Tag Archive for 'Sustainability'

Welcome to the Kindo Beta release!

Published
by
Gareth Knight
on 2007/9/7
in GTD and Productivity
. 3 Comments

This has been a long time coming, and it feels good to finally get there, albeit with a mountain still to climb!!!
Personal reflective blog post to follow soon…

A little while ago we released an Alpha to a small group of people, to gather valuable user feedback. Thanks to those great people, we’ve had our heads down improving Kindo, and as a result we’re releasing the Beta, and at the same time opening it up to a wider audience for more feedback.

We’ve made the following progress:

  1. Kindo is much faster now
  2. The Kindo tree is now much more stable and knowledgable
  3. You can invite family members to your tree
  4. Many more user interface improvements and enhancements
    • *Note: we’re continually adding more, so please tell us about things you think should work better or be more obvious.
  5. The internet is global now, so we’re releasing in 7 languages:
    • English, French, German, Spanish, Italian, Swedish, Afrikaans, Polish; with Russian, Turkish, Hindi, Hebrew and Arabic on the way.

Our mantra has become “Speed, Simple, Pleasure“, so in a nutshell that means we’re always trying to make Kindo faster for you, simpler, more intuitive and perhaps most importantly a pleasure to use.

Our new URL is http://beta.kindo.com/.

What can we do to make Kindo better?
If you dont like it – tell us why.
If you do like it – what are you missing?
Join the conversation on our blog, we’d love to hear your opinion.

Don’t worry – the same login details apply, and your data is all still there.

Have fun!

Heard of the “Bili Ape” at all?

Published
by
Gareth Knight
on 2007/7/25
in Uncategorized
. 0 Comments

Was chatting to Tim recently and he brought this up, looks pretty interesting… Not sure what to make of it, but I sure as hell don’t doubt there are still things we haven’t discovered yet, especially in a place like the Congo or the Amazon… Wonder what we’ll be saying about this in a few years?

_ Bili Ape - Wikipedia
Bili Ape, also Bondo Mystery Ape, is the name given to a large primate that is said to inhabit Bili Forest in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

_ Mail on Sunday article
Some locals say they are eight feet tall and weigh 20 stone. Others claim they are even bigger, equipped with huge flesh-ripping teeth and muscles capable of dismembering a man.

Forest dwellers have told visiting explorers and scientists of a ferocious grey ape, with the cunning of a chimpanzee and the power and size of a gorilla - and a taste for meat rather than the shrubbery loved by most apes.

_ The not so silly Bili Ape
The Dark Continent may yet harbour secrets long after its opening up by Western explorers. Karl Shuker examines the evidence for an unknown species of great ape reported in the jungles of the Congo.

Hat tip to Tim Shultz

Naked CEO series: work life balance and health/fitness at a startup

Published
by
Gareth Knight
on 2007/5/15
in Productivity
. 5 Comments

I’ve got 10 mins to write this so I’ll keep this as short and brief as possible ;-)

I’m really struggling with this work life balance and exercise thing. I’m totally cool with where I am regards the amount of work I’m doing, and the hours I’m putting in, ‘cos I’m working towards something. But that’s another conversation altogether.

Point is that at this stage, I’m really trying hard to get exercise into my daily schedule. I find the benefits of even 3 sessions a week massively worth it. More than that and my body feels like a different beast. When I was younger I played a pretty competitve level of sport, so I really do miss that physical exertion thing.

The main problem apart from actually doing it, is doing it at the right time. I’m not really a morning person, but I’m told that exercising in the morning is better for a few things, so have bought into that. Problem is that when you’re getting to bed at 12 at night, and waking up at 6am (latest to make it possible) to go to gym, then get to work by 8, you’re only getting 6 hours of sleep, more like 5 hours with actually getting to sleep factored in. Not good, and defo not sustainable.

