Meet the MumpreneursMK

LifestyleMK had the pleasure of attending the MumpreneursMK Mastermind Club Christmas Party, and chatted to Bianca Chappell, Development Coach and Founder of MumpreneursMK.  Bianca supports mums making their way in the world of Self Employment and celebrates these truly amazing ladies and their business success.

Meet Bianca and some of the wonderful women behind these exciting local businesses.

Secklow Sounds at the Community Action:MK Employee Volunteer Awards

It was wonderful to celebrate Corporate Social Responsibilty with the Community Action:MK Employee Volunteer Awards

The event was hosted by Metro Bank, and Community Action:MK awarded the wonderful companies who have been involved in exciting community development projects this year.  David Hopkins, Deputy Mayor presented the certificates, and Secklow Sounds was delighted to speak with him, the hosts and the wonderful volunteers.

Community Action:MK links up businesses wanting to contribute to their community and project manages their volunteering.  It is an inspiring way of bringing the town together, as well as seeing the best within your own team!

Catherine Rose (Classics from Scratch) and Stephen Whitton (Everyday People) captured the excitement with interviews which will be broadcast soon, and Audrey Tang (Lifestyle MK) presents the video.

Beat the winter blues

Catch LifestyleMK's Dr Audrey on the Chrissy B Show (Sky 203) talking about Seasonal Affective Disorder.

The Chrissy B Show is the UK's only TV programme dedicated to mental health and wellbeing.

Then tune into LifestyleMK on Tuesday at 7pm as Audrey and Gill take a look at another topic affecting millennials - Shift work!

Revolution: New Art for A New World is out on Limited Release this Thursday write LifestyleMK's Tremayne Miller

ARTS ALLIANCE presents by Tremayne Miller  REVOLUTION - NEW ART FOR A NEW WORLD A Margy Kinmonth Film

Margy Kinmonth
Created with the support of Alisher Usmanov,
Founder of the Art, Science and Sport Charity Foundation
Matthew Macfadyen (Anna Karenina, Frost Nixon, Ripper Street)
Tom Hollander (Pirates of the Caribbean, The Night Manager)
James Fleet (Sense and Sensibility, Love and Friendship)
Eleanor Tomlinson (Jack the Giant Slayer, The Illusionist)
Daisy Bevan (The Two Faces of January, Elizabeth)

Director:

Featuring:

The feature documentary “Revolution — New Art for a New World” looks at artists of the Russian Avant-Garde, such as Chagall, Kandinsky and Malevich.

It was filmed on location in Moscow, St. Petersburg and London, with access permitted to the State Tretyakov Gallery, the State Russian Museum and the State Hermitage Museum, in co-operation with the Royal Academy of Arts in London.

Kinmonth says: “I was inspired as an artist to discover how many of the descendants of Russian Avant-Garde artists are themselves working as artists today. Access to their intensely moving stories brings to life this extraordinary period of artistic innovation, which continues to exert such a powerful legacy a hundred years on.”

Contributors to the film include museum directors Mikhail Piotrovsky and Zelfira Tregulova, and the film’s director Margy Kinmonth

The Tsar's were under threat from the late 19th century up until the outbreak of World War I in 1914, and by the end of the World War the clouds broke and a revolutionary storm began, which brought an end to the 300 years of Tsarist rule.

During this period right up until 1916 Russia had no income tax, and so The Tsar regime raised money by taxing the produce of peasant farmers. As a consequence they protested, only highlighting the unhappiness of the vast majority. 

In the 1880s Marxist ideas circulated throughout Russia, ideas that were based on those of German economist, Karl Marx, which put forward the notion of the working class fuelling a rebellion in order to establish a fairer society. 

The Bolsheviks and other socialist parties campaigned for the conflict to be brought to an end, and militias under their control became The Red Guards.

In the October the Bolshevik party, led by Vladimir Lenin, overthrew the Provisional Government in Petrograd and the Russian SFSR was formed.

 ‘..artists undertook a revolution.’

