Posted: Wed 20 August, 2008 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Five Year Plan (now Ten), Health, Thoughts |
Among other things, this evening I’m having a quick visit at a new gym that’s opening up near us.
Currently I’ve no idea what it’ll be like, and I’m slightly concerned that the manager has said “There’s about ten different pricing plans”, but we’ll just have to see.
I know I need to get back into going to a gym, so it’ll be interesting to see what this one’s got to offer. Otherwise, we’ll be going back to using the local council-funded one who couldn’t find their own arses with both hands and a flashlight when we went there late last year. (And we’ve never darkened the doors since that piss-poor experience)
Posted: Mon 21 April, 2008 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Domestic, Driving, Five Year Plan (now Ten), Getting Organised, Own Business, Work-related |
So, in a fairly busy morning I’ve:
- Sorted out the business account, and started the process for getting it all up and running
- Had one of the front wheels replaced on the car
- Finally posted off a couple of letters it’d taken me ages to write
- Posted off my 2007/8 Tax Return (Yes, Recorded Delivery)
- Confirmed an interview for Friday
and
- Driven in to work
There’s a lot more stuff in the offing at the moment (and a site to finish off tonight/tomorrow) but at least progress is being made on a number of fronts.
Not a bad start to the week, really.
Posted: Mon 21 April, 2008 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Five Year Plan (now Ten), Getting Organised, Own Business |
So this morning I’m sorting out a bank account for the business. It’s taken some time to organise (and the worry is that the bank haven’t actually sent me the meeting confirmation, I’ve just realised) so I just hope that it all works out well in the end.
Following on from this, and getting everything set up at this point, I then need to sort out business insurance as well, but that’s the joys of business.
And at least I’ve also got my tax return done now for the 2007/8 Tax Year. So things are all shaping up as we go along. I’ll probably write more once the bank meeting is over and done with.
Posted: Sat 19 April, 2008 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Five Year Plan (now Ten), Own Business, Thoughts, Work-related, Writing |
A couple of weeks back, I was having a conversation with a friend about what we’d do if we were to ever become lucky, and win the National Lottery. (Or any other ‘big money’ concept – so long as it resulted in having a large amount of money) At the time, I said I would probably just keep on working (after a small holiday) and that’s still true – I’d want to be doing my own stuff, and have the ability to not worry if no money came in for a few months, so I could spend time getting things to work out properly.
But then I thought about it a bit, and something else occurred to me. If I had that much money, I’d be able to do the other thing I’ve always wanted to. I’d still want to do my own thing – the writing, the photography, and almost certainly the websites – but I’d also do something completely different.
I’d take the time out from working (other than the bits I want to do, of course) and go do a university course in zoology. And then I’d go to do unpaid (or bare-minimum paid) work at either a zoo or down at Monkey World in Dorset, which has been my long-term dream for at least the last fifteen years. Which is a scary amount of time for one ideal role.
It’s something that I could only really consider if I had the money behind me to manage the course – which involves not really working (in paid employment) for at least two to three years. And that’s only going to happen by me either working my ass off and building up the finances to that level, or by winning a significant amount somewhere along the line.
In the end I know that a Lottery win isn’t going to happen – it’s something that’s so open to chance, the probabilities are too high for anything to base plans on – but the working plans are still coming through, and who knows, something might work there. At the end of the day, it only needs one idea to go big, and I’m sorted.
So – what would be your dream? And how would you go about getting there?
Posted: Mon 31 December, 2007 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Animals, Domestic, Five Year Plan (now Ten), Getting Organised, House Purchase, House Work, Own Business, Thoughts, Work-related |
In a lot of ways, 2007 has been a very long year – yet in others it seems to have raced past.
It’s been a year of many changes too – just before 2007, we moved to Norfolk, and now we’ve bought a place there too. So two moves in thirteen months, as well as doing the initial preparation on the new place (and continuing to do other work on it since moving in) and the work on the garden, and getting a mortgage for the first time, along with a whole bundle of bits that make me look a whole lot more grown-up than I did this time last year. Oh yeah, and three chickens.
