Megève’s a stunning place to see Snow and Ice, something I don’t know!

I’ve always wondered what it’s like to be in the Alps in winter. The cold, the snow, the strong biting sun but I’ve never had the chance, until now!

Megève from high up on the slopes

What we call mountains in Australia doesn’t really compare to what is the real alps scattered around the rest of the world. When I finally saw those mountainous rocks piercing the sky on my first visit to Megève in the summer of 1992 for my sister’s wedding I thought to myself, “these are real mountains!” …And as I left I wondered what it would be like in winter.

Now I’ve seen a real winter scene.

Megève at night

Coming from the sub-tropics, a real winter as experienced by most people is something that I’ve always wondered about. Sure I’ve experienced some cold moments in my life but never the ice and snow of the French Alps and all that it entails. It’s far too easy for me to have no idea what to do and how to live in this environment but there is also the fun of seeing for real what I’ve only every seen in film and images.

• My first step when I arrived involved sliding on the ice. (The ground isn’t supposed to be slippery).
• How do the hedges survive under half a metre of snow.
• Amazement of the strength of the building to hold tons of snow on the roofs.
• Icicles forming from dripping water on the gutters.
• Bitting cold that saps the warmth from every exposed or poorly covered part of the body.
• Snow that remains dry and powdery even after days of warm weather.
• Ice that melts (sublimates) to dryness without ever being liquid water.
• How much air is in freshly fallen snow.
• A large mouthful of snow results in very little water to drink.
• Ice is really hard to walk on in leather soled shoes!
• The comfortable inside temperature is no indication of how cold it is outside.
• Ice crystals growing on the snow over the several days of fine weather .

An Alpine Village

Megève is a quintessential French Alpine village with all the cultural aspects that come with that. The people are fiercely proud of their farming heritage even though tourism has developed into a major part of their community. The local produce from cheese to cured meats is of the highest standard and in no time at all you can indulge way too much of the good life.

Mixing it with the Locals

If you’re inclined and can afford it I would whole heartily recommend Megève as a place to visit and enjoy.

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Tycho
“Hours” (mp3)
from “Dive”
(Ghostly International)

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Letting life unfold as it will…

What will happen, will happen and we can do nothing about it because we don’t have any control despite the illusion that we do.

This, to my understanding is the way of life. We live an illusion that we make decisions about all manner of things but the reality is every decision we make is based on the sum total of experiences that we’ve had in our life. At the most fundamental level we are our genetics and our totality of experiences, nothing more. And those two criteria are all that we are and every decision is based on those things. We make our decisions based on this criteria but who are we, if not our genetics and our experiences which drive our decisions?

Todays Your Story Addendum episode is from the departure gate just prior to boarding my flight to Europe.

I’m off on a trip to Europe for 2.5 months. Initially I’ll be in Megève in the French Alps as a guest of my sister and her family then I’ll be heading north to spend a couple of months in Berlin.

Did I make the decision to go?

On My Way to Europe

Well, I may think and feel like I did but the reality is I simply reacted to the situations as they presented themselves with the final upshot being I’m now on my way as I write this somewhere over Indonesia. But more to the point this trip is about creating situations that could provoke opportunity.

In my everyday life I have a routine of situations and people who are a constant with little variation and without breaking away from the status quo I’ll continue to have the same opportunities.

It’s crunch time!

For five years now I’ve been working on Your Story and Create Your Life Story, to learn the skills and develop the sites to where they may be able viable as more than just hobbies. I’ve tried a few things to develop them but to date these things haven’t worked and it’s time to see if there may be some other opportunities that I haven’t considered.

Staying in my home environment will maintain a similar situation to what’s been the case for these last five years but travelling to Europe may, just may, create an environment that is different and present opportunities that I couldn’t find at home.

Everyone who’s had any level of success will be the first to credit the good fortune in their lives that has lead to them becoming who they are (actually that’s the same for all of us, good and bad), and that good fortune could turn up anywhere. It’s just that if you get around, meet more people and be in different situations there is a greater chance of that good fortune turning up.

It isn’t choosing anything!

For me this is just about putting myself out there where opportunity may arise and allowing things to unfold. When we think about it, that’s how life is for all of us.

I don’t know or can’t imagine what may come of this trip. Maybe something, maybe nothing but as I said when I started on this adventure of learning how to podcast I’d rather give a red hot go, than stay in the certainty of routine.

What may come.

I’ve a few ideas for content for Your Story. We may get to revisit some past stories to see how they’ve developed over the last few years and I’m sure we’ll discover a few new stories. I’m hoping to produce both video and audio content and I’ll be putting it out in all the usual channels.