Soviet film director, Sergei Eisenstein, a pioneer in the theory and practice of montage, made October (Oktyabr), recreating the final days of the Soviet Revolution, and despite its inaccuracy and simplistic stereotypical characterizations, the films visuals were brilliantly complex.

Kazimir Severinovich Malevich (February 23, 1878 – May 15, 1935) was himself a pioneer in geometric abstract art and the creator of the avant-garde Suprematist movement. Malevich produced the iconic painting The Black Square (Black Square or Malevich's Black Square), often invoked by critics, historians, curators, and artists alike as being the “zero point of painting", where references are drawn from a whole host of catalogued historical events.

In 1918 Moscow became the capital, and new strategies came out of The Imperial Academy of Arts, some of which lead to individuals their thinking that they could change the world.

Atheism was like a state creed, as it promoted the idea of abolishing everything that was old, and The Black Square represented something new.

‘Art believes it can exist without things..’

After the Russian Revolution of 1917, the Imperial Academy went through a number of changes; formally it was abolished in 1918 and the Petrograd Free Art Educational Studios (or Pegoskhuma) replaced it. But in 1947 once the Academy had moved to Moscow, the building referred to then as Leningrad was given the name the Ilya Repin Leningrad Institute for Painting, Sculpture and Architecture.

Wassily Kandinsky (1866 –1944) was a Russian painter and art theorist, credited for painting one of the first purely abstract works of art.

Kandinsk, born in Moscow spent his childhood in Odessa but

in 1896 Kandinsky settled in Munich, where he studied first at the private school of Anton Azbe and then the Academy of Fine Arts.

Kandinsky's creation of abstract work followed a long period of development. He referred to this devotion as “inner beauty;” that is to say ‘fervor of spirit.’ His abstracts were never completely removed but always connected to figurative images.

Kandinsky while in school studied a variety of fields, including law and economics. Later on he revisited his fascination in colour, within which he recognized a sort of symbolism.

‘each colour lives by his (or her) mysterious life.’

He then returned to Moscow in 1914, after the outbreak of World War I.

The sun melts all of Moscow down to a single spot that, like a mad tuba, starts all of the heart and all of the soul vibrating. But no, this uniformity of red is not the most beautiful hour. It is only the final chord of a symphony that takes every colour to the zenith of life that, like the fortissimo of a great orchestra, is both compelled and allowed by Moscow to ring out.

— Wassily Kandinsky

The diverse artists around 1917 would make up part of a cultural dynasty.

Nikolay Punin, born in Helsingfors (now Helsinki), studied the history of art at St. Petersburg University ) from 1907 to 1914 under the guidance of professor Dmitry Aynalov. He completed his studies in 1914, when he embarked on a career in art critiquing and editing but it was Punin's involvement in the schools such as Acmeism, Constructivism, Formalism, along with other developments in art and culture, that would eventually make him one of the key figures in the Russian art world, despite barely being known outside of Russia.

Punin protected many western artists’ paintings. These particular works would acquire the name "decadent bourgeois art,” seen as communist propaganda. Punin was himself in danger as he rose his voice in opposition to the Soviet officials.  As a curator of the Hermitage Museum and the Russian museum he managed to recover many an important masterpiece.

Attitudes towards the revolution were changing, as a New Wave in Russian Art immerged. Artists’ work was deeply rooted in national identity, where a history of artistic oppression and enforced ideologies lay.

Kuzma Petrov-Vodkin a Russian, later Soviet, painter and writer, was exposed to art as a child. After failing the entrance exams in college during his late teens, he took Art up again but this time under the direction of Fedor Burov.  And through taking up odds days, here and there, and help from his mother, he was then invited to study in St. Petersburg, from 1895 to 1897. 

The soviet government in support of Petrov-Vodkin’s works meant that Lenin could see the relevance of Art fusing together with Politics, a marriage of convenience, one might say.

Although the irony is that Petrov-Vodkin’s works were largely ignored immediately after he died, until a renewed gathered interest arose in the mid-1960s.

By 1921 Russia’s economy had been affected by the effects of War Communism, and Lenin was concerned. He responded to the poor economy with a new plan called the New Economic Policy, or the N.E.P.

