Mark O’Meara: the blog

I think the rules for speaking to a group of people are basically the same all around. What works for three hundred staff should work for a congregation should work for a stand up audience.

1. speak plainly.
2. be interesting.
3. appear to know what you are talking about.
4. be humorous now and then.
5. use small narratives effectively
6. look alive

and most importantly
6. when asked a question, answer the actual question asked.

Lesson for the day - this is much more easily said than done.

Working in a large company that didn’t seem to care about the cost of phone calls got me into a bad habit. I would just pick up and phone and call anyone for anything regardless of where they were in the country. It really didn’t matter. And you can often resolve something quite quickly on the phone whereas with email it can take days to resolve an issue.

Since I have been at home I use the phone less but that is mainly because there are just fewer people interested in hearing from me.

There is, however a reason to change.

Every time I call someone it costs 25c of thereabouts. And I probably pick up the phone and do this four or five times a day. Which costs a dollar a day. Or nearly $400 a year.

Email, however, is included in my data traffic and I have heaps of that to spare. I would want to really thrash the internet connection and then write utterly massive emails for it to cost 25c each.

So I am going to try, by and large, to email rather than call for most things.

Lesson for the day - the human voice is good but then so is saving $400.

Kristen, are we still going tonight?

Lesson for the day - now and then I am more confident of someone reading my blog than their own email.

The new owners of my Maton came by the collect it today and I could not have asked for more. They help coordinate tours for country musicians and the fellow played with Slim Dusty’s band in the fifties. Better still he had a couple of guitars but they were brands I had never heard of.

It was obvious that getting a Maton was a bit of a thrill and that it would be both played and appreciated.

Lesson for the day - it is nice to know that quality will be appreciated.

“This is the day
and it’s here for the living”
Take it in - The Waifs

I tend not to think much about songs lyrics and don’t search them for meaningful content and, by and large, this stance is justified.

When I went to Sarah’s Mum’s funeral they played Take It In and these lines took a whole new significance as everyone sang along.

I guess I understood it two ways. One is that life is for those living and although we celebrate those who lived, life itself is for those of us alive. The other is that this day is for living. Not for worrying, regretting, planning or many other things but for actually living.

It strikes me that the past in a collection of stories in all kind of flavours. And the future is largely unknown. Perhaps there will be another series of Big Brother or perhaps everything will work out well. But the live you live is right now, today, right now.

So if you are nothing getting anything from reading this page it’s probably best to go away and do something that will reward you. If you are not enjoying the next movie you watch then leave or turn it off. If you wish you could be nicer to people then this is very much the time.

You just might have eighty years ahead of you but your actual life is this every moment. Make the most of it you characters.

Lesson for the day - somedays I am much less profound than I imagine.

Shannon is here from March 3rd until March 24th which is a good amount of time to see things. Happily the following hard-to-see-in-Oregon shows are on.

Wednesday 9th - Dr Folk. Hopefully see both myself and The Wily One Play.

Thursday 10th - Wily Tim Hackett supporting John McCutcheon.

Friday 11th - Deborah and Willy at the Evelyn

Lesson for the day - sometimes this stuff just happens to happen.

You can set iTunes to fill the iPod Shuffle with just any two hundred songs or it can pick from a playlist. So far I have just done all songs but have set up the following playlists.

The Boys
The Girls
The Bands
Australia
Folk
Country
Rock
Classics

Mostly albums and artists appear in about three playlists. I was thinking of doing themed lists using words that would appear in a title. For instance I have 53 songs with love in the title.

So I am looking for suggestions. Four keywords to build a decent list. For instance “house dog pineapple wind” would have twenty two songs which, some to think of it, is far too short to be a useful list.

Anyhow suggest away.

Lesson for the day - sometimes a name in common is not all that much in common.

I have spent part of my Maton money on an iPod shuffle. For $150 it seemed too good to miss. Having encododed songs at quite a low rate (I can’t tell the difference) I got 230 songs on to it when I attached it the first time. That’s probably enough to get me through even the most slack day.

I mainly bought it to plug into the stereo to give Foozley and I a musical education and the play through the car stereo for the 4 hours each week I spend going to Geelong and back.

It just finished charging so we gave it a blast through the stereo. Perhaps Perhaps Perhaps by Doris Day followed by Dr Robert by The Beatles followed by In The Lowlands by Crowded House.

It’s very cute.

Lesson for the day - even I can do this shuffle.

We have had seven good years but now it’s time to let go.

Lesson for the day - it’s a shame to let a good guitar go but I only need one these days.

I am finished.

102 Artists (not including those on compliations and soundtracks)
Songs from 301 discs
3473 songs in total which would take 8.8 days to play
6.96 GB of disc space

234 Paul Kelly songs
134 Deborah Conway songs
134 Ani Difranco songs
84 Loudon Wainwright III songs
76 Dar Williams songs
60 Kasey Chambers songs
81 Waifs songs

and many many more.

Lesson for the day - you can pay people to do this and perhaps I should have.