Since my last trip social networks have continued to develop and with the power of my new iPhone 4S along with the video, photo, audio sharing networks there is an opportunity for me to put out a variety of content through multiple channels.

If you want to find all the major social channels that I use go to About.me/IanKath where you can link across to see all that I produce over the next many weeks.

If you have any ideas for people to meet of place to visit in Berlin please let me know using the contacts above.

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Some people have a passion for food that goes beyond what most of us have.

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Do you love food?
I mean really love it, in all the different ways that it can mean. The history, the preparation, the eating, the sharing! Or do you just eat food because you have to, as the cooking is more of a task that has to be put up with in order to eat.

Charmaine O'Brien

For some people food is more than just simple sustenance and for Charmaine O’Brien food is far more than just that!

We all eat but it’s rare to find someone who embodies food in more than just the simplest body nurturing way. Occasionally I come across someone who eats, breathes and sleeps food, and recently at the Oral History Association of Australia conference in Melbourne, I had the good fortune to meet and ask Charmaine to come onto the show and tell us about her interest in food, based on the stimulating presentation and menu she prepared for the dinner.

What’s on the menu? – 100 years ago!

It’s not often that we get to taste a historical menu from post colonial, Australian cookbooks and discover that food reproduced from 100+ years ago is not just boiled mutton and lard with damper.

As we discuss on this episode of Your Story, the meal was a wonderful blend of different ingredients that we no longer think of using and a surprise to realise how well the people of Victorian Australia ate, despite the challenges of preparing food without all the modern appliances that we now take for granted.

Presentation @OHAA

Charmaine opened my eyes to how well they ate in the 19th century and some of the reasons for how things have changed over the last 120 years.

Her website is CharmaineObrien.com
Her email is Charmaine@CharmaineObrien.com

When have you meet someone or done something that goes beyond the norm of what most people think of food?

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Music is from

← If you want to record the Life Stories of others, listen to my other podcast at Create Your Life Story.com or on iTunes.
…Or have a look at some other great shows available at LifeStyle Pod Network→

Music is from

Argy
“Peace Of Me feat. POSH! The Prince” (mp3)
from “Fundamentals”
(Ibadan Records)
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David Starfire
“Indian Fever” (mp3)
from “Bombay Beatz”
(Six Degrees Records)
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Tycho
“Hours” (mp3)
from “Dive”
(Ghostly International)

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How does an entrepreneur see the world?

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Are you one of those rare individuals who see the world differently? You see opportunities where others only see problems!
Do you then have the skills to action those opportunities to make something of them? Maybe a business!

Mike Boyd

If you are, maybe you’re what is referred to as an entrepreneur. But the curse of the entrepreneur is seeing too many opportunities and maybe working on so many of them that the efforts are fragmented and none are given the effort that is necessary to make a success of any. Or maybe you don’t have all the skills in place to make a success of your ideas even though you see the opportunity. There are so many components to get right to have a successful business personality.

Today we talk with Mike Boyd who has already started drawing attention to himself as a young “go getter “, making a name as someone who can think and motivate with his enthusiasm for business. We talk about:

• Stating business in childhood
• Multiple businesses through University
• Strategy for finding the passion that all entrepreneurs need
• The importance of giving back to receive
• Rebranding himself to help others

Mike shares what he feels is the different attitude that all entrepreneurs have and gives us a glimpse of how to negotiate all those ideas, to find the single one to put all that enthusiasm into, for the sake of you and all those around you.

His website is MikeBoyd.com.au
Contact via This contact form

Let us know your thoughts in the comments below

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← If you want to record the Life Stories of others, listen to my other podcast at Create Your Life Story.com or on iTunes.
…Or have a look at some other great shows available at LifeStyle Pod Network→

Music is from

IceCold by Jason Shaw

is licensed under a Attribution 3.0 United States License.

Paxton Fettel
“Stare Forever” (mp3)
from “Dusty Thoughts EP”
(Soul Sheep Music)
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Interview on GeneaBloggers Blog Talk Radio & Podcast²

It sometimes becomes a deluge but recently I’ve done two interviews.

The first published was with Thomas on GeneaBloggers – BlogTalk Radio about the advantages of recording a life story and how that will become part of the history for future generation.

The second was with Andrew at his podcast review site Podcast² which is all about letting you know what is out there in the world of podcasting and winnowing out the wheat from the chaff. Recently I was interviewed but Andrew about how I got started in podcasting and a bit of the back end story of me and podcasts.

