This Week with Taylor & Gordon

Another week has passed

Stingers – after credits on a film

Wednesday night cinema trip

Automating the timings for leaving, travel, time to eat and then time to enter the screen to miss the adverts

Bonus extra content during and after credits – https://aftercredits.com

No API available but it does run on WordPress

That means there is a REST API

The request returns the information and that is then added to the automation calendar content so we know whether to wait at the end of the...

Essentialism – The Disciplined Pursuit of Less

Stop saying yes to please people

Setting core values to allow you to make decisions

Do you have the bandwidth to do things?

Declutter projects

Delete projects, no archiving

Saying yes to help people

Doing things you want, and enjoy doing

Family and Friends are possible exceptions

If you say no, then offer some alternatives – someone else for example

Admin – a tedious and boring job

Not the things you got into busine...

Back from holidays

Renovating my Gordon’s Magic box of tricks

Jezo Bond took on the project, vinyl graphics printed by Rob Gaffney

Went to see Jezo perform at a holiday park in front of a real audience

Can be a difficult audience, need to grab their attention

When collecting, the box was amazing

Brand new rubber wheels, with locks on the back ones

Painted, sanded, painted and repeat

Felt fabled on the inside of the box as well as on the top

Last episode before holiday

How Gordon research’s

Look at what I use a product for and what I want to use one for in the lifetime of a future upgraded version

What is the product capable of, what do competitors versions have, what features are the most important to me.

Mid range is normally a good place to start

YouTube is a great way to research, brands and models

Reviews are also useful from people you trust

Learning everything you can about your new pr...

Voicepal (phone app) – Ghostwriter in your pocket

Helps to rid yourself of writers block

Transcribes your verbal thoughts and then asks questions using AI

Learns from examples of your writing style

How strict or free do you want it to be

Creating blog posts to your website is great for the search engines

Getting ideas down and in a usable form

Making the most of downtime

Banners replaced recently

Box needs to be refurbished

Sanded down, filled and then pa...

Planting seeds in the minds of your customers

Busy week performing as it is the end of the school year

Moved from December to Summer over the last few years

Sowing the seed for another show next year – pointing out the positives

Performing at one child’s birthday, 4 years running

Making a suggestion of what we could do next year that is different and exciting

Making sure the last day of term is a good one

Not a hard sell, but a seed they can thin...

Visiting Jake Woods in Ireland

Main platform is WordPress, but also a little bit of Shopify

WordPress is open source and easier to work with

Which is better – depends on what you are selling

Shopify allows only 3 variants of a product

Started in Hospitality, but saw the possibilities of the Internet

Self Taught – and built a simple website which got some attention

Moved into marketing and found WordPress

Worked for an agency and then went self employed

Taking the leap of fait...

Taking Time Off

Watching F1 at Silverstone

Laptop hardly got used, no work was done

First time podium for Hülkenberg

Great infrastructure for getting people in and out

Systems in place for emergencies

Feeding huge numbers of people

Celebrities attended including YouTuber Colin Furze

Staying Curious

New 3D Printer – Bambu X1C

Improvements in technology, speed, software, materials, accuracy

Connect 4 – with spirals that auto-separate themselves

Replacing a prop that has got really tatty for a tri...

New 3D printer accessories arrived

Printing infill patterns

Tidying Up Loose Ends – last 20% of a project takes 80% of the time

New systems in place to track and complete projects

Checklists to make sure everything is done

New workflow with new projects

Brand Image update

Changed from Magical Entertainment to Gordon’s Party Piece to Gordon’s Magic

Changing to new flyers is a slow process when you have 10k printed

Updating flyers, stickers, banners, videos etc. is difficult in a short period...

A very expensive week

New roller banners – replacing with good quality ones

New bunny hutch to replace one that is nearly falling to bits

New MacBook Pro M4 – rewarding himself for working hard

Raycast – https://www.raycast.com/ – your shortcut to everything

A really useful application for finding things and information quickly

Adding your own modules that pull information from anywhere

Installing apps on a fresh install of MacOS instead of migrating

Run both computers for a couple of weeks to make sure you have...

