my Audible account and listen to a book. I continue to listen whilst I get ready to leave for work and then on the 40 minute drive to work plus for the first half hour or so of work whilst I warm into my day. How long I listen is dependant on how many books I am listening to on that given day. I also listen on the almost hour long drive home and when doing a bit of tidying around the house and when I am cooking dinner of an evening. All that adds up to quite a bit of listening time and gives me a lot more listening than I could ever hoped to have achieved when it comes to sitting down and reading. Does that last sentence make sense? Summary Listening lots, reading a little.

Yes I still read but this is more of a substitute for radio which is not great between 20 to 6 and quarter past six on a weekday morning. At the moment I have 3 books that I am reading but I usually only get to them 3 or so days a week. Got to make more of an effort.

So, let's start with audiobooks. Plenty of people are sceptics when it comes to audiobooks but if you get a book of interest it can be just as good an experience and turning the pages yourself. I have been a member of audible since 2016 and according to my account I have 94 titles to my name. It costs me $15 a month and that includes 1 book a month and a free book which audible makes available to all readers each month. They also have podcasts and other free stuff but I already have too many things to listen to on other apps. Having said that I did really enjoy the podcast by Marc Fennell called It Burns which is about the contest for the world's hottest chilli. Well worth a listen. I also listen to audiobooks for free on my local library's app "Libby" which has the great advantage of being completely free. They have an every growing list of titles and some great reads.

Podcasts. I listen to podcasts through Ipodcasts and Spotify. Hoping to add my own soon to be created podcast to the list. Podcasts are free and another great modern substitute for radio. 

Alright lets get to the nitty gritty. What do I recommend? What are my favourites? Should I make them top 10s? Yeah, why not?

Okay my top ten oops, make it 15 audiobooks in any order and on which platform did I listen.

1. The Art of Learning by Josh Waitzkin Audible
2. Born to Run by Christopher McDougall Audible
3. Salt, Fat, Acid Heat by Samin Nosrat Audible  
4. Sherlock Holmes: The Definitive Collection by Arthur Conan Doyle Audible
5. Working Class Boy by Jimmy Barnes Audible
6. Legacy by James Kerr Audible
7. Vagabonding by Rolf Potts Audible
8. The Lost Gate by Orson Scott Card Libby
9. The Orphan's Tale by Pam Jenoff Libby
10. Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen Libby
11. The Time Traveller's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger Libby
12. The Other Einstein by Marie Benedict Libby
13. The Strange Case Of The Alchemist's Daughter by Theodora Goss
14. Down Under by Bill Bryson Libby
15. Finding Gobi by Dion Leonard Libby    

And now on to Podcasts. Do I dare to say top ten? We will see. 

1. Christopher Kimball's Milk Street Radio 
2. Kurt Fernley's Tiny Island 
3. Rabbitohs Radio Podcast 
4. Oh My Codcast
5. The Bangkok Podcast
6. The Sporkful
7. The Tim Ferriss Show
8. Meat : The Ultimate Podcast
9. The Howie Games with Mark Howard
10. Heston's Journey to the Centre of food
    
    

and an honourable mention to the Tune up Podcast by an old mate of mine from school Joel Curtis. 

Well that just about does it. Hope you can find you next read or listen in amongst this lot. If you have any recommendations for me please feel free to leave a comment. Happy listening!!!

Changing things up - Plans for the future

I have moments where I feel really motivated to put out new content and really feel some energy towards creating my own business and space in this modern internet world. Then other times it all seems like too big a mountain to climb. Then I go to work and think there must be more than this. Is this how I want to spend the next 20 years? You hear in the media about modern workplaces and flexible hours and I am sure that for some they exist, but for me I'm not feeling it. There are so many things I want to try and on the weekend and even early in the week you feel like you can put in the time to build something significant, something than will pay the bills and still leave time to enjoy your life. You charge into the week, Monday, Tuesday getting things done, and then by Thursday you are so exhausted that all you can do is put some food on the table and get clothes ready for Friday. It's a thing of celebration to hear that my wife has an idea for dinner which means one box is ticked to get you through to the next weekend.

It can't be like this. Or at least it shouldn't. Usually it is the starting that is the most difficult so this week I am aiming to put in larger chunks of time into my various areas of personal study and business building. I found a business plan template on a government business site and have decided to work through it one step at a time. At the very beginning it has a space to add my business logo and slogan so I found a free site that I can use to make a logo with slogan and am on the task of creating. Not 100% happy with the slogan as yet but launch of my new Arcadia Glutton branding will have to wait a little longer. Confident it will be this week. 