GeneaBloggers

If you want to listen to GeneaBloggers – BlogTalk Radio I’m on from about 5:00 minutes to 25:00 minutes

Some of the topics Thomas and I touched on were:

• My back story
• Ease and cost of modern technology
• Laying down genealogy for the future
• Sharing stories with family
• Audio as a start for other media
• Advantages of recording before it’s a panic
• Leading to others developing an interest

Podcast²

Andrew and I discuss similar topics but get into a little more of the podcasting side of things. If you want to listen to the Podcast² I’m on from about 11:30 minutes in.

Let me know what you think of the interview in the comments below

 

I’m not big into self promotion so I’ll let Adam do it for me!

I like to let the work that I do here at Your Story and over at Create Your Life Story speak for itself. But the way the internet works is that you need to be noticed, shared and recommended or else you disappear into the mire.

Fortunately for me there are people out there who appreciate what I’m attempting and are happy to blow the trumpet for me. One of these is Adam Daniel Mezei who we’ve heard from on Episode 25 and Episode 58 who I regard as a good friend but recently he produced this unprompted video that I thought I’d share with you. Yes it is a huge compliment that I appreciate and am humbled by his comments and if what he is saying is true it only means that I’m producing content of the standard that I strive for. But still I know that I continue to learn and improve

Thanks Adam

 

Build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door – NOT!

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**BLAM!… Out of nowhere you have the inspiration of a great idea.
You’ve just dreamed up a new and novel way of doing something that everyone will want and now all you have to do is show it to the world for the fame and fortune to be yours. Too easy! Now to make it happen…

How many times have you heard or thought this yourself?

OTTO Espresso

Good ideas are like grains of sand on the beach, very few will ever find their way to an oyster to become a pearl.

Craig Hiron

Craig Hiron has learned the lesson, that there are four main steps to making a raging success, while developing one of the hardest design tasks around in the OTTO Espresso.

• The easiest aspect of any new project is the inspiration, where everyone has a good idea…
• But of the millions of good ideas, few make it to the serious design phase, where the reality of the idea will normally fall by the wayside…
• Leaving few, to move on and deal with the challenges of  manufacturing…
• Then only to be left on the shelf without great marketing.

By the time an idea has been through each part of this process, with sometimes hundreds of thousands of steps, dealing with multiple complication of ideas, people, finance and business, very few ever survive to become a viable success. And then you have to measure success?

The Classic Atomic and the OTTO

Craig tells us of his journey to create, from the inspired classic form of the Atomic Stove Top Cappuccino Maker, something that takes 21st century technologies and creates the ultimate portable cook top espresso maker.

When the OTTO Espresso was released I immediately ordered one because of my love for my Atomic and it’s classic form but also with full regard for the challenges of manufacturing the OTTO. My unboxing video is below.

Craig explains in detail in this episode of Your Story the challenges of finding a product to develop, all the way through the design, manufacturing and marketing process.

Bringing the inspired idea to fruition is is a tale of determination to overcome the pitfalls and a great lesson for anyone interested in product design, manufacturing and marketing.

If you’re a student of industrial design this is a must listen to episode of Your Story.

His website is OttoEspresso.com

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Here is my un-boxing video of the OTTO…

Music is from

The Black Seeds
“Sometimes Enough” (mp3)
from “Into the Dojo”
(LOOP)

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The Airmen of Note
“Blues for Mundy” (mp3)
from “Today”
(Altissimo!)
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Every generation thinks that it’s all new and then you see something that comes from the past in the case of this from 1940 reminding us that nothing changes and the same issues are around today as have been part of civilisation for a long time.

**Start and play both videos together, Chaplin video starts 54 seconds in.**

Although The Great Dictator was a film of it’s time this closing speech by Charlie Chaplin is still relevant today as we deal with the infernal War on Terror.

 

Using their pleasure for tango to help others who desperately need it

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We’ve all had the experience where we’ve gained so much value from people or an activity that we feel a need to return something. It called reciprocity  – the desire to do something in return.

Cheryl & John

In this episode of  Your Story we talk to John and Cheryl Lowry about how they have fulfilled this desire in themselves for all the pleasure that they’ve had from being involved in learning and dancing tango. They’ve returned the favour not to the greater tango community but by using that communities desire to dance tango socially as a means of generating income to support disadvantaged children in Argentina by setting up Para Los Niños children’s charity.

Internationally supported

The charity is supported internationally to enable income to be generated through milongas (tango dances) which is then used in Argentina to support many desperately in need children to have what we would call the necessities of life.

Here is an example of one of the Milongas that has been orginised in aid of Para Los Niños.