So the other option is to do gym in the evening after work, which I like as it means that after a long hard day you can go to gym and really work out any frustrations/demons/backaches, and there are enerally more women in the gym too ;-) Problem here is that you end up going to bed later (like I am now) as you’re only really getting home around 8/8:30, which means you’re only able to get work started by 9 earliest, which means at best you get 3 hours in before 12 and bedtime. I don’t personally like this much as it means I’m still wide awake when I should be sleeping - my brain doesn’t switch off unless I encourage it to.

Still, both of the above are better than staying at the office until the last tube (which I’ve done more times than I can remember, and have vowed not to do again!), as then you lose supper, exercise, contact with human beings, although you might actually get more work done.

My big problem is that I’ve figured out through many weeks and months and years of batting my head against my metabolism, that I actually do need at least 7 hours of sleep, preferably 8, at this stage of my life, to function properly and not enter into zombie Gareth mode. And sleep is something that I want to safeguard as much as possible as I’m starting to consider it as a cornerstone of being productive and efficient.

So, this is basically a monologue, where it looks like the answer has come out through conversation with myself, which is also another reason why I enjoy blogging!

I’m gonna aim to go to gym by 7/7:30am, get to work by 8:30/9am, which I’ll try tomorrow. If I can’t make it ‘cos I’m too tired, I sleep more, and go to gym in the evening. If I can make it before work, then I have gottten exercise out of the way, and will have more time in the evening for other stuff, or just plain more work, so either way I should be able to keep the number of hours of sleep consistent, as well as regular exercise. Wonder what a good session on the guns in the morning will feel like at lunchtime! ;-)

Key here is to get that regular sleep, and to get that regular exercise, whatever it takes.
I’m gonna try my best to get the above into a daily habit (27 repetitions of the action I think is what is needed), now that I’ve talked about this publicly, and have to do something about it! Today was day 1.

Has anyone else found any other systems / approaches that work? Would love to hear as I’m sure there are loads of tricks that would help… Like putting your gym bag in the doorway before you go to sleep!

Naked CEO series: Taking stock of where you are

Published
by
Gareth Knight
on 2007/5/9
in Uncategorized
. 0 Comments

A long time ago, a older man gave a younger man an axe, and told him to go and tend to his own forest to make sure he had enough wood for his fires in the winter.

So the younger man went to the forest and began cutting the trees in the right place, to make sure they grew back again. Sure enough, other woodcutters were attracted to the sound of the younger man chopping wood, so they joined him in the chopping of trees.

After a time, the woodcutters were so busy cutting trees, that they forgot to count how many logs they had cut, or to check where they were. When they counted, they found they had plenty, and when the looked to see where they were, they found they were deep inside the forest, far away from any other woodcutters.

~~~

Just had an IM conversation with a client, who has reminded me that taking stock is very important. I’ve realised that we’re so focussed on the present and the future, that we’ve not looked back at our successes and acknowledged them for what they are.

I’m not going to go into detail here, ‘cos now is not the time and the place, and I need to go to sleep, but suffice it to say, we’ve grown incredibly fast, and actually taking stock of it all in the last hour, I’ve realised that for all of the speed wobbles and growing pains were going through, they far, far, far outweigh the alternatives.

And for that my friends, I am glad.

The naked CEO

Published
by
Gareth Knight
on 2007/4/26
in Uncategorized
. 0 Comments

I’m an entrepreneur, technologist and environmentalist. I’m also passionate about Africa, Africans, photography, open source stuff, and the web. I play hockey for fun. I believe we’re at a critical juncture in human evolution. I try constantly to be more productive. This is my blog where I talk about all these things, some more than others.

Just thought I’d get that out that way - hate it when people put other people in boxes. Never really fitted into boxes.

So as a follow up to this post about being a Naked CEO, I’ve exercised my right to change my mind after more deliberation, and have decided that henceforth, this blog will be about my experiences and thoughts (dirty laundry will be aired here - iron fist). The Technovated blog will be about Technovated (velvet glove), the business I started and am now lucky enough to be a part of, and what we’re doing there. There’s going to be a lot to talk about there over the coming months… ;-)

So, next post is about a frustration I’m having…

Craftsmanship

Published
by
Gareth Knight
on 2007/4/25
in Uncategorized
. 0 Comments

Just seen this on the Vanilla blog:

It ain’t about the dollar,
or tryin’ to go fast,
if you don’t take pride
in what you’re doing
you won’t last.
Craftsmanship:
it’s a quality that some lack.
You’ve gotta give people a reason
for them to come back.
Buck 65

It’s significance portends things to come…

PS - Buck65 is worth listening to if you get the chance…

Getting things done and keeping peace of mind in a growing business

Published
by
Gareth Knight
on 2007/4/11
in GTD and Productivity
. 0 Comments

So today I was in meetings most of the day, but apart from some interesting project meetings, a discussion about the naked CEO came up, and I got inspired. So I’ve written up two blog posts and decided to alter my perspectives on blogging as a person, a business founder, a businessman, a project and account manager and a coder. The last two years have been an interesting ride so far, so I’m going to talk about the past probably here as that makes sense and it’s generally retrospective stuff that I’m interested in as lessons for the future. Today and tomorrow I’ll talk about on the Technovated blog/site, with a mind to talking about daily perpectives that are either interesting or useful to others.