But an assassination attempt of Lenin by Fanya Kaplan on August 30, 1918 helped pave the way for a new leader.

Soviet Artists found it impossible to sell pieces of Art, except to the state; and people feared for Petrov Kotov’s life when he refused outright to do a portrait of Stalin.

Many Artists were then classed as “enemies of the state,” every third family practically.

This also stretched as far as Poets, even Scientists.

Gustav Klutsis  (January 4, 1895 – February 26, 1938) was a pioneering Latvian photographer and a prominent member of the Constructivist avant-garde movement; known especially for the Soviet revolutionary and Stalinist propaganda he co-produced with his wife and Valentina Kulagina.

Despite his loyal service to the communist party, Klutsis was arrested in Moscow on January 17, 1938, just at the moment he prepared to leave for the World’s Fair in New York. For months Kulagina agonized over his welfare, and disappearance, until eventually in 1989 it came to light that he had be executed, order of Stalin.

Many a breathtaking piece came out of the Avant-Garde mouvement, from which inspiration can be drawn today.

From the mouvement an ideology spread, which transformed the world of art, where forms appeared to move, at the same time new ones were born. An absurdity of sorts, where The Black Square was no longer seen as a forbidden fruit but of a pivotal moment in history.

REVOLUTION : NEW ART FOR A NEW WORLD is in cinemas 10^th November, 2016

Writer © Tremayne Miller

Catch Tremayne on LifestyleMK tomorrow from 7pm speaking about "Norfolk" 

How do you take your feedback?

Gill O'Rourke - Co Host

Feedback is SO important for self development - but it can go so terribly wrong for all concerned!

Tonight at 7pm,  the LifestyleMK girls are looking at reviews - their importance and how they affect the reviewee.  With their regular features on fitness, pets and relationships, and another set of fabulous guests, they are asking you:

HOW DO YOU TAKE YOUR FEEDBACK?  Do you review?  Do you read reviews?  Do you think all reviews are created equal - or not?

Any comments, please do let them know on #lifestylemk as they'll be reading out your views on the show or tweet @draudreyt   or   @gillian7751

Dr Audrey - Producer and Host

Meanwhile, Dr Audrey - Producer and Host of LifestyleMK has been thinking about this in her latest blog post:  "I am always happy to learn - but not always for you to benefit" (Let me feedback on your feedback).  You can read it HERE

...and of course, you can purchase her book here (which she was delighted to promote on Transition with the erudite David Stimson (3 - 4pm on Secklow Sounds!!)


TUNE IN AT 7PM TONIGHT for your weekly night in with the Girls: LifestyleMK on Secklow Sounds!

"Be A Great Manager - Now" promoting interpersonal strength and pro-active leadership and is available on Amazon.

Get defensive in Leighton Buzzard

Dr Audrey and Gill from LifestyleMK visited Combat Academy in Leighton Buzzard.

They'll be covering their experience in a show later this season, but if you want to learn some essential life skills - not just physical, but psychological as well, get down to HQ!

You can be aged 7 or 70 - and the Combat Academy Team will teach you - not to "beat" your opponent - because realistically, that's not your aim in a real life situation, but not to lose...and THAT'S the key.

Run by ex military personnel, the session is (surprisingly) warm and welcoming - I say "surprising" for your benefit - once you've met the team you are completely at ease, and you start beginning to wonder if they aren't all just teddy bears in combat gear! Again I jest - the service history of the Instructors is as applaudable as their skills set including positive psychology, criminology, Military Police, the British Army, the Egyptian Armed Forces. Operations and Service tours.  This team truly knows their stuff, and not only that, they know how to teach you so that you learn, and inspire you to want to learn more.

To find out more, please visit Combat Academy's FACEBOOK PAGE or WEBSITE  Their introduction to Self Defence and Personal Safety Bootcamp is only £25 and it's going to be one of the best (or most essential) 4 hour blocks you will ever experience!