The charity website for Para Los Niños is paralosninos.net

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Music is from

Che Papusa
“La Milonga” (mp3)
from “Buenos Aires Tango Dance”
(Suramusic S.R.L)

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Juanjo Hermida and Gabriel Merlino
“Sauvage” (mp3)
from “Tangos En Duo”
(Suramusic S.R.L)

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This is how to tell a good story?

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Daryll Bellingham

Many people live a life in the arts. Sometimes it’s through choice or circumstances but it’s always a life that is lived independent of many of the norms of Western Society, using their resources to work in a variety of fields within the art that is their choice. The performing arts are much like this. In today’s Episode 61 of Your Story we talk to Daryll Bellingham about his life as a professional storyteller.

Through examples, Daryll shares with us some of his personal life stories of how he expresses himself using his skills as well as some of the advantages for adults in communicating better with family and colleagues using these storytelling skills. Daryll mentions how the use of storytelling has given his community and himself some of the greatest gifts that people can give each other – the sharing of stories.

Daryll has a huge understanding of both sides of the storytelling world both as performer and teacher of storytelling as a communication tool for individuals and corporates, as well as being an oral historian and digital storyteller of other people’s lives.

How do you make a living as a professional storyteller? By being as skilled as Daryll Bellingham is, in many aspects of this oral art form.

Daryll’s  website is Storytell.com.au
His email is mail@Storytell.com.au

To automatically receive this podcast freely to you, click on one of the links to the left or search in iTunes for “Your Story.”

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Music is from

Das Kamileon

“Detroit Taxi” (mp3)
from “Lovn Cruzn”
(e.y.e. Label)

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Swanken
“Lose The Man” (mp3)
from “Break Out”
(Musical Missionary)

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Helios
“South Tree” (mp3)
from “Unleft”
(Circle Into Square Records)

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Mint
“Personal Spaces” (mp3)
from “Glued, Stapled, Remixed”
(Boltfish Recordings)

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Walking to the other path through life

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Have you ever wondered what it’s like to be the opposite gender?

Or have you ever wondered how it is for someone who isn’t just curious but identifies with being the opposite sex?

I like many people have wondered these things from time to time. I’m happily a heterosexual male but I realise that there are some people in our community who feel different about their body and would love to have the opposite gender. What is that like and how does someone deal with it?

Lorelei

Today we talk with Lorelei, originally from Northern New South Wales but now living in Brisbane who is 18 months into transitioning from being a male electrician working in a sugar mill to a female natural therapist.

Now that must be some journey!

Lorelei and I talk about her early memories as a boy with some different feelings, then becoming and working with blokes but with a feminine twist,  eventually to migrating to a supporting community as she transitions to become one of the girls, including dealing with hormones, possible medical procedures and relationships. What a journey this must be.

Thanks for being so open in sharing Your Story, Lorelei.

Website is EverQuestingMind.wordpress.com
Email is on her site’s Contacts Page

Do you know someone who has been through similar experiences in their life? Please comment below.

To automatically receive this podcast freely to you, click on one of the links to the left or search in iTunes for “Your Story.”

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Support Your Story by commenting on this episode with one of the social network sites below or writing a review on iTunes.

Music is from

Che Papusa
“La Milonga” (mp3)
from “Buenos Aires Tango Dance”
(Suramusic S.R.L)

Buy at iTunes Music Store
Stream from Rhapsody
Buy at Amazon MP3
More On This Album

Kevin Selfe and the Tornadoes
“Playing the Game” (mp3)
from “Playing the Game”
(Blue Skunk Music)

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More On This Album

 

One of the best Episodes Re-Published

It’s a rare world that we live in. I don’t mean you… I’m thinking of a few rare people that I meet from time to time and myself.

Stories of Our City

Most people are worried about what I call the noise of life. You know what I mean… All the stuff that is out there that we’re told to be afraid of or we need to be entertained by. Look at the news channels and reality TV, it’s all there… The Noise of life.

But there are a few of us who look for the substance of more important things. The stories that are real and live in everyone. “But normal people are boring”, I hear you say. NO! You’re the normal people and you have amazing stories. We all just need to take the time to turn off the damn idiot box and listen to the real stories that live in everyone around us.

That’s what I’m doing here on Your Story and what I’m encouraging others to do on Create Your Life Story. Get into real stories, not the media beat up that we’re familuar with.

It’s rare that I meet someone who has similar ideals in this regard. Sure, many people pay lip service to it but few (and I mean very few), actually do something about it. But there are a few…!

…and she has the personality to match the smile

Recently one of the previous episodes was picked up by another podcast. To my joy Stories of Our City has republished an edited version of the Episode 48 : Tiffany. Infidelity Investigator. It’s a brief example of what we’re doing here at Your Story and I encourage you to see what Katy is doing with Stories of Our City and listen to some of the other stories that she has published maybe even on iTunes, they’re eye opening to the life that she observes in the middle east.

