[00:00:10.950] - Gordon
Hello,

[00:00:11.750] - Taylor
Hello.

[00:00:11.750] - Gordon
My name's Gordon from Drayson Design.

[00:00:13.730] - Taylor
And I'm Taylor from The Creative Tinker.

[00:00:15.870] - Gordon
And welcome to "This Week with Taylor and Gordon," a weekly podcast, and Vidcast, where we talk about things that have affected our businesses over the last seven days. Thank you very much for joining us again.

[00:00:29.150] - Taylor
You say that every week.

[00:00:30.110] - Gordon
It's lovely to see people come back and watch again and again. And, you know, we thank you for that because otherwise, why would we be doing this?

[00:00:38.750] - Taylor
Yeah.

[00:00:39.320] - Gordon
Yeah. So it's been a busy, busy seven days as always. And let's see what have you been up to the last seven days?

[00:00:48.350] - Taylor
I've been working on kind of trying to get stuff done that I've been, not putting off, but there's lots of things that are high priority which causes there to be a high, high priority list, which then causes a high, high, high priority list, because everything is just really important. And so it's kind of getting around to the things that are kind of not hard to do, just I've been putting off and just need to get done really

[00:01:13.850] - Gordon
OK. So lots of little jobs that sort of add up to bigger job.

[00:01:18.060] - Taylor
Yeah. It's kind o,f it makes me look like I've got a lot to do, but then once those bits are done, it's actually kind of like I don't actually have that much.

[00:01:26.720] - Gordon
So you've got a to do list this big. But that much of them are going to take like 20 minutes each or something. Yeah. Ok. So you can get those and just get rid of them and then you'll only have a little bit left.

[00:01:38.240] - Taylor
Then I'll only have the high high list.

[00:01:40.070] - Gordon
Then you'll go for the high high high list. Yeah. I've been, I've been continuing writing panto so, I am directing and writing pantomime for, it was going to be last Christmas. The pantomime that we do always happens in January. So it would have been this last January that the panto would have happened and it didn't happen. We knew that. We decided it wasn't going to happen sort of in the summer last year. And so my time to do it is going to be next year. So now is the time that

[00:02:14.180] - Taylor
January 2022.

[00:02:15.800] - Gordon
January 2022 is when the the panto's going to be on, yes. And I'm writing and directing it. So at the moment I'm just finishing off the writing of it. And then it starts the, um, the stage where I talk to all of the other creatives that are involved, the costumes, the music, the sound and lighting, because there's lots of things that need to be discussed. Scenery, um, and hopefully because we had a year off, it's going to be a much bigger event than normal, um, due to the fact that people are, you know, wanting to come and join in and be part of it, having had a year off, you know, not something they wanted to do, but having a year off just because of covid, basically. So that's what I've been doing this week. So, would you like to start today with your topic.

[00:03:14.010] - Taylor
So much of this week is cycling. So I stopped cycling around winter time, I struggle with the cold, so I kind of thought instead of me ending up going through the winter trying to cycle and ending up hating it, I would just stop for the winter and then start up again, kind of springtime when it kind of gets a bit warmer. And so, yeah, I've been starting cycling again. I impulsively bought a new bike. Give me a bit of kind of to be excited again, but also because I wanted to kind of up my kind of level of cycling. And so, you know, I thought it would be a good way to kind of, um, kind of get two things in one, really. And I started cycling, with my best friend as well, so that's been very nice because it kind of gives you someone to chat to during your rides, and, you know, you kind of give each other motivation and I keep up with each other.

[00:04:11.790] - Gordon
It's always good, actually, when you say I'm going to go out and do something if there's someone else involved.

[00:04:18.900] - Taylor
Accoutability.

[00:04:19.860] - Gordon
Yeah, that's exactly what I was going to say. Accountability, because it means you can't back out of it and go, you know what? I just don't fancy it today, because it's not just yourself that you're letting down, it's the other person you're letting down.

[00:04:32.790] - Taylor
Definitely. I mean, yeah, it is, I used to go for runs in the morning with my friend as well. And it was you know, there were a lot of times that I kind of like I just don't feel like doing it. But because, you know, we would call each other up in the morning at, you know, six, six thirty in the morning and one of us would sometimes be asleep or kind of be like really don't want to go. But then as soon as we'd kind of call each other, we would like no, I've got to go because.