~~~
For now, my absolute frustration is with the whole GTD concept in general - no matter how much I try, how many emails I answer, how many calls I make, how late I stay up to work, nothing seems to bring me closer to Nirvana.

I should be in bed getting my beauty sleep, should have blogged earlier! We’re (brother and I) almost moved out of our house in Wimbledon Park now, so in a weeks time I’ll either be dossing on someone’s couch, or in a new house. Sitting on the floor with a hot laptop warming your bollocks is not ideal!

My only solace is that through the application of the 80/20 principle and an almost religious fervour towards making sure I keep a record of what I have to do, I’m able to make sure that the most importat stuff at any one time is being dealt with. I WANT everything to be done so that on a Sunday or an evening like this evening, I can think about other stuff without that nagging little devil called work on my left shoulder.

Sometimes I think GTD is a great idea in principle, but in a growing business with different systems for different people, it’s almost unattainable. So, I keep my lists, I keep focussing on the important things, and I keep my reminding myself that nothing will ever be totally finished. There will always be emails in my Inbox, and always more project actions to do - so I guess the best I can advise myself to do it to just deal with that and get used to it, ‘cos it aint gonna change! (unless I get Doris, but that’s another story).

So, what do you do to keep peace? How are you managing the growth of your business? What’s your secret?

The pain of blogging

Published
by
Gareth Knight
on 2007/3/15
in GTD and Productivity
. 0 Comments

It seems an age since I last blogged regularly. I mean, I used to live blogging. I love the ideal of it, the ability to communicate with anyone anywhere in the world with access to the internet, the way the long tail brings you together with people in a way that you never thought entirely possible. I love the application of blogging too - support tool, notification tool, reminder tool, news tool, memory tool, family tool, community tool, collaboration tool - and in each of these ways I’ve missed the contact I used to get every day through blogging.

People used to laugh at me and ask me why I blogged - “What’s the point?” they’d say; “Who’s reading your blog?” thay’d ask; and so it went on and on and on. I just smiled and told them that it was more for me than anything else. The catharcism of blogging is unique in human existence I think. When else were we as individuals able to communicate with so many of our own kind at the click of a “Publish” button? That was my excuse and I’m sticking to it. [ As an aside, to all the doubting Thomas', today I can honestly say that I have a business, doing more business than I could have ever imagined a year ago, with two partners I would have given my left testicle to work with a year ago, doing the kind of work that I love doing, because I blogged. Put that in your pipe and take a deep breath ;-) Blogging works. ]