Katy is one of us dear reader/listener. She knows the power of stories and how sharing them makes all of us much better to the greater world.

 

Ramblings or real understanding from your dreams

Ever woken in the morning and wondered what that dream meant? Sure you may be able to second guess what it’s all about if the dream was similar to what’s going on in your day life but we’ve all had those dreams that confound any sense of meaning. And even if we did have some understanding, can we really trust those supposed meanings. Aren’t they, after all, just the random mumblings of our subconscious mind and not important anyway?

Jane Teresa Anderson

Or are they?

Maybe we can guess or ask someone who “supposedly” knows what they may mean, for some real insight but aren’t they just as clueless as us? Well maybe not everyone…

The filters we look life through

Jane Teresa Anderson is one of those people who can help with our understanding of our dream-life but with a twist. She comes to dream interpretation, not from the esoteric fields of connecting with your hidden spirit guide, while dancing amongst the flowers, where everything is touchy-feely but from the world of hard core science.

Trained in the UK with a Honours Degree in Zoology, specialising in developmental biology with some neurophysiological research, Jane Teresa had taken her analytical scientific approach into the world of understanding dreams, their meanings and how they influence our lives.

She knows that with an understanding of our dreams we can not only understand our current lives but we can also impact on what we want to achieve in our daily experiences. Dream interpretation is a real diagnostic tool to better live our lives and help us understand how we are evolving in our personal life towards achieving what we want for ourselves.

In this Episode 59 of Your Story Jane Teresa gives us an overview of her journey through the sciences to end up in this, not so science recognised field of understanding. She also has an hour long weekly podcast with invited guests discussing their dreams and their meanings along with private coaching and professional services.

Her website is dream.net.au and contact email is JaneTeresa@dream.net.au

.

.

What are dream interpretation experiences have you had? Post a comment below and let us know.

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Music is from

Urban Legend
“The World Keeps Spinning (feat. Chana)” (mp3)
from “Tropical Techniques”
(Blind Lemon Music)

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Swanken
“Lose The Man” (mp3)
from “Break Out”
(Musical Missionary)

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Kevin Selfe and the Tornadoes
“Pulled Pork” (mp3)
from “Playing the Game”
(Blue Skunk Music)

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More On This Album

 

What is a Producer of Marketing and Distribution? – PMD

Welcome back everyone!

…And welcome back to Adam Daniel Mezei who we last heard of back in Episode 25 while mid-way through his 5 year European sojourn, living in Prague. I had decided to take up his invitation and drop in on this crazy Canuck who I meet on Twitter while I was spending a couple months in Europe back in 2008.

Adam at Toronto International Film Festival

As I mentioned back then, I had a wonderful three days with Adam as he showed me around the sights of Prague, looking after my every need as a tourist wanting to understand the city but also to understand this Canadian ex-pat making a go of it in the Czech Republic.

We’ve stayed in touch over the last 2.5 years since I was there through Twitter and Facebook and I knew he had returned to his home city of Toronto to chase down his new dream as a PMD for Hire, helping film industry professionals to grasp the dynamics of marketing and distributing films in this new era where the old systems aren’t holding up to the dynamic flux being created by the internet.

This is the same skill-set that Adam used in Prague, in a trivial way, to organise me to settle immediately and get to see the sights of the Golden City. The same skills he had been honing in networking to satisfy the desires of other ex-pats as clients who wanted to do business in The Czech Republic and didn’t know where to start. These skills of creating a network is what he’s bringing to film makers who don’t know the new playing field of marketing and distributing their films.

Bringing a new marketing skill set to Film Makers

Adam is the “Mr Wolf from Pulp Fiction“, who is called in to sort out the Marketing Issues for movie makers overwhelmed by the demand to be noticed amongst the white noise generated by many great movies that are never noticed and simply fade away to the discount bins where they can never return their funding.

In this Episode 58 of Your Story, Adam and I catch up (sadly not in person but on Skype) about what he’s been up to, why he left Europe and how he’s resettled into Toronto. We chat about the importance of family to him and the advantages of being in North America for his PMD work and what he can do for clients.

His website is PMDforhire.com

Email is info@pmdforhire.com

Here is a video of Adam with a little bit of philosophy on life…

ADM Videoblog #188 — “Don’t Bring Yesterday’s Garbage Into Today” from Adam Daniel Mezei | ADMTV on Vimeo.