[00:05:01.110] - Gordon
You don't want to let the other person down.

[00:05:02.080] - Taylor
Yeah,

[00:05:02.760] - Gordon
Yeah. And accountability is really important with any task, really. If you've got something that needs doing and it's something that maybe you're not looking forward to doing, find someone else that you can do it with and you'll find it becomes a lot easier.

[00:05:19.120] - Taylor
Doesn't always have to be kind of like not wanting to do it. Could be you're in a similar situation. So I know a lot of people that join kind of a small group or get together a small group of kind of strangers that, from the Internet, that all want to learn coding, for example, and they create a small group and kind of like, you know, let's keep each other accountable by learning and improving ourselves, because they'll give you a motivation to keep going, not because they don't enjoy it, but just because it's nice to then share what you've built and what you're struggling with and you can kind of all learn together, which is another reason for kind of like accountability groups.

[00:05:58.020] - Gordon
Yeah, that's really good. Sounds like, my office is behind this wall and it sounds like someone was trying to call me on it. So they obviously are not watching the "This Week With" otherwise they'd know I'm busy. So just your cycling. You bought a new bike and I know the bike you bought has rounded,

[00:06:18.660] - Taylor
Dropped handlebars.

[00:06:19.590] - Gordon
Dropped handlebars. There we go, see, look at me with the lack of lingo. But apart from that, is there anything else that you find the new bike is giving you that the previous one hasn't?

[00:06:30.510] - Taylor
It's a lot more comfortable.

[00:06:31.590] - Gordon
I'm going to go and stop that. You carry on.

[00:06:33.750] - Taylor
It's a lot more comfortable because of the way your hands are. If you think about having it's called a straight bar, if you have them straight and you can't if you're listening, but if you have like you have like a bend in your wrist, because obviously the angle that your arm is coming down at to then go on handlebars, if there is a bend in your wrist, which it will cause you a lot of pain if you keep your hands in that position for a long time. And whereas if you have your hand out or down and they're side on, it, there's not as much strain on your wrist. And so it's obviously more enjoyable. Also, I can go a lot quicker. I think it has more gears, although I'm not too sure my new one doesn't have numbers on it. It's just like a ticker. It tells me how high or low I am. But yeah.

[00:07:18.390] - Gordon
So you could be quite high high.

[00:07:20.100] - Taylor
Yeah.

[00:07:20.520] - Gordon
Or you could be quite low low.

[00:07:21.660] - Taylor
Yeah.

[00:07:22.160] - Gordon
Ok, perfect.

[00:07:24.780] - Taylor
But yeah I've got kind of like paddles kind of like paddle shifting which I never actually realised how you shift up and down on dropped handlebar bikes until I kind of gave it a go because where the brakes are, which are kind of like on the curve bit, you actually push them left and right, so you obviously pull them towards you to break like you're on any kind of bike, but then to be able to go up and down gears you push them to the side. It's kind of weird at first, but it's actually quite comfortable and it's convenient, I guess. But yeah, apart from that is just exciting in general.

[00:08:01.410] - Gordon
When's your next ride?

[00:08:02.640] - Taylor
Um, hopefully this weekend.

[00:08:04.980] - Gordon
Wonderful. That's really good. By the way, I've got a magic door in my office.

[00:08:09.570] - Taylor
Yeah?

[00:08:10.020] - Gordon
Yeah. You open the door and whoever was ringing you stops, it's like they're looking and they see you about to get there and they stop calling. Isn't that amazing. I didn't know I had a magic door.

[00:08:21.410] - Taylor
No neither did I!

[00:08:24.180] - Gordon
Anything else you want to say about cycling?

[00:08:26.760] - Taylor
I think just trying to get out for fresh air or kind of taking a break is good. I started walking as well. And kind of when I go to see my girlfriend, we kind of go for a nice walk along along the river.

[00:08:39.570] - Gordon
Pretty much all you can do at the moment.

[00:08:40.930] - Taylor
Yeah, but she lives next to a river and it's really nice to walk along the river.

[00:08:46.530] - Gordon
Which river is it?

[00:08:47.940] - Taylor
I don't actually know. I don't know, it's a river. It's not the Thames, that's behind, well from where she lives, it's behind us. But, um, yes, it's a river that goes parallel with the Thames.