I used to just read and absorb as much as I could, and then simply point to it. My blog was only useful to people who wanted to find the kind of stuff that I was pointing to. Now, when I do blog, I try to make my blogging useful in it’s own right. There are loads of people pointing so why add to the noise? If you are any good with a search engine these days, you shouldn’t need a pointer - blogs are indexed so regularly now that if you use the right search phrase and you’re specific enough, you go right to the source - so I’m not going to try point anymore unless it’s really something I think you might benefit from, especially if it’s a bit of humour, or something I’ve got first heads up on ;-)

The pain is that good blogging takes time. It’s time consuming because to write something good takes something out of you, and it requires that you think before you write. At the moment, everything I have is being poured into my business to get to where we want to be, so I have little left to give outside of getting sleep, going to gym and running, eating properly, and having a small semblance of a normal social life. I don’t bemoan it, but I do feel guilty for not blogging more than I would like to.

The greater pain is that I have started to realise what I can blog about, where I can actually offer something of value to readers, and the ideas that pop into my head all the time are all great blog posts, but they need time. And like any good cobbler, I’m so busy that I’d rather not blog, than blog something half-arsed and half-conceived.

What do you think?

Anyways, this is a brain fart. I’ve got about 20 mins before I need to catch the last tube home, so I thought I’d post something for a change, and it’s been really cool just letting the words come out. The good news is that I’m starting to change my role within the business, so that I do less code & project management, and more communication, so hopefully that will lead to more regular posts about good stuff. I also need to introduce you to Doris, and I’m really looking forward to that.

Adios for now ;-)

Tech 4 Africa - Gaining momentum

Published
by
Gareth Knight
on 2006/11/28
in Uncategorized
. 9 Comments

Technology for Africa '07

And so it begins…. We’ve started getting some really good feedback for the Tech 4 Africa conference (last check we were up to about 30 replies after a day or so of being up and emailing to an initial beta group for testing) which has totally surpassed our expectations. When the automated notification emails started coming in, you shoulda heard the shouts of joy! ;-)

Almost surprisingly, the feedback has been along the lines we were expecting:
people would be willing to go to JHB,
wanna know about stuff around web2.0 primarily,
want to hear international speakers, and
think the conference would benefit the African web community.

On top of that, we’re getting some good coverage on the blogosphere so far:
Update as of 27/11/2006:
David Duarte
Cowboysengines (business site: http://www.virtualworks.co.za/index.asp)
Hash @ Whiteafrican.com
Update as of 28/11/2006:
Coda.co.za
Scott.za.net
Muti.co.za
http://digitalafrica.blogspot.com/

Anyone else we don’t know about yet? (If you’re going to blog about it, then please use the following Technorati tags: tech4africa07,T4A7 or T4A)

Which is all good. ;-)

Some people have asked why we’re not just launching with dates and relying on “if you build it they will come” to make it a success - in short, 2 reasons:
1. We are speaking to some really, really high profile international speakers, who naturally want to allocate time to a conference on the other side of the world if they feel there are going to be enough people to make it worthwhile. We’ve invested the time up front to collect some real data, that goes beyond a thumbsuck, to show we’re serious.
2. We believe that business rules should apply - we need to at least break even, and we need to justify further time put into the project, so it makes sense that without real data we can’t make any assumptions beyond that we reckon 10 - 20% of people we email should respond to the initial email asking for feedback.

So, if you’re reading this and haven’t filled in the feedback form on the site then please do, just to prove us wrong ;-) The more data and feedback we have, the more likely we are to actually hold the event and make it something truly special!

I’ve also been asked what I’d personally like to see at the conference, so for posterity, here goes:
1. Web app dev in Africa - what it takes, how to do it, what markets are ripe
2. How the web can help Africa lift itself up - technologies that come into play, mindsets that need to change, strategies that work
3. What Africans need to do to compete internationally - once we’ve gotten over the bandwidth issue, what needs to happen for Africans to create more Thawte’s and PayPals.
4. What web 2.0 really means for business - technologies, trends, people -> how can it be leveraged?
All underscored by a good vibe, good music, good networking, and some good ‘ol fashioned fun of course ;-)

If you want to stay tuned to what’s happening, then watch this blog, and/or our business’ blog category wev’e setup for the conference (yes, I know the theme is still default K2 - something about the cobblers shoes I think…;-( - so it will change soon enough, as well as being an addition to our shiny new site which is being designed as we speak).