…and if you want an opinionated Adam as a PMD about the importance of using more than just Facebook and Twitter:

ADM Videoblog #210 — “A Facebook page and a Twitter handle is not a marketing strategy!” from Adam Daniel Mezei | ADMTV on Vimeo.

…or watch the videos on his blog

Ian and Adam in Prague in 2008

To automatically receive this podcast freely to you, click on one of the links to the left or search in iTunes for “Your Story.”

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Support Your Story by commenting on this episode with one of the social network sites below or writing a review on iTunes

Music is from

Heyoka

“Micron” (mp3)

from “Marklar”

(Muti Music)

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More On This Album

Panik

“Their Unforgetable Things” (mp3)

from “Panik #5 Instrumentals”

(Molemen Records)

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Stream from Rhapsody

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I’ve been a Tad Busy with a Flood

I want to bring you up to speed in this episode 26 of Your Story Addendum to help you understand what’s been happening, particularly in the last three weeks with the flooding of the Brisbane River and it’s impacted on me.

This Episode 26 Recorded Here in the Foreground

If you would like to understand my experience I’ve written a post about the Brisbane Flood 2011, on my personal blog about what it was like to prepare and make the most of a community flood but in this episode I just want to explain and remind you that all is still good and I’m still here although maybe a little busy dealing with my other podcast Create Your Life Story and a few of the issues that come up from time to time

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If all the information is available, how do we understand it?

We have concerns with information, for some it others having information about us that we don’t necessarily want to share but for everyone it’s also having so much information thrown at us through the various different mediums, particularly the Internet, that it’s easy to be completely overwhelmed. So how do we deal with it? If everything is available as information how do we make any sense of it.

Ladies and Gentlemen the man who introduced me to the TED talks with the first TED Talk I ever watched and the joy and new understanding of statistics primarily through his enthusiasm, Professor Hans Rosling

 

Back on Episode 50 with Kate Foy I used a track from Nick Hollywood. I was just poking around the web and I found a few other tracks  that you may find interesting. Here they are:

This track is from Swing Republic just in time for Christmas Boogie Woogie Santa

SWING REPUBLIC – BOOGIE WOOGIE SANTA by FreshlySqueezed

 

Talent, hard work and good fortune this is what made the success for John Birmingham

Sometimes we can read a book that has a significant impact on our understanding of things. To come to an understanding of what Sydney is… it’s history and personality, I needed to read Leviathan : The Unauthorised Biography of Sydney and get under it’s hem stained skirt to really understand just what Sydney was really like and how it got to be like that. Leviathan then gave me a whole new understand of this city by the harbour as I live there back in 2001.

John Birmingham

Leviathan was my introduction to John Birmingham and his writing style. A style that is entertaining while still immensely informative, pulling no punches from telling it as it is but with humour all the way, albeit sometimes a very dark humour. John is a local Brisbane lad, who grew up in Ipswich after migrating from the UK with his family in the ’70′s. He’s one of the  better known writers in Australia initially for his 1994 share house exposé, He Died with a Felafel in His Hand that later went onto stage shows and a film but now his notoriety is for his columns and articles in numerous publications including Brisbane Times and an ever extending long list of published novels and researched non-fiction.

In recent years he’s written the Axis of Time trilogy and is now two books into the Without Warning trilogy with the final book in the series due for publication in 2011. He’s currently rewriting a 10 anniversary update of Leviathan and is working on numerous other publications.

This man is a writing machine with a work ethic setting a constant budget of 2000 words a day five days a week all year. One book, one started,  columns and articles. If you want to understand how to write this is how you do it. You write!

His website is CheeseburgerGothic,com

He writes for Brisbane Times

Give his books a go, they’re a bloody good read Here is a link to his Amazon Page.

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Check out my other podcast Create Your Life Story about how easy it is to record yourself or someone you know.

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Music is from

The Black Seeds
“Sometimes Enough” (mp3)
from “Into the Dojo”
(LOOP)

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Kalpataru Tree
“Elliptical Sequence” (mp3)
from “Preverberations From The Infinite Future”
(Cyberset Music)

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What is needed to make it in music?

Sarah Collyer

How may people are performing, working their craft, doing all they can to be seen and heard, to make it in this world as an artist? How do they get noticed amongst all the noise and what do they have to do in the mean time until it’s their turn, if they ever have the chance?

Today on Your Story we chat with Sara Collyer about her world as a jazz singer. How she studied music and voice and her motivations along the way. We talk about what she has to do to be noticed and what she does between performances and her music.

Take the time to check out her website at SarahCollyer.com where you can listen to some of the music and purchase her EP This Way or on iTunes.