A multipart business utilising online resources is the goal and I am so keen to make it happen. I have a countdown on my phone which runs out at the end of March. Every step has so much to learn. Committing to the hours is probably the most fundamental step. There is probably an argument to say that I may be spreading myself too thinly but I am hoping that by spreading the income sources that I will not have to be a superstar in any one element and that the small pieces with make the whole. 

What are the pieces? Todays thinking is Podcast, Video Blogging , Blogging, Drop shipping, and food production. Also, if I am unable to generate income from these areas I may also consider buying a food truck or cookbook writing as other options. Is it too much? Should I focus on one piece at a time? 

I just have to make sure that procrastination isn't what undoes me. Every area needs to be putting out content weekly. A weekly podcast, a video each week, a blogpost or two, add an item to a store, add a food product each week. If I am going to pull this off, one thing is for sure I am going to be busy. 

LEARN BY DOING.

Making Time

Why do we find time for the things that we find time for? That sounds a little longwinded and confusing. Why do I make time each afternoon to study German and Thai and write my blog and study food and do a little exercise (as yet not enough) but I don't find or is it make time to wash the car or tidy the house. Why? I don't know. 

Have you ever heard the saying that if we didn't have deadlines we wouldn't get anything done. I oven wonder at work why my intensity increases only as the deadline for lunch service approaches. Don't get me wrong I have gotten into work some days and tried to run like a crazy man to get things done as quickly as I can, but too often I burn out at some point of the day and much like a long distance runner who goes out too hard I hit the wall at some point (usually when the deadline has passed) and progress grinds almost to a halt. So basically I charge happily with awesome intensity through the morning only to hit the wall at clean up time and then struggle to the finish. Surely if there was any logic to life I should find the energy at the end of the day because the motivation at that point is an earlier departure and with the heading home my time becomes mine. And surely what most if not all of us are striving for is the opportunity to have more time to do as we wish. 

Why do I sleep in on the weekend when time is mine but set an alarm an get out of bed on work days? Surely I should be setting alarms on the weekend because there the day is mine to spend on me and for me. But alas the modern world for all its sophistication and talk of work/life balance this is not the case. Not even close. I started typing this 2 days ago and in truth didn't really have a plan, but thought if I just start typing it will come to me. Start it off and see where it takes you. 

In the 1800's people worked over 60 hours a week, they also slept or at least were in bed whilst it was dark. So take tomorrow. The sun will rise at 6.12am and set at 7.10pm. That is about 11hours of darkness. Prior to the advent of electricity that meant that most people would have been asleep or at least in bed for 11 hours of the day. 7 x 11 is 77 plus the 60 to 70 hours of work. Lets make that 65 hours. That leaves a mere 26 hours in the week for yourself. Less than 4 hours a day. Are we better off today? Short answer yes. How much better? Most of us claim the 6 to 8 hours sleep a night. 49 hours on average plus working 38 hours. That's 87 hours, giving free hours to do as we please (some of that spent in transit) of 81 hours a week. How are we using those hours? Maybe for some, during Covid they have spent more time around the house getting some projects done. Maybe in normal times nights out with friends and family or just a just a dinner for 2 at a local restaurant. For everyone it is different. How much time is 81 hours a week? That's over 11 hours a day on average even if we do an extra hour at work Monday to Thursday. As I type that I realise that your lunch break at work is not included there either. 

That thought set off a mental alert too. That half hour for lunch is still ours to do with at least to some extent as we please. How best to utilise it? If my workmates over the past few years are anything to go on it will be spent staring at a mobile phone whilst eating lunch. Now that mobile phone connects to the world via the internet as we know so we could do any number of things with it. Most likely though we scroll through social media feeds and if asked what we looked up we will be unable to recall within an hour or more. Why don't we use that time to read or do some language study through an app or meditate for 15 minutes? It doesn't have to be dead time. 

I guess my point is that it is your time to use as you please. I am a fan of audiobooks and podcasts which I listen to whilst in transit. Yes I consider this to be a reasonable way to spend my hour and a half daily commute but by getting the right podcasts on I could be using the time more wisely. I could be using it to be better informed. Having said that we aren't robots and do need some downtime every day. 

I guess the point I am making is that we do have a fair amount of time for ourselves and need to be better at making good use of that time. Balance is important though and no one can work 17 hour days, at least not for an extended period of time. Are we working to live or living to work? The choice is yours to make. Let me just finish off with a quote I heard some years back whilst listening to the Tim Ferris Show and his interview with Wim Hof. Wim has some wild ideas on icebaths and the like. The memorable quote was "easy choices, hard life or hard choices, easy life". Feel free to let that one roll around in your head for a while. It's time I put a fork in this one because it is done. Happy living people!!