LifestyleMK with Audrey, Gill and the Lifestyle Team broadcasts Tuesdays from 7 - 8pm on Secklow Sounds

Boost your life with some colour - says LifestyleMK's Audrey

LifestyleMK's Dr Audrey also appears as one of the Chrissy B Show (Sky 203)'s resident guest experts.  The Chrissy B Show is the UK's only TV show dedicated to Mental Health and Wellbeing.  

With the rain we've been having - how about some colour to bosot your life?  (and style!?) 

For the full episode:

and you can subscribe to Chrissy's channel here  or catch her show on Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 10pm, Sky 203 - and you might see Audrey too!

Meanwhile LifestyleMK is back for a new season on October 4th.  The girls Audrey and Gill are raring to go on Tuesdays from 7 - 8 with chat, tips and secrets on all aspects of life.  They are joined by their awesome team - Personal Trainer Robb, Vet Dr Jamie, Dating (disaster) Paula, and feature presenters Ro and Ashley.

Tune in from October 4th, or  - if you can't wait - catch past shows on Mixcloud.

There's something evil afoot writes film critic Tremayne Miller

LifestyleMK's film critic and writer Tremayne Miller gives her insights on "Blair Witch"

Blair Witch

From the director of ‘You’re Next’ & ‘The Guest’

Adam Wingard
Rating: 15 Run Time: 89 minutes

Cast
• James Allen McCune as James Donahue
• Valorie Curry as Talia
• Callie Hernandez as Lisa
• Brandon Scott as Peter
• Wes Robinson as Lane
• Corbin Reid as Ashley

Blair Witch formerly sold under the false name of “The Woods” is directed by Adam Wingard and written by Simon Barrett. It is a direct sequel to 1999 film The Blair Witch Project, which follows a group of college students as they bravely head into the Black Hills Forest, in Maryland in order to uncover the mystery surrounding the disappearance of Heather, James’s sister.

Many believe there to be a connection to the legend of The Blair Witch.

Blair Witch – the sequel is presented in a similar vein to Paranormal Activity of 2007, an American Independent presented in the style of “found footage.”

The search party are at first hopeful, particularly when locals offer up their services, and guide them through the deepest, darkest part of the forest but as the nights wear thin the group is visited by an intimidating presence, and it isn’t long before it becomes a menacing reality.

During the filming of blair witch - the sequel, actors were provided with clues as to what their next location would be via messages in milk crates found by using Global Positioning Satellite systems. Individual instructions were then given to each of them, which they would use by way of helping them improvise actions throughout the course of the day.

The Blair Witch Project of 1999, relays the fictionalised story of three student filmmakers (Heather Donahue, Michael C. Williams and Joshua Leonard) who disappear whilst on a hike in the Black Hills, intending to shoot a documentary on the local legend of The Blair Witch.

Viewers are then informed that the three were never to be heard of or seen again, despite video footage and sound equipment having been unearthed at the scene, this "recovered footage” is, in fact, the film the viewer is watching.

Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2 was released on October 27, 2000, and another film was planned for the following year, however, it did not materialise.

The backstory for the film, a “faux legend,” was made up by filmmakers Sánchez and Myrick, and it detailed The Curse of the Blair Witch in mocumentary form, which was then broadcast on the SciFi Channel in 1999 prior to the film’s release.

The mocumentary was to lead people into believing that the legend was true, least it did me and I recall a group of my friends teasing me about it at the Sixth Form college I was attending at the time in Derby, in Derbyshire!

Myrick and Sanchez were to develop the idea of paranormal activity after having seen lots of documentaries on the subject, which they found to be a lot scarier than average horror movies.

“Found footage” is scarcely tackled by modern horror these days, which is baffling when you consider the lengths technology has grown in recent years.

However, Hollywood’s interest in “found footage” has waned, at the same time that Paranormal Activity: The Ghost Dimension is about to be released.

It is thought that it will be the final installment in this genre of “flagship franchise.”

A positive - “found footage” has never really fit into the Hollywood format, and was never meant to go mainstream. It will undoubtedly, however, always thrive within the realm of budding and broke filmmakers.

We, after all, live in a society where everyone who has an iPhone can gain access to a high definition camera.

But what’s now missing is “the blurring between fiction and reality,” as had been first promoted thanks to the aide of the Blair Witch mocumentary.