I reckon it great (just my biased opinion)

Cover Art – This Way

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You have the idea but how/who to write the book!

Have you ever wanted to write a book? Have you had a great idea that you need to get out there? Do you have life experiences or know someone who you would like to write about? Maybe you have already started writing? Do you have:

Ghost Writer Michael Collins

• An Idea – Inspiration of what needs to be said
• Notes – A series of concepts written down
• Rough – Already written a considerable amount
• Draft – Written the overall story
• Manuscript – The finished book that needs editing
• Book – But maybe it needs re-writing

Writing a book is a huge task and in this Episode 55 or Your Story we talk to Michael Collins about the art and skill of ghost writing and what he has done for many people to help them get their stories out there.

Michael as a professional Ghost Writer has the skills to understand a person, to get under their skin and realise their dreams so they can get the story that lives inside them onto the page while maintaining their voice and their own original personality. It doesn’t have to be a book written from the beginning but ghost writing can and often is a form of editing. He is editing a persons ideas and voice into text or editing a finished manuscript into a final form for publication. As Michael explains ghost writing is a very personal, specialised form of book editing where he, as the ghost writer, in order to write as that other person has to know them and their personality and not just edit the text that is written on the page.

Michael has the wit of the storyteller and the ability to show it in this episode of Your Story of how he came to writing and ghost writing in particular but also the skills to write about his interests on his personal web site. It’s worth taking the time to read some of his interesting anecdotes and see his writing style in action

Michael’s website is Your-GhostWriter.com

…and his email is ghostwritermc@gmail.com

**UPDATE: 4/10/11 – Michael has just published his latests thriller The Last Book
on Amazon **

I’ve also mentioned on this episode and edited part of it for my other podcast Create Your Life Story as Ghost Writing happens to be the perfect mechanism for writing a personal biography using transcripts form audio recordings. If you’re unable to write for yourself or need someone to add that critical eye over what you’ve already written it may well be worth taking the time to contact a Ghost Writer such as Michael. To find out more on how to record, edit and share your life story check out Create Your Life Story.

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Support Your Story by commenting on this episode with one of the social network sites below or writing a review on iTunes

Music is from

Di Johnston

“Fascinator” (mp3)

from “Fascinator”

(Undercover Culture Music)

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Luis Garcia

“Paper Birds” (mp3)

from “Between Walks”

(Audiomoves)

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One of the great pleasures of having a blog is being able to be self indulgent  -  This is one of those self indulgent posts.

As you may know I dance tango for pleasure, a great pleasure! Sure I’m still learning after 3.5 years but I think tango is one of the life passions that is all about learning and the journey rather than the destination. To that end I’m slowly, very slowly becoming enamoured by this most wonderful of dances. If you have no idea of what I’m talking about I suggest you go and watch Sally Potter’s The Tango Lesson and you may get some small idea of what I’m talking about… But that is not what this post is about.

On twitter I’ve made the acquaintance… (yes that’s right, a small friendship that is possible to be generated on twitter), with a quite spectacular musician in Sean A McGee and his ElectroTango (read nuevo style) music.

I must admit that when it comes to dancing Tango I tend to be a bit of a traditionalist (it’s what’s familiar), only occasionally dancing the more modern styles of tango that have become popular with Gotan Project and Carlos Libedinsky. But when it comes to listening pleasure I adore the electronic blends that are this style of tango music and I much prefer to listen to it over the traditional (Piazzolla and a few other excepted) music.

To give you a bit of a taste here is a player of some of Sean’s music. Click away and imagine being in one of those wonderful milongas in Buenos Aires, like the image above, when I was there last year, and the rich tapestry that is that city, that is the very heart of Tango.

The album Nebulosa is out in September so if you like his music go and buy it… go on, you know you’ll love it

 

Today’s Episode 54 of Your Story is about looking at what we are told regarding domestic solar power generation and how viable it is as an environmental and economic alternative to base load power generation such as coal, gas, hydro, geothermal and nuclear.

From a personal interest in energy and a desire to share what he knows with society in general and other members of the University of The Third Age (U3A), Ken Harrison has set about looking at the viability of solar generation and has come up with some surprising and disturbing facts relating to the viability of using grid connected domestic solar panels to augment and replace power generated by the coal fired power stations in New South Wales.

Ken’s interest in managing power developed while he was responsible for strategising the energy usage of the Australian National University immediately after the first energy crisis in the 1970′s. Because of his hard work,  ideas and understanding of the use of power around the university he was able to reduce the ANU’s energy costs and consumption by elimination its usage of fuel oil in favour of electricity and by computer controlling that usage in the most cost effective and efficient manner. This hands-on understanding of energy usage in actual situations is the foundation of his interest in wanting to understand how the new system will work and how efficient it will be.