Flying under the radar

I sometimes think that my simple lifestyle affords me some kind of immunity from the world around me. So far at least, the effects of a global pandemic which has impacted many millions of people around the world has in some way passed me by. Yes, over the last few months whilst waiting to find out if I still had a job it caused me stress and my wife was without work for 6 months and stressed out by the possibility of catching the virus which could have had serious ramifications due to her lower than normal immunity due to having her spleen removed a few years back, but the actual impact has been more mental than actually impactful. Sure we have eaten out less and maybe tightened our spending a little, but really I am actually in a better financial position now than I was this time last year, or at least will be if things work out with my new employer and my old employer comes good with my redundancy pay-out over the next couple of weeks. 

What do I put this relatively unscathed yea
r down to? It’s quite simple. Low expectations. If you aren’t biting off a giant piece of the pie you don’t have as much to drop down the front of your shirt. Life is always going to knock you down and if you’re standing at the top of Sydney’s Centrepoint Tower then you have a long way to fall and just as far to pick yourself back up again. However, if you are just plodding along above the water level then it’s not so hard to get back there or even climb a few rungs on the ladder. 

As I said above I am hoping my old employer, as of last Wednesday, comes through with my redundancy payment then I’ll be sitting pretty for a few home improvements and maybe an upgrade on the old car too. To be truthful, whilst many are struggling I feel like I’ve had a small win. That win eases some financial pressure in the short term and hopefully with a large chunk of commitment from me I hope that in six months time I’ll be breaking free of the rat race to launch my own small food based business. Sure it won’t be easy but if I can pull it off I’ll be setting myself on a path to a better life than ever before.

Most people working in hospitality would say that the life of being free from location is impossible for a person working in an industry where the customer is right there in front of you. I am hoping to utilise the internet and the socials to generate income. How? Well, initially I want to commit myself to 30 minutes of blogging a day and see what comes of it. As well as that I want to start a vlog. I love the youtubers who take deep dives on particular foods or restaurants. Maybe I can do the food review thing, or try to make the best ever homemade pizza or make brie cheese at home. Go deep food nerd and see where I come up for air. 

Podcasting also has a strong pull. It's another thing you can do from anywhere. What do you I talk about? How often should I do an episode? Special guests, where do I find them and so many more questions need to be answered. I guess some serious brainstorming and then a trial run or pilot episode. Can you do more than 1 pilot episode for a series? If I am making the rules maybe I can do a few pilots before official kick off. The Sporkful Podcast is one of my current favourites. Dan Pashman, the host started it in his home and now pays the bills with his income from podcasting. At least that is what I heard. That is the dream.

So we have blogging and vlogging and podcasting. And, have you heard of drop shipping? That buy and sell thing where you buy a product cheaply from, usually China and sell it in another online market for a profit. I like the idea of creating a small food equipment business. The goal isn't to get rich but to find products I think would be useful to me, test them out myself and then if of good enough quality sell them in my little online store. 

Once I have written up enough recipes and the like I could possibly think of writing a cookbook too. That however is a long way off. There is however one other element to the business and that would be manufacturing, on a small scale, products such as peanut and mixed nut butters as well as preserved chilli sauces and so much more. I have currently got my first apple cider and raisin vinegar batches on the go and am keen to make a really high quality product that can also bring an income. 

Life theory number 8,000,007. When you ever seek advice on investing you are almost always told to diversify your investments. The reason being that if you put all your eggs in the one basket then if it goes pear shaped you lose all you investing capital. If however you diversify, that is, invest in a number of areas and one goes badly, hopefully some of the others will be able to support the weak investment. Have you noticed in life how most of us humans gain almost all of their income from one job? So, as we have seen over the last 9 months in particular if you lose that job then you will have no fall-back to support you in your time of need. There is in most peoples cases no spreading of income that can make up for the loss of your job. This is something I would love to overcome. 

My first cooks job was with a fantastic chef who ran a bits and pieces food business with a number of small income sources which together made the business tick the financial boxes. I would say that most of the pieces weren't enough on their own to support the business outright, but in combination with the other elements formed an important part of the business. There was also the possibility of putting more energy into particular elements of the business if extra income was needed or even because the owner simply enjoyed working in that particular part of the business. 

Anyway I thing I have waffled on here quite long enough and have hopefully made some sense at least at times. Time to leave this here and continue to chase the dream!!