There’s something evil hiding in the woods… the Blair Witch. In cinemas on September 16.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=girSv9UH_V8 (trailer)

*On July 22, 2016, an official trailer for the Blair Witch – the sequel was screened at the San Diego Comic-Con.

The film is released on September 16, 2016.

(c) Tremayne Miller

GRAND OPENING - The Parks Trust Floodplain Forest Nature Reserve

On Thursday 25^th August 2016, Adam Henson, farmer and rural TV presenter, officially opened The Parks Trust’s new Floodplain Forest Nature Reserve, and LifestyleMK were delighted to be present.

The Parks Trust has converted 48 hectares of the Great Ouse Valley near Old Wolverton, Milton Keynes into the reserve, with the help of Hanson UK.  The transformation of the reserve began with an initial idea 20 years ago, with work commencing in 2007.

Watch LifestyleMK's video of the beautiful reserve here: CLICK HERE for LifestyleMK's video

Queen of Earth - Review by Lifestyle MK's Film Writer, Tremayne Miller

Queen of Earth

Dir Alex Ross Perry (Listen Up Philip).

With

Elisabeth Moss, Katherine Waterston, Patrick Fugit, Kentucker Audley, Keith Poulson, Kate Lyn Sheil, Craig Butta. 

Produced by Elisabeth Moss, Alex Ross Perry, Joe Swanberg, Adam Piotrowicz.

Running time: 89 MIN.

Mad Men and Top of the lake - the extensive repertoire and talent of Elisabeth Moss.

The Critics Consensus of ‘Queen of Earth’ seems to be that it is led by a scorching performance by Elisabeth Moss, with the addition of strong writer-director Alex Ross Perry, who has an impressive filmography to date.

Queen of Earth unlike other short stories surveys the different stages of one woman’s psychological breakdown.

- ‘an utterly fearless central performance by Elisabeth Moss.’

Although the “misanthropic signature” of Perry mightn’t appeal to all, for connoisseurs of “auteur cinema” this may well not be the case.

Perry’s film appears to carry a deep affection towards the late 1960s and early 1970s alt-Hollywood cinema, with narratives mirroring those of Brian De Palma’s “Sisters.”

As I set about writing my review on unnerving new thriller, ‘Queen of Earth’, starring Elisabeth Moss (Man Men) and Katherine Waterston (Inherent Vice, Steve Jobs and forthcoming Fantastic beasts and where to find them, penned by JK Rowling), so do I draw parallels with early 1950s Bette Davis film, What Ever Happened To Baby Jane.

In What Ever Happened To Baby Jane

Jane Hudson (Bette Davis) is an aging child star who is left to care for wheelchair-bound sister Blanche (Joan Crawford), also a former child actress. As they live together in a Hollywood mansion, Blanche intends to get even with Jane for the car crash that she imposed, which left her crippled. However Jane is desperate that Blanche should remain imprisoned at the same time she sets her heights on rising to fame again. Why, she even goes so far as to try and hide Blanche from doctors, visitors and neighbours.

Perry cites Woody Allen’s “Interiors” as a key influence. The obligatory woman in this instance being an on-the-edge Catherine (Moss, also a Producer of the film), who decides to spend a week of exile at the lake house of her friend, Virginia (Katherine Waterston), this is instigated by the death of her father and a messy breakup from her boyfriend, whereupon we find ourselves somewhat immersed in the haunting tranquility of the Hudson River Valley, where the silence is most deafening.

We learn that Catherine’s late father was a notable artist, and that she worked for him as a kind of bumped-up assistant. In contrast Perry shows us what life was like at the lake house a year previous, when Catherine had visited. The Catherine then was in a blossoming romance with James (Kentucker Audley), a continually laid-back fellow whose influence over Catherine is a source of “pronounced irritation”.

In the present, circumstances have changed, and Virginia is now under the control of (Patrick Fugit), who lives next door.

‘The flashbacks in “Queen of Earth” are like little Proustian splinters that lodge under the skin of the characters as they run their hands along the bannisters of the past.’

Perry provides structure to the film by assigning chapters.

