Weekly Roundup - Gangs of London

Watching: Gangs of London
Reading: The Hunting Party by Lucy Foley

Tue 28 Apr

14:00

I started this week's diary late. I could backtrack and think about what I did yesterday but as Nessa would say, ‘if truth be told, I can’t be arsed.’ I’ve been time-blocking again. It’s the only way I shift stuff. To-do lists don’t work. We’re gonna die with a to-do list. That’s a fact of life. It’s about progression for me. To stay motivated we have to have a sense of accomplishment at the end of the day. Then we’re motivated for the following day. We feel good. The way to do this for me is to work in blocks of time. So it’s the time you are ticking off rather than the task. So for any given project, let’s say one of my projects is to edit a music video (Which it currently is), my estimation is it’ll take around 10 hours of editing. So I time block 2 hours each day for that purpose. Then once the two hours are up, I tick that off. Progression.

17:00

Got to call Claire in a bit. She’s baking like crazy. She was a bit annoyed today cos she burnt her sourdough bread. That’s a process and a half making that break. She gives me the full rundown. There’s something so special about cooking. It’s pure creativity, isn’t it?

Started watching Gangs of London. Man alive it’s fun. It’s violent. It’s very very violent. And it’s fun. The fight scenes are borderline John Wick. If you’re in any way queasy of spirit when claret is being spilled - steer well clear of this one. 

Spoke to Mum. Sophia is messaging me pics of the dresses I asked her to bring for the little fashion shoot I’m doing with her on Friday.

21:53

Took 38 minutes to defrost 4 chicken breasts. Mental. Listened to Gervais twitter live. Gonna sneak in an episode or two of Gangs of London.

I sent the guys a rough draft, ungraded, of the Heartless Music video. (Second Single video I’m putting together). Still waiting on the footage from Jay and Lewis. Jay hasn’t got a drum-kit where he’s locked down so we’re having to improvise.

Got a shit load done anyway. Sophia and Louise are back tomorrow.

Wed 29 Apr

Man alive. One more day left in April. Woke up late. Boris has had a daughter. Good luck to the fellow - a little milky bar kid on the firm. Head feels as dizzy as fck today. Need to clear it. Shower. Water is a wonderful thing. Shower song of choice - a bit of Coldplay - yellow. There’s stuff I sing in the shower that’d I’d never sing in real life. Some things are best kept secret and liking the odd Coldplay song is one of them.

15:05

Sophia and Louis arrived back about an hour ago. They’ve bought the pigeon with them - little woody. It’s a little orphan Sophia rescued from the wrath of a renegade cat. They’ve been nursing it back to health for about a month. It’s cute as anything. She showed me how to feed it. It pecks like a good-un. There’s a bog-roll challenge thing going on with the Heartless mob on instastorys. I get nominated. Luckily I’d done one a few weeks back for TikTok. Don’t ask. I throw that in.

16:37

Working on a keyword list for this new website. Lists lists lists.

Time out. It’s 21:36. I must have drunk 10 cups of tea today. Not good. Running out of food so going to have to venture out in the next day or so. We had spag bol for dinner. Woody the pigeon had mashed broccoli. He was loving it. I’m gonna bang on an episode of Gangs of London and get my head down.

I need to tighten the reigns on working each day for four hours on my most important project. I’m not quite sure what that is. Generating income in the short term in some way. I’ve a few ideas. I’ll take some time out tomorrow to figure out what my priority project is and block a big chunk of time out to take care of it each day for the next month.

Finished Gangs of London. It didn’t disappoint. It’s the kind of show the UK has been promising to put out for years. I didn’t realise until reading up but the show is directed by the guy that did ‘The Raid’ films which I also loved. It accounts for all the violence as those films were proper mayhem too.

Thu 30 Apr

22:20

Up a little late today. Fed Woody the pigeon with Sophia. He’d shat in his box and decided to jump out and go for a little walk around the kitchen.

Miscellaneous Hour. One of the things I’ve started doing recently is to have a miscellaneous hour in the morning where I block several things that are under 10 mins together in an hourly block and take care of them first. It’s usually 2-3 things I’ve got lying around from the previous few days. I also throw in a 10-minute social commenting block where I get in to the newsfeeds and leave a few special comments. I’m not rushing this. One or two quality comments are fine rather than lobbing a load of ‘great shot’ grenades on the newsfeed.

Long day. Mom dropped off some chicken and a frozen bottle of milk. Milk looks weird when it’s frozen. Spag bol (again) for lunch. Sophia had a tutor zoom at 4 pm. The leads for the iPhones are buggered. They’ve gone all temperamental. You have to figure out which way round to connect them. I also have a wireless mouse that also uses the same cable and it keeps dying. Driving me bananas as I want to get shit done. Still - It’s niggly stuff. No big deal in the scheme of things.

Our world can become kind of small in lockdown have you noticed? You watch the news and it jolts you back into reality and then you crack on with your day and the most ridiculous little things niggle you.

Fri 01 May

22:01

A new month. A hugely significant historical event. That is what we’re all living through. Its crazy when you slow down and think about it.

Out of food. Took a walk to the garage. It’s funny the gear you put on, gloves, mask, etc, to enter a shop - 4 months ago you’d probably have gotten yourself arrested for attempted robbery wearing such a get-up. Theres a lot of idiots around. It’s kind of damage limitation. We’re fighting a corona virus and we’re fighting a bunch of idiots. No masks, ok, fair enough, but wear a pair of gloves at least you vegetable brained thought wanting morons. I feel in some way like we’re carrying these idiots. We’re doing all this work, staying home, taking the necessary precautions only for these spanners to be walking around like nothings going on.

Got some bread and some treats. I’ll have to do a semi proper shop at some stage.

Didn’t get much work done today. Still waiting on one of the guys from the band to get some footage to me for the Heartless video.

Booked a doorstep shoot this evening. Came through my friend Lesley. It’s for a dancer so should be fun.

Watched Fantastic Beasts 2 with Sophia. It’s ok for gloss and fireworks but not a patch on the original Harry Potter films.

Gonna put Sophia to bed and probably watch something else.

Going to vlog tomorrow - a little fashion shoot with Sophia.

I’ve been reading a bit of Jack Kerouac of late. I must have read ‘On the Road’ a dozen times over in passages over the years without ever actually having read the book. Odd. I love Kerouac's approach to writing as just write it the fuck down. No matter what comes up just write that stuff and don’t edit yourself. That’s pretty much my daily journal anyway.