[00:09:00.840] - Gordon
OK. So this week, I would like to talk about my shows, I've got my t-shirt on today, my faded logo t-shirt. I quite like it actually. It's subtle without being too in-your-face because if these were, actually when it was printed, it was obviously a lot more vibrant than this and it was just a bit too much. But now it's been through the wash, you know, many, many times the colours have faded and actually I quite like it. It's like a watermark in some respects. Because the red and the yellow are very bright because, you know, children's entertainment, this one Gordon's Magic.

[00:09:43.220] - Taylor
I apologise for our podcast listeners. You have no idea what we're talking about.

[00:09:46.790] - Gordon
Well you'll just have to watch the YouTube or the Facebook stream.

[00:09:50.180] - Taylor
Some people don't watch it because they're busy. They're busy people. I know Emma, she doesn't watch.

[00:09:54.470] - Gordon
And they're listening to us in their ear.

[00:09:55.590] - Taylor
She isn't listening because she's a very busy woman.

[00:09:58.070] - Gordon
She is a very busy lady. However, you know, if we've given her some cues as to where she needs to come and look, she can just go to the website, find the relevant episode. Number 49.

[00:10:10.580] - Taylor
We should put timestamps in, there you go, add timestamps

[00:10:14.510] - Gordon
Another job to do. So the reason I wanted to talk about my shows is because now things are changing, I'm starting to get more enquiries for shows. And it's not just for live shows, which I haven't been able to do much of for the last year. And there's been about four, five maybe in that time, live shows when we were able to, between lockdowns. But I'm also getting enquiries for Zoom shows, which is really interesting to me because I thought that once people were allowed to meet up again and, you know, parties were, June 23rd is when sort of, um, most of the restrictions are lifted. Not all of them, as far as I understand, social distancing and masks are still going to be a thing. But the number of people that you can have, sort of round your house or in a local hall has been lifted. And so people have seen this and they've started to make enquiries for events and parties and, you know, my services. But I'm also getting enquiries still for Zoom shows. And I, as I said just a second ago, I was assuming that as soon as people could meet up, Zoom shows would stop.

[00:11:41.210] - Taylor
Is it for people that, you know, you have families that live across the country that

[00:11:45.950] - Gordon
Well, that's just it. Yeah.

[00:11:47.120] - Taylor
Want to celebrate together?

[00:11:48.260] - Gordon
I think that's that's part of it. It's the fact that, because people have been used to now over the last year seeing friends and family on a regular basis that maybe don't live near each other, they've decided that this is something they want to continue doing. For example, we have a family quiz that we do.

[00:12:11.060] - Taylor
Yeah.

[00:12:11.540] - Gordon
And we do that sort of every couple of weeks, over Zoom. And the you know, we've got family all over the place in Wales and Birmingham and all over the place and during lockdown it was a nice way for us to just check up on each other and have an activity that we were doing together.

[00:12:30.110] - Taylor
Saw each other more than we did when we weren't in lockdown.

[00:12:32.960] - Gordon
Yeah. Quite often we would only see these people sort of Christmas time when we went up to see them or they came to see us. And, you know, for the last year, we've seen them pretty much every two weeks. And for me, this is sort of Taylor and my partner's side of the family, rather than my side, so I got to learn a lot more about them. And, you know, I felt more part of the family than just seeing them once every year at Christmas. And I think you're right Taylor. I think people have decided to carry on doing that. The reason I mention the quizzes is because we are still doing them, even though, you know, we could get in a car and, you know, soon drive up and see these people. It's just more convenient to do it on Zoom.

[00:13:21.950] - Taylor
Yeah, I mean, the amount of time I save when having meetings that I don't have to just go and see, although I do enjoy having in-person meetings, I also don't.

[00:13:31.910] - Gordon
It's all the travel time isn't it?

[00:13:33.170] - Taylor
I also don't enjoy it because it's just, in my opinion now that I look back at it I wasted time.

[00:13:37.100] - Gordon
Well it's travel time, it's the cost of petrol, it's the cost of...

[00:13:40.550] - Taylor
...Entertaining guests.

[00:13:42.740] - Gordon
Yeah.

[00:13:43.010] - Taylor
When you go to a coffee shop and have a meeting.

