International Podcast Day, Context tags on your to do list, inspiration and productivity

Published: Sun, 10/04/15

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Hi 
 
It's been a birthday weekend. Friday was my husband, Simon's, and today it is his Mum's, so lots eating and drinking going on this weekend...and a late newsletter ;-(

I started writing this in the lunch break of a Choral Singing Day on Saturday in Folkestone, near where I live. We were singing Handel's Jephtha​, which is quite difficult to sight read (though not the worst!) but fun. We sing through each of the choruses a few times interspersed with the conductor telling us a bit of the story of the oratorio so it's really interesting - if you're into music and singing that is, it would be my husband Simon's worst nightmare!

I did some more of this newsletter on Sunday lunchtime whilst Little Doddsy was doing some audio recording. She came in whilst I was recording the intro to my interview with Jason Buckner for my podcast and decided to take over. It's impressive how quickly she improved but also how she started getting a bit perfectionist about it, and by then we were on about the tenth recording and performance was starting to drop! A lesson in not over practising, I think!

She very excitedly bought herself a laptop yesterday out of unspent pocket money, sensible girl, so I think Audacity will likely be the next download.

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Habitica and Reader Feedback

You might remember last week that I introduced the tool 'Habitica' that Little Doddsy has been using to manage her to do list and to encourage her to improve her daily habits. I had some feedback from Tanya who said, "thanks for the habitica recommendation.  Sophie (12) has taken to it and loves it!  Early days on whether it will actually help her get through her homework and be more organised, but enjoyment is the first step.  She keeps telling me how many points she's earned by taking the stairs at school (even though she has no choice in the matter) and already suggesting how she would modify the app!" I love getting your feedback about the newsletters - please keep it coming. 

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International Podcast Day

It was International Podcast Day this week and so this week's blog post was about 'my favourite podcasts' and how I fit listening to them into my life. I hope you find it helpful and that it gives you some ideas for your own listening. And if you don't already listen, why not click through and have a listen to one or two of them.


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Location and Context Tags in your To Do List

If you are a fan of 'Getting Things Done' (GTD) by David Allen, this tip won't be new to you. He suggests adding tasks to your to do list based on the context you need to be in to complete the task.

Some examples are: 'laptop', 'phone', 'office', 'desk', 'errand'. 

As I mention regularly I use Todoist to manage my 'to do list' and I use context labels to organise my tasks. I was reminded of how useful that can be this week when I was dashing off to Manchester. As I had limited time in the office before leaving I clicked into my filter of 'today's urgent and important' tasks that also had a label of 'desk' to ensure that I got those tasks done as a priority whilst I was here, leaving tasks to complete on my laptop and phone, both of which I took with me, later in the day. 

How can you use that functionality? Let me know if a video showing how to set this up might be useful?


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Trolley Bags Lakeland

You may have heard that supermarkets are due to be charging for carrier bags from tomorrow. A friend shared a picture on Facebook of her solution to the challenge.

They are trolley bags from Lakeland; they look really cool, although of course it does mean that you need to remember to put them back in the car after you've taken your shopping into the house!

And if you need to fundraise for anything, these bags are brilliant. We raised funds with them at Little Doddsy's school last Christmas and we're doing it again this year because so many people said they'd have bought more, or at least one or two, if they'd known what good quality they are. And I'm looking forward to getting one or two of their new 'summer' design.


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Inspirational Thought

I read this paragraph this week, which is really helpful advice. Just realised I must have been in a hurry as I didn't note where it came from, so apologies to whoever said it!

"Read more and read wide. The more you read, talk to new people or experience new things, the better you’ll become at connecting pieces of information together to spawn an original idea."


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Improving your Productivity as you Blog

And finally, this is a really great article I read this week that has tons of tips and tools to help you to be more productive as a blogger.


Catch you next time
 

PS Have a great week!