WordCamp Europe 2025 Showing off WP Extended Putting faces to names from forums Mini celebrity in a small niche Talking to vendors Site Mait – WordPress AI Voice Agent – https://sitemait.com/ WP Umbrella – manage multiple websites themes, plugins and so much more – https://wp-umbrella.com/ Integration with Patch Stack – https://patchstack.com/ Drunk nerdy people The ... Read more

Our episode recorded in Basel, Switzerland (no mic so sound is not as good) WordCamp EU 2025 – largest of the WordCamps in the world Networking and meeting up with friends WP Entended – https://wpextended.io/ Functionality that should be in core – No conflicts between modules Free and Pro versions available Conventions are really tiring, ... Read more

Bank Holiday Weekend setting up Home Assistant Automations Lights on and off in office Playing Apple TV will dim the lights and turn them back up on pause Wordcamp Europe 2025 – Basel, Switzerland – https://europe.wordcamp.org/2025/ Talks, workshops, networking, looking around Basal and the Alps Might pre-record an episode next week at Wordcamp Looking forward ... Read more

Home Assistant – Home Automation Discussion on Home Assistant and its relevance for Taylor’s flat Purchasing and setting up the Home Assistant Yellow Details about the Raspberry Pi Compute Module 5 Experience with the component issue and customer service from Pi Hut – http://thepihut.com Cost analysis of setting up the Home Assistant system Hardware and ... Read more

Trix – Children’s Entertainer Convention Meeting and networking with other professionals I was in Stoke on Trent from Sunday through to Wednesday Seeing people you only see once a year – stopping and chatting Lectures, Talks and Shops Chatting is what I find the most useful and interesting – Brainstorming 4 hour drive each way ... Read more

Gordon performed in a VE Day performance at The Magic Circle this week Wordsearch Game Creation Generate a wordsearch that is customised with certain words like a birthday childs name AI Code Creation using an app called Cursor – http://cursor.com WordPress Local, creates a local install of WordPress so you can built quickly without needing ... Read more

Frustrating Things… Very annoying especially when you have no control Waiting for a new battery pack for devices like my phone Found it cheaper elsewhere after the order so cancelled the order and re-ordered Lost in the post TWICE Royal Mail appears to have been the culprit by losing or not tracking the packages correctly ... Read more

5 year anniversary for This Week With News: The chatbot on the website will now show you which episode content is in. Expense Tracking – looking to move out and getting finances sorted Subscriptions that get forgotten Figuring out existing subscriptions and new subscriptions / monthly expenses that are coming soon Annual payments, like TV ... Read more

Special Guests: Marc P Summers & Leo Summers Travel with family Tracking flights with Jet Lovers app Training Leo to find his way around an airport Maths – using numbers for anything you want Fibonacci as a middle name No limit to Maths Problem solving is the fun part The Hedgehog Principal – https://worldofwork.io/2019/07/the-hedgehog-concept/ Anything ... Read more

EPISODE 200 Special Guests – Marc P Summers and Caroline Ainslie Climbing Mount Kilimanjaro for a second time at the age of 64 in January 2026 Looking for more people to join Caroline’s team Using your skills to achieve success 20th anniversary of Bubbly Maths Oldest person to climb Kilimanjaro was 89 Success mentality – ... Read more

Special Episode leading up to our 200th episode next week We have guests, Marc P Summers, Automated Marketing Agency and Caroline Ainslie, Bubbly Maths AI in Business – The Portrait Agency – looking for high value customers using AI to check an estimate of their home address house value Then checks with AI to see ... Read more

Embracing the Unusual Magic Show and Magic Workshop Surprise Birthday Party – he was blindfolded Working with another entertainer Also a party in a marquee in a scouting field 1.5 hours straight with no break Used my EcoFlow power for sound and electrics – Use link for 10% off – https://www.ecoflow.com/uk/referral-rewards?inviteCode=ALLJXEKDBP If you think you ... Read more

Next Steps when hitting a brick wall Stepping away to think about things Or breaking down the problem into smaller chunks Projects taking longer than they should because you have to think and decide on the way forward Making notes about processes that you don’t do very often Keeping in contact with customers Difficult when ... Read more

UI Design – Building a booking system Adding in travel time as a buffer Making it easy for customers to see what is available Making it into a plugin to make it easy to maintain Having the power to say No… Not capacity at the moment, so I have to say no Kyle Van Deusen ... Read more