The wooden house is scarcely left, and seems to play out like more of a Bunuelian prison, and eeriness is enhanced by the piano’s score.

In Perry’s world he defines what his interpretation of friendship is.

Despite Waterston being the passive-aggressive one, the film belongs to Moss, who, did the same in “Listen Up Philip,” when she played the neglected girlfriend.

She reacts to Catherine’s downward spiral with such unpredictable rhythm that every gesture appears to be in the moment.

Together, Perry and she draw us in, into a sort of orbit, which, although wild, begins to make sense.

  “Queen of Earth,” like ““Listen Up Philip” is aesthetically pleasing, courtesy of cinematographer Sean Price Williams; that is to say, a warm 16mm lense that favours tight close-ups. Fittingly the credits at the front and back end of the film are set in an elegant font, and read almost like invitations to a party that no-one would dare attend.

  “Queen of Earth” will had a limited theatrical release in the UK & Ireland on 1 July 2016.

©Tremayne Miller

 - https://www.wearecolony.com/

*We are Colony is a startup that’s trying to be like the next Netflix for behind-the-scenes film footage, whilst connecting you up with great movies and exclusive behind-the-scenes footage from your favourite filmmakers and Talent.

 Overall result 1 star.

Spotlight on Management: Coach Chris Browne at the National Museum of Computing

Coach Chris Browne

The National Museum of Computing in Bletchley Park is delighted to play host to a book-signing where TV Coach - Chris Browne (also one of London's top Development Coaches) is the keynote speaker.

Coach Chris, will be "Inspiring a Shared Vision" and opens the event to be held at the Museum on July 5th.
Coach Chris Browne is a Speaker and Coach who specialises in inspiring individuals to take the necessary steps towards making positive change of life. He is a member of ITOL, qualified in teaching, and has also been working in the field of Personal Development for a number of years. Coach Chris has had the pleasure of working with individuals and delivering workshops as well as talks at many well known organisations in the United Kingdom and internationally on various topics such as Employability, Communication, Confidence building, Goal setting, and also facilitating workshops on Successful Interview Techniques,  Catch him on Sky203's Chrissy B show too!

Dr Audrey Tang

Also presenting and signing her book is Secklow Sounds' own Dr Audrey Tang (Host of LifestyleMK).  Her book "Be a Great Manager Now" published by Pearson is not only heading for "Book of the month"in WH Smith Travel, but has been submitted by the publishers to the CMI Book of the Year Awards, and has been licensed by Skill Pill as part of their digital library.  Audrey says of her book:

"In the current fast-paced world, we sadly have little time for self-development. Pearson’s “2 in 1” series structures its content for the busy manager. The grey pages are full of tips, ideas and insights – things you can try immediately, but then when you get the time to think about why something was effective, the “big picture” section looks that the context and theory behind the ideas. This supports managers not just in knowing what to do, but in understanding why they are doing it, and as such empowers them to implement their own actions based on that understanding."

Gary Fay

Maria Jensen

Speakers include Maria Jensen, Manager of Amtrac Ltd, and Gary Fay co-director and founder of Identifi Global - talent recruitment agency, who will also be offering CV support throughout the evening.

The evening is aimed at new and aspiring managers, is free to attend (although it is by invitation only), and is even CPD accredited to 2 hours (or 2 CPD points).



...and covering it all for Secklow Sounds will be David Stimson of DSP New Start and "Transition"

David Stimson

For more information, or if you would like to attend please email

audrey@clickproductions.co.uk by 5pm Friday July 1st 2016.

When Lifestyle and Transition meet...

David Stimson

David Stimson from Secklow Sounds' "Transition" (Thursdays 3 - 4pm) will be interviewing LifestyleMK's Dr Audrey about her new book "Be A Great Manager Now".

This "2-in-1" style text, published by Pearson offers busy managers instant tips and ideas to implement immediately within the workplace, and then presents the theory behind the idea for a deeper understanding, when the reader has time.  The book is already moving into "Business book of the Month" in WH Smith Travel, it has been submitted by the publishers to the CMI Book of the Year Awards (