To my surprise, despite what we are told, the introduction of such systems does not have any guaranteed effect on reducing carbon dioxide production and could very easily make the electricity grid unworkable if the scheme is extended to the levels envisaged by some of its proponents. The scheme will also increase the cost of power in direct proportion to the extent of its adoption. They are only a waste of money that could be used in better ways. Ken suggests that spending the same amounts of money on stand alone, off the grid domestic power generation would have the positive financial and carbon benefits that are desired

If you would like to read his papers or wish to contact Ken send an email to chat@yourstorypodcast.com and I’ll pass it along to him for a reply.

In summation of his paper Ken recommends the following:

SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS.

There is no way that any of the renewable energy systems can replace our coal fired steam turbine generators.

There are only two options that can do this, namely gas fired steam turbine generators or nuclear powered steam turbine generators. The latter is the complete answer to carbon dioxide emissions as well as any other nasty emissions at the point of generation; however, there is some CO2 release through the mining and processing phases. Its only drawback is the very serious one of waste management.

Geosequestration seems unlikely to be a solution for NSW even if it is ultimately shown to be viable. IGCC is the only developing technology that may be useful to NSW.

NSW has to do something about future generation very shortly – it is possibly already beyond the critical time for planning to be complete.

Since I have no expectation that any government will do the right thing I set out for your consideration what I would do if I were a dictator.

1. Introduce a scheme to eliminate or, at least, severely reduce our wastage of electricity. This would give a breathing space of several years with reduction of emissions to levels lower than any mentioned so far at Kyoto or Copenhagen.
2. Withdraw the present subsidy scheme on domestic photovoltaic generation and replace it with one that offers a generous subsidy for anyone prepared to go off the grid entirely i.e. a “stand alone” system.
3. Continue with research and the introduction of renewable energy generation wherever it has some engineering viability.
4. Build our first nuclear reactor as a matter of some urgency.
5. Plan the longer-term close down of coal-fired plant replacing it with nuclear where alternative systems couldn’t do the job.
6. Fund infrastructure schemes that can make good use of the skills of those who would become redundant with the demise of the coal industry.
7. Modify the ETS to give it real power to achieve emission reduction.
8. Scrap our existing financial system and replace it with something based on more rational considerations than the fear and greed, of an extreme minority, that characterises our present system.
9. Introduce methods toward achieving zero population growth by 2015.

K.W.Harrison
March, 2010

What do you think?  Write a comment below and share your thoughts on what Ken has mentioned.

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Music is from

The Airmen of Note
“Blues for Mundy” (mp3)
from “Today”
(Altissimo!)

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After watching Matt Ridley’s talk, How Ideas Have Sex on TED, I’ve been thinking just how interdependent we are.

I remember when the first Gulf War started in 1990 I thought “OhOh here it is, Armageddon, nuclear war, WW3, what ever” and I started to wonder if it was possible to run somewhere and go 100% self sufficient. What would we take with us?   I composed a long list of what I thought was important and contemplated that for a while.   Fortunately it never came to pass and we all went merrily on our way.

But this talk has just made me realise that I was completely fooling myself.  There is no way I would have been 100% self sufficient.  I was taking society with me and eventually if we were the only community(for argument sake) we would have consumed and exhausted what resources we had taken with us.

Matt mentions that today no one knows how to make anything.  Bold statement I thought.  I know many people who know how to make things, I include myself amongst them, then I got thinking…

Take a piece of timber furniture.  Sure I know how to build a stool but do I know how to cut the tree or mill the timber?  What about the tools that I would use to cut, mill and dress the timber?  What about the chisels and hammer for cutting the joints and that is assuming that I don’t use any fixings or glue.

Try and think of one thing in our society that we can make 100% ourselves, without the input of someone else.  Anything that you do think of will be using the technologies of the stone age.  Spear, bowl, stone axe, that sort of thing.  Grow something and make a stone age meal sure but no more – fascinating!

I’ve heard it said that civilisation started with the advent of agriculture but this talk has made me realise that agriculture came about due to the exchange of ideas and that it was the trade of those ideas that was the start of civilisation.

Just today I heard of a new lost tribe living in the Highlands of Papua New Guinea.  Hunter gathers from the stone age.  I’m not sure if they have traded from outside of their society but the limitation of exchange of their ideas has definitely maintained their existence in the stone age.  This is exactly what we would be like today without the huge interdependency that we have around us and our society.

Causes me to appreciate the web of influence that we all share.  Thanks