Trouble waking up with an alarm… Habit of turning the alarm off with your voice without realising Alarmy App – challenges to solve before the alarm will turn off Scan a barcode, take 20 steps, submit a photo, memorise the pattern of dots etc. Another alert a few minutes later – making sure you are ... Read more

Deepseek has been causing waves – https://www.deepseek.com/ Self Assessment Tax Submission Digital Tax – talked about for many years, not implemented yet Pro’s and Con’s to the new system Making sure you get your accounts in early You need time to save for the payment, so submitting it early is in your best interest Submitting ... Read more

Splitting up projects into manageable tasks – quite time consuming to do Action Hub – a web app designed to do this automatically Paste specs and notes and return in JSON format the various tasks which are then added to Motion via the API Ability to set time and bulk edit as required before exporting ... Read more

Busy week with Pantomime. Robin Hood – https://www.sdclub.org.uk Filming the pantomime Two cameras – fixed wide shot and a close up Technical issues on the first night of recording Two groups of children on alternate nights so the footage was very important Master and then second video with other groups performances Setting it up and ... Read more

New Season – Season 6 started last week New colour – Yellow, for this season. All graphics for the podcasts, vidcasts and website have been updated with the new colour Manage Your Focus – creating tasks that need to be done Getting work, writing a project list, create the tasks and then do them Context ... Read more

Happy New Year New Season, New Colour Formula 1 Exhibition and Guys and Dolls Oura Ring – https://ouraring.com/ Track heart rate, Activity, Sleep and more Tracking while watch is charging API available for personal website content 75 Day Challenge update New Years Resolutions !! Finish personal projects that have been started More reading this year ... Read more

Our seasonal video to wish everyone a very Merry Christmas Visit the website: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk Drayson Design Website – https://www.draysondesign.com The Creative Tinker Website – https://www.thecreativetinker.com Facebook: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk/facebook Youtube: https://www.thisweekwith.co.uk/youtube * Full transcript will be available on the website. We may receive a referral fee from any of our links which help towards the costs involved ... Read more

This Week With – Season 5, going on Season 6 Reflection on last 5 years Why we started This Week With Keeping a record of what has happened Transcription and languages If you get anything from our episodes, let us know New Highlight Colour – leave a comment with your suggestions Thank you to Taylor ... Read more

Subscriptions Meal Prep to eat healthier Sent to you once a week on a Sunday Using subscriptions to save you time or do a job you don’t enjoy Car cleaned once a month Audit subscriptions every now and then – check you still need or want them December is quieter this year than it was ... Read more

Winter has definately arrived Christmas Cards – branded for The Creative Tinker – sending them to clients Keep the company in the minds of the clients Quite expensive to do – but a nice thing to do Cost of postage is huge at the moment Sending them through a service to make it easier to ... Read more

Back again after a week off Final Cut Pro update v11 Accounting – a necessary evil HMRC bringing everyone in line to the tax year Digital tax due soon – submitting tax every three months? It is really difficult and not clear – I had two, two hour calls to HMRC to find out where ... Read more

FACE The Podcast – for Family and Children’s Entertainers Round Table works really well Asked the question “What is the best thing about conventions” Chatting with like minded people was the biggest answer Talking to other business owners, who are not your competition is very beneficial Bounce ideas off them, get inspiration, how to deal ... Read more

Big week for Apple Announcements Three in total – first was iMac with M4 chip – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaB7nCdId0Y Next was Mac mini M4 – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TtFm9n3NVzE Then last there was the new MacBook Pro with M4 – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0cmfY7qdmY New minimum memory of 16GB on all these new machine iOS 18.1 and Mac OS 15.1 (along with other ... Read more

75 Day Challenge Slightly modified to suit Taylor If you miss an activity or a day then you start over Physical and Mental Discipline Not about getting fit, but more about making yourself better We will come back to this and see how Taylor did Setting yourself a challenge will always improve you Use things ... Read more

Busy week as always – drama teaching, migrating sites to xcloud.host, clearing emails UPS using difficult to get to shops as a hub if you are not in Trying something new… Mango Tango – something new Food for the dog – cutting the food into quarters from factory Getting feedback on whether your customers like ... Read more

Making Notes to remember what was spoken about Write out action points Legal reasons Make sure they make sense when going back in a few months time Making notes when you think of them Expanding on the notes while you remember the details Using Apple Watch Voice Memo for this Record call and transcribe with ... Read more