[00:13:45.440] - Gordon
Yeah. It's the cost of buying coffees and things that you know, it's all added costs both in monetary terms and in time, yeah. So I shouldn't really have been surprised, but I am surprised that I'm still getting enquiries, and the nice thing about Zoom shows is that people can be anywhere so you can have several different people from one family, from different countries. You can have friends who don't see each other because they also live in different countries or they're just nowhere near to each other. And they can have a shared experience, which is something that last year has taught me as an entertainer. And it is nice to get back to doing live shows. I did...

[00:14:34.240] - Taylor
Instant feedback.

[00:14:35.680] - Gordon
Yeah. So on Zoom, there's a delay when you when you say something and... You get the feedback after a few seconds, it's, if you're singing Happy Birthday, you've got lots of people on different connections singing Happy Birthday it just sounds horrible.

[00:14:51.380] - Taylor
It's in time for where you are, but not for everyone else.

[00:14:55.520] - Gordon
Yeah. And then they can hear what you have just said like a second later. So they're joining in with that and then everyone else is sort of at, it just sounds horrible you know. The thing with live shows is, they it's sort of reteaching myself how to do my own show because I have had to make changes and I can't currently have people coming up and helping me because, you know, that's not following social distancing rules, and you want to make sure that people are safe and not only are safe, but feel safe.

[00:15:35.540] - Taylor
Stroking the rabbit.

[00:15:36.680] - Gordon
Yeah, stroking the rabbit. And then the bunny rabbit appears at the end of the show. You know, again, something that's not really possible because you can't have, you know, one person stroking the rabbit and then sanitise the rabbit.

[00:15:47.480] - Taylor
Disinfect the rabbit.

[00:15:49.200] - Gordon
Yeah, you could, but it's not nice on the rabbit, so I don't. But the other thing is, as well as changing the situation, I'm doing the shows in, it's remembering how I used to do things. And as I'm doing them more and more now, it's all slowly coming back to me, because you have sort of a like a muscle memory for performing a trick and you've got a memory for the words that you say, and if you do enough shows, you end up with routines that are honed to perfection. You know, anything that could go wrong has gone wrong. And you found ways to stop it going wrong or you know what to do if you do have a situation where it's not going to plan. You have something that you can say or do depending on the reactions you get. And again, if you get different reactions, you have different responses. And your your actions quite often go along with the words. And just like, if you will, if you were rehearsing a play, you get actions and words that happen at the same time. And the ideal situation is to be able to reproduce it every time exactly the same, but to make it look like it's the first time you've ever done it.

[00:17:15.350] - Taylor
Yeah, I mean,

[00:17:16.070] - Gordon
That's the secret.

[00:17:17.180] - Taylor
During zoom. I and my networking group. I've got to a point where my 30 second kind of,

[00:17:25.520] - Gordon
Elevator pitch.

[00:17:26.210] - Taylor
Yeah. Elevator pitch, is so kind of autonomous now, but I think I need to kind of rewrite it and rethink it just because I don't really think about what I say at the beginning. So I've said it so many times, I don't even really think about it and I can just say it. But then I end up stumbling the last bit just because I've said the first bit so, so many times I don't even realise sometimes I've actually said that and I'm like where am I actually at?

[00:17:51.290] - Gordon
Yeah. So with your BNI meetings, when you have all these elevator pitches, you've probably listened to the same people saying the same thing over and over again for the last year. That you could probably do their pitch for them.

[00:18:04.490] - Taylor
I mean, yes. I mean, next week we actually have basically what it's going to be is people are going to be switching roles. So I get someone else's, I have to basically present as someone else and they present as me. And I've seen this done at another chapter when I visited. And it was great fun. I mean, the way that we're doing it is we're giving people a bit of time, whereas the way they did it was you literally were given it on morning and you had maybe twenty minutes. And I think kind of the less time is the better, because one it goes to show how I mean, how much do you actually listen and two how rememberable is your speech. You know, this was when I visited the chapter, this was a well-established Chapter they've been going a very long time, you know, probably ten, fifteen years or something likethat. And so, you know, there was some people have been there a long time. So obviously they would have changed it, but it's the same kind of things. And if you as long as you make it memorable, people are going to easily pick up on that. And if you think of anyone that does any speeches, there's always some parts that are memorable that you can obviously always refer back to and go, oh, he said this in this show or because it was very, because of the way they presented it or because of the words they used. And so that goes to show, OK, one, do people listen if it's interesting, but two do you present it in a way that people actually can understand it and easily pick up on what you say?