Also, we’ve been asked what to do if folks are interested in helping out:
1. Email us to say so whether you think you can help with something small or big - the more help we get the better - and we’d really appreciate it. Up front, we don’t have cash to pay people now, but as and when that happens then we’re all about getting the right help, so that may be an option. Right now, telling 10 of your mates would be the best help in the world!.. and…
2. Blog it - please blog it and help to moibilise the troops ;-)
3. If you have a speaker you would really like to hear, then please do email us to say so - being able to tell speakers they’ve been asked for by people is good motivation for them!

Cool - more soon - time to go to bed ;-)

TECH4FRICA 2007 - Technology for Africa: A web and emerging technology conference

Published
by
Gareth Knight
on 2006/11/22
in Uncategorized
. 1 Comment

We’ve been a long time in preparation for this, and it’s taken a huge amount of work to get to this point, but I’m happy to say that we’ve launched the site for the TECH4FRICA 2007 - Technology for Africa: A web and emerging technology conference, and we’re starting to mail the people we know to tell them about it…

Here’s the blurb for ya!:
We’re trying to figure out whether there is demand for a web and technology conference in Southern Africa, and we’d really appreciate your help if you can spare a few minutes.

What’s the big idea?
We’re convinced that there should be web and technology growth in Southern Africa, so we’re really interested in getting together a bunch of leading, internationally respected speakers and thinkers from the industry to discuss what’s happening and what’s possible.

Some of the things we’d like you to get out of the conference:

* Hear international speakers and authors presenting in your own back yard.
* Discuss what the global web and technology opportunities are over the next 5 years
* Understand what technologies are making the biggest impact
* Thrash out how the web can positively play a role in the development of (Southern) Africa
* Create a fun, informative event where you can meet and interact with other people like you

Call for feedback
Of course, there are loads more things that are important and that could be discussed, so this is why we’re asking for your feedback – we’re committed to a bottom up conference where you get value for money, you make new friends, and where you walk away inspired.

Let’s hear from you
Tell us what you think by filling out the questionnaire below. Stay tuned, and tell your friends! We’re looking forward to seeing you in 2007. We won’t sell, trade, or abuse your data. We’ll only email you if you express interest in attending this conference.

And that’s it!

Tell us what you think by filling in the questionnaire at:
http://www.technologyforafrica.org/

Also, please tell as many people as you can, blog it, add the site to http://del.icio.us, http://digg.com (and others like Reddit and Newsvine), and tag it for http://technorati.com/.

Losing my mojo, then finding my flow again

Published
by
Gareth Knight
on 2006/11/9
in GTD and Productivity
. 7 Comments

If you’ve spent any time on this blog at all, you’ll know that I’m a passionate blogger who likes to talk about pretty much anything that takes my interest. You would also have noticed that things have been pretty scant around here primarily because yours truly has decided that for the last little while, blogging has been a secondary priority to building a business. In about 9 months I’ve gone from being a web contractor/freelancer guy to a business owner with salaries to pay and clients to deal with on a daily basis.

A little background…
In my career so far I’ve been a part of precisely 5 startups, of which this is the 5th and the one in which I have the most to lose. Of those startups, one has been wildly successful, one I walked away from as a co-founder after 6 months or so, one was shut down by the owner after he realised he was losing money hand over fist, and one was killed by the owner through unnecessary spending and doing unto others as you wouldn’t want have done unto you.

I guess it’s in my nature to work in the agile, startup culture, ‘cos I like the speed, flexibility, ability to change direction and try new things, as well as the potential to learn massively, sometimes well before your time.

