Tales from a dog named Tescos.

The temptation to write "Tails" in the title was nearly too much to bear.

Hello you!
I'd like to tell you a little bit about my newly discovered love of organisation and all things organised.

I know what you are thinking. "But C.J! You the most disorganised person I know!"

Yes. I am.

I have attention issues, there is always some really cool website to be dicking around on, I am frequently re-adjusting my underwear and thinking about yet not writing the album that pours my heart and soul onto glorious .wav format. It is for these reasons that I have decided to take matters into my own grubby hands.
My attention span is so bad that when I saw the drawing of the attention horse on Scott Coello's (excellent by the way) Cribble.net my first thought was
"I NEED ONE OF THOSE!"


Another factor leading up to my newly discovered love of organisation was that my good friend and co-host of Liquid Inspiration Podcast the self styled man about town without pants Bromley Daz has recently given up smoking. Now my default reaction in past years has always been a negative one in this situation. I have made comments about how "That last cigarette was so good it makes me want to strangle baby seals and hump Jessica Alba"
or "That last cigarette was so good it makes me want to strangle baby seals whilst humping Jessica Alba" and on one occasion
"That last cigarette was so good it makes me want to strangle Jessica Alba and hump baby seals".
Although I was charmingly inebriated when I said that last one...
...I think.
Anyway my point is that this time I realise that Old Dazzer has made a new years resolution and unlike the new years resolutions most people make he is actually going through with it to the bitter, bitter, crabby, grouchy, bitter end.
I belive that this move by him was a catalyst for what I was about to do next.
Unlike previous form I decided to completely support his decision to be a bit better smelling, slighty financially better off and a rampant homosexual.
Quite out of charicter for me to do so but it got me thinking.
Perhaps it was a good time for me to reflect on the things that I feel I could change for the better in my life. That is a list as long as my leg. A sample:

*Lose festive weight.
*Get hair trimmed.
*Adjust underwear.
*Tidy bedroom.
*Write blog post.
*Lose pre-festive weight.
*Sort out car.
*Adjust underwear.
*Comment on Gus Greeper.com.
*Organise mp3s.

This reads as nothing more than a to do list. A to do list that will...
eventually... get done... eventually.

Enter this stories hero: Mr Merlin Mann


"How does this chair surfing, bespectacled, sweater wearing chancer help you?" Is something you may ask in your head whilst reading this with one eye and gawking at your Twitterfox with the other. Possibly.
He has helped me in several ways.
One thing that happened two nights ago was absolutely genius! And I don't mean like iTunes genius or anything.
Actual genius that actually WORKS!
I listened one of the many 43 Folders Podcasts which was a talk that Merlin did for google about something called Inbox Zero.
I then went over to 43 Folders.com and found a message stating:
"it’d be swell if you wanted to share the video of the Inbox Zero talk via your own blog or web site. Here’s the copy-and-paste embed code:"
How refreshing! Seriously! How many people would willingly share their stuff around all willy and indeed nilly? Answer? Not that many.
And so, because he invited me to do so in such a nice way:



Did you enjoy that?

I don't care.

I enjoyed it and for the purposes of this tale that is all that counts.
I have had the same email account since 2005. It normally takes me between 15 to 30 minutes to check new email and reply to the old ones. This new idea seemed like one that could apply to me.
So sure enough two nights ago in just under an hour and a half I deleted 4'500 emails, archived 200 of them and sat back in awe of the glow of an empty email inbox.
This got me thinking:

a)"What other advice this man(n) can give me?"

and:

b)"Can this email solution be applied to my life in other ways?"

Just as option 'b)' popped into my head I saw this post... It was like my mind was being read, questions answered, problems solved and then being posted 5 years ago online with by a bloke with a great sense of humour. It literally blew my mind.

Up until now I have only ever been aware of Merlin on the excellent
You Look Nice Today podcast.

And whilst I am clearly running the risk of sounding like an enormous pompous brown noser, I humbly suggest that whilst everyone feverishly downloads lots of episodes you absolutly must include the episode entitled "Where Is the Ham?" as I belive that it was that particular show that made me want to get into podcasting when I grow up.

Again for evidence that I won't be growing up any time soon please visit www.liquidinspirationpodcast.com.

So that's it.

Thank you Merlin.

And Thank you for reading.




"Um… this is a little rant of mine that I’m gonna quickly go through. I have this theory… I dunno if you wanna call this blogging, personal publishing, insert-your-favorite-gerund for putting things on the web that you made. There’s a controlling metaphor for this that means a lot to me, and it’s… I tried to write this down in a way that’s clear, so I’ll read this.
Topic times voice. Or, if you’re a little bit more of a maverick, obsession times voice." - Merlin Mann 2009