[00:19:35.270] - Gordon
So it'll be interesting when you hear other people doing other people's pitches, to see if the important points that you want to give to them are being picked up by the people who are doing yours.

[00:19:50.800] - Taylor
Yeah.

[00:19:51.220] - Gordon
That'll be really interesting because then you'll know whether you need to rewrite it and emphasise the points more.

[00:19:57.040] - Taylor
Yeah. And I also think you should rewrite every now and again just because your business focus might change, but also because people are more likely to listen. So a great example is the VP in our chapter called Richard. He changes it most weeks or comes up with something completely different that he talks nothing about kind of, he's a financial adviser, he talks nothing about pensions, he talks nothing about, you know, investing money. He talks about where do you want to be, you know, how do you want to be living.

[00:20:30.760] - Gordon
Customer focussed.

[00:20:31.800] - Taylor
Yeah. And thinking about the end goal. And a bit like if you watch a holiday advert on TV or a plane, like a holiday, um, kind of trip, they'll always show you the destination not how you get there. And that's the same type of thing because that's the end focus really. And, you know, really make you think and you also kind of listen and go "oh hang on this is different to what he said last week. What's he talking about?"

[00:20:58.410] - Gordon
So it's keeping it fresh and therefore people want to hear what you're going to say. You know, going back to my pantomime, if we did the same pantomime every year, we wouldn't get people coming to see it because they want to see something new. They want to hear something that they haven't heard before and experience something they haven't heard. So, yeah, I mean, it's hard work coming up with a different 60 seconds every week, but maybe it's worthwhile doing maybe you should take a just like we do with the podcast, we talk about different things every single week. Maybe you should do the same sort of thing with your elevator pitch and just focus on a particular part, you know, really specific part of what you do, and how it might apply to the people you're talking to.

[00:21:45.580] - Taylor
Yeah, definitely.

[00:21:46.930] - Gordon
There you go see you've just got a brand new pitch to do every week to do now.

[00:21:50.380]
Yeah.

[00:21:50.980]
So hang on, let's see if you are willing to accept, after you've done this next one that you're going to do with someone else's pitch. After that, would you sign up for doing the next month, so what's that? Four weeks worth, with completely different pitches?

[00:22:11.890] - Taylor
I can give it a go? I mean, I'm not the best with words, so it's kind of trying to make sure I don't put too much jargon in that other people aren't going to understand, but also try and make sure that it's memorable and kind of different. I mean, I can definitely try. Well, as Caroline would say, there is no try. You do or you don't.

[00:22:30.790] - Gordon
From Star Wars. Yoda.

[00:22:31.150]
I will spend some time to write something different for the next month.

[00:22:37.510] - Gordon
I think you know your subjects well enough to be able to condense it into, I mean condensing it to sixty seconds is probably going to be the hardest bit. But yeah. Good. Right. We will, we will check back on this in about a month's time and see how you get on. So that's it for me

[00:22:56.710] - Taylor
And same for me

[00:22:58.270] - Gordon
As always. We are on Facebook and on YouTube please like, share, and subscribe the URLs for those are on the page, on the screen now.

[00:23:08.650] - Taylor
You can also go to our website "thisweekwith.co.uk", which has all of our past episodes on there. And yeah, you can see what else we've been talking about, if you find us interesting.

[00:23:18.520] - Gordon
Don't search for 'cookie' though we did that last week didn't we?

[00:23:20.980] - Taylor
Yeah. Yeah,

[00:23:22.540] - Gordon
Nothing else there.

[00:23:23.590] - Taylor
Your keywording obviously isn't up to scratch.

[00:23:25.900] - Gordon
Well, I'm not sure we've actually spoken about it before.

[00:23:28.030] - Taylor
You said we had.

[00:23:29.230] - Gordon
I thought we had. Obviously..

[00:23:31.270]
Maybe we had and just hadn't written it down.

[00:23:33.610] - Gordon
Maybe I didn't write the word cookie in the description. Anyway, thank you for joining us. We'll see you next week at one o'clock. My name is Gordon. I'm from Drayson Design.

[00:23:42.430] - Taylor
And I'm Taylor from The Creative Tinker.

[00:23:44.890] - Gordon
Good bye

[00:23:45.370] - Taylor
Bye.

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