Today I received my forms from the UK companies house – basically I have to send them a whole bunch of information – which isn’t really important to you at all, except that it reinforces that I’ve made the first year of being in business, and that I’m not one of those 80% first year casualties of business that everyone hears about.

Most importantly we’re building a team of crack web professionals (who in past history would have been ninjas) where we’re planning on making everyone a shareholder eventually. It’s damn exciting and heavy stressful at the same time, but I guess that’s the way it goes, and you know what, I wouldn’t have it any other way at all.

Back to the mojo thing…
So, I guess the point is that to make all of this happen, I’ve had to make a few choices, one of which was that blogging became less important than getting client work out, or finding some sleep, and another is that I was only going to blog again when I felt inside that it was right. I think I needed some headspace to figure out where I was going, and how I was going to get there.

To be honest, I’ve not done much reading, browsing or playing with new code toys at all, because I’ve been so busy getting client work out the way, and building some neat things that we’ll be releasing in the near future. What I have done however is consolidate a lot of my thinking about the web at the moment, and what we’re talking to clients about, and what we’re putting into our web apps, and it’s exciting – for the first time in a long time, the weariness is giving way to hope and anticipation, which is a great place to be in.

.. and then finding my flow.
I’m a big believer in the idea (not necessarily the religion) of Zen and the state of no-mind (being “in the zone” to Westerners) that advanced practioners of Zen get to when they’re completely and utterly focussed on the task at hand. For me, finding my flow has meant re-discovering the things that I enjoy about work, and then finding other people to work with, that feel similarly.

Having my head down in client work lately has meant that there was little else to think about bar the next deadline, but now that we’ve grown the team a little, and we’ve gotten on top of our workloads, we’re able to take a step back and recognise that we’ve made good progress (the fruits of which I’ll talk about now) as a result of being in the zone, and in doing that I’ve reached a point where blogging has and will become part of my flow again. This is exciting as I’ve got so much to talk about now I’m almost bursting at the seams.

To give you an idea of what we’ve been working on, in the near future we’ll be launching a web app that I don’t want to say too much about here for now, a business blogging service aimed at making blogging easier for business people, another take at personal bookmarking, and a web and emerging technology conference in (Southern) Africa (website still being tweaked and tested) where we’ve got some really good international speakers lined up. On top of that we’re going to be launching a web 2.0 dating site with a client, and helping Seagull become the leading PHP web app framework/platform. Additionally, I’m hoping to find another 2 to 4 days in the coming month to get the first public version of the PHP / CSS framework I’ve been working on and using internally for 6 months now, out and into the wild.

Bottom line is, it’s good to be back, and I hope you’ll stick along for the ride ;-)

The monetisation (revenue model) of user generated content?

Published
by
Gareth Knight
on 2006/10/12
in Uncategorized
. 0 Comments

Just posted something over at my (newly setup) business blog, about user generated content:
The monetisation (revenue model) of user generated content?

Would love to hear your thoughts or opinions - we’ve really been racking our brains, and when you look at things pragmatically you think to yourself, “What the hell am I thinking - stop dreaming!” - yet, other people are doing it and making it work, so you kinda get on your horse and say “well if they can do it then I shure as hell can do it” - know what I mean?

So I guess it’s an exercise in discovering what your users need, and what they would pay for, so that you can make your service sustainable, and they still get value.

Would really appreciate any comments / thoughts ;-)

Rest in Peace Steve, we’re going to miss you…

Published
by
Gareth Knight
on 2006/9/5
in General
. 0 Comments

As a zoologist, I was always enraptured by Steve Irwin, and his approach to conservation in general. His death is a great loss to everyone, and makes me sad - one wonders what he would have gone on to do given the opportunity, but also realises what he had already contributed in such a short time.