Along the way, I’ve managed to stay in the same workplace all year, but also done a whole bundle of work for smaller clients, which has (in general) gone really well, with the exception of payment hassles from one client. But all told, a busy and fairly successful year, which will be the foundation for a lot of work in 2008. I’m going to be changing main workplaces in 2008 as well, but that’s something for another post.
During the year I’ve also bought my first car, and already added 15,000 miles to it – and there’s already a lot more driving planned for 2008, including a trip to Ireland in June, which reminds me, I must check my car insurance policy at some point and double-check the mileage on it, as well as the cover for non-UK driving. Still, that’s something for Jan 2nd, or sometime soon after.
It’s been a busy year, and I think 2008 will be busier – but hopefully a bit calmer at the same time. Lots of things to do, but the plan is definitely to have more leisure time (or at least time to get out and do other stuff) too, so let’s see how that goes. I’m vaguely optimistic…
Posted: Sun 9 December, 2007 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Five Year Plan (now Ten), Getting Organised, Introspective, Work-related |
At the moment it’s looking like my contract in Cambridge is coming to an end – they haven’t actually told me either way yet, but as it comes closer and closer to the end of the month, the likelihood of it finishing is becoming more real. Not that I’m bothered, to be honest – it’s about time for me to move on, but I could stay there another couple of months if I had to, too. At the moment it’s one of those *shrug* decisions – I don’t honestly mind whether I stay or go.
But while they can’t decide, it means that my CV starts doing the rounds again, and I find myself wondering where’s (and what’s) next.
It’s not an uncommon thought, to be honest – and I know I’ve written about it before- (Probably several times – I just can’t be chuffed to check) but I also find myself coming back to the question of “Is this what I actually want to do?” And at the moment, the answer comes back “No”. The problem arises from the fact that I don’t really know what I actually do want to do for a living. Well that’s not true either – it’s more that I know the things I’d like to be able to do for a living, but there’s a whole shitload of work to do to break me in to those areas before I can change.
So for the moment I know I’ve got to keep on with what I do, and see how things progress. At the same time, I need to work hard towards the things I do want to do as I go on. And really that’s the plan. I know what I want to do, what I want to be, and now I “just” need to work towards those goals.
[Quick Update: The contract is now likely to extend to the end of Jan, but on a seriously reduced number of days, so if I can find something new that’ll be a good thing too.]
Posted: Sat 24 November, 2007 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Five Year Plan (now Ten), Own Business, Thoughts, Work-related |
Back in May 2006, I launched the first version of Where’s Good, which I planned/hoped would be a restaurant review site where people could become reviewers, recommend their favourite places to other people, and possible organise events and meetups based around those places.
To date, it really hasn’t worked out all that well. It’s a nice idea (or at least I think so, and so did some of the people I spoke to at the time) but it just hasn’t taken off. There are a couple of other ‘restaurant review’ sites around now, such as Hardens (which seems to be getting most of the business) but at the same time there were a couple of others that were due to launch around the same time as Where’s Good, but have never got past the holding-page stage. (For example, the Where Shall We Eat site, which just never seems to have done anything.)
Now, I’m not laying the blame at any/everyone else’s door for the lack of success – in fairness I’m the primary culprit. Where’s Good is a good concept (I think) but the design is frankly bad, and while it all works and works nicely (and fast) I suspect it just hasn’t got the right feel or interface.
In short, I need to do some work on it. (Wow, that’s becoming some kind of mantra for me at the moment) I need to have a think about how to make it work better and how to make it more appealing.
I think that I’m probably going to relaunch it in the first quarter of 2008, (i.e. between January and March) although I could wait ’til May, and do it on the anniversary of the initial launch and see what happens. In the meantime I need to figure out a lot of things about the site, including how to pimp the bloody thing out to the world. Well OK, probably initially to the UK, with potential for expansion.
In the process, I’ll be aiming (of course) to keep the sixty-odd reviews that *are* in the system – no point starting from absolute scratch again, after all, but most probably with a bundle of new ideas, a new design and the same old concept.
We’ll see.