Rest in Peace Steve…

The going on holiday post, updater, and the next few months

Published
by
Gareth Knight
on 2006/8/18
in General and Productivity
. 0 Comments

So here I am - it’s almost 3 in the morning, the morning before I’m due to go on a short holiday to Greece and Turkey, and I’m still working. My Mom told me to get a few early nights before leaving, so that I could start to unwind… no such luck.

Such has been life of late, although I dare say it’s of my own making. The problem is that I enjoy what I do so much, that I don’t really count the hours as much as I used to - it’s a funny state of affairs.

So here’s the updater…

One of the casualties of the last few weeks has been this blog, so I’m sorry for the lack of any real meaty posts. But I’m also happy to say that life isn’t about “posting on your blog every day, dude”, but about the peaks and troughs, the swings in the roundabout so to speak, so although I may not have been visibly blogging, I certainly have been running things through in my mind - most of which is fundamental to the next 18 months or so, and thus the quality of blog posts here.

My little freelance / contracter practice has grown bigger and faster than I anticipated, so I’m now paying wages, and going to sleep at night just after I mentally do the books. Anyways, the spin off of this is that I’ve been able to finance the development of the prototype for our first web app, and am lucky to have a good friend and trusty accomplice working with me now to get the web app off the ground and into public beta.

Over the coming months I’ll be looking to grow the team into more of a web SWAT team, and less of a web mini-SWAT team; while still doing the client work I’ve been doing of late (mainly backend stuff, with some consulting and project management sprinkled in for good measure and sanity). I’m also going to be setting up a formal business site for my company, a business blog to discuss business stuff that’s important, and quite possibly moving into new shared offices with some other businesses run by mates of mine. So all in all, the next few months are going to be exciting ones to say the least!

I’m going to Greece tomorrow (I’ve never been) and only now do I feel like the kid in the candy store - if I was any less tired I’d probably feel excited. The upshot is that I’ll get some kip on the plane, and then it’s a week or so of rest, relaxation, sunshine and swimming in the Med. I can’t wait - I only hope that my lilly white ass doesn’t scare too many folks away. I’ve charged my camera batteries, had my Lomo fixed, and have a few black and white spools for the F70, so I’m really looking forward to taking some cool photo’s and just forgetting about work - sometimes I have to pinch myself to remind myself that there’s this whole world out there beyond my monitor, mouse and keyboard…

The only negative thing that I can think of for now is that I am absolutely knackered. I have dark rings under my eyes, my eyes have started twitching again (they do at about 2am), and I constantly feel like there just isn’t any more energy left in the tank. If I allowed myself to, I could fall asleep anywhere and anytime (when I was in university, I mastered the 10 minute catnap between lectures so sleeping on the train is easy), so this holiday is coming at exactly the right time. So my intention is to forget about everything, get some rest, and come back to London with a different approach and renewed vigour.

They say that successful captains know how to re-align the ship onto it’s course when the ship starts to go off course - now I’m not saying that I’ve gone off the rails (hardly, just not sleeping enough!); but just that the last few months have made me realise a few things about myself, and also about the industry I work in, the way I conduct my business, the work ethic I have, and the way I want to live and lead my life.

I’ve kinda come to the conclusion that as an entrepreneur, there simply is no nirvana of a 9-5 work-life balance - it’s not possible unless you have seed capital at least - the only balance you can have is to make sure that you don’t work all the time, you get distracted with other stuff that interests you, and that you maintain your human relationships. So on my return from holiday, I aim to puruse all of the above, rather than to the exclusion of… Playing hockey again soon is going to be cool too (I went to my first fitness session of the season yesterday and my body is aching like it should) ;-)

And that about sums it up - I’ve drawn a blank, have a real need for some shuteye, and can’t think of anything more to add here.

Adios, and seeya on the flip side - if I’ve got a mail from you in my Inbox, it WILL get replied to on my return; if you’re in Greece over the next week, look me up - I’ll be the big guy with white legs on the beach oggling all the skimpy bikini’s… ;-) - and if you’re a blogger, stop blogging, go get some air/sleep/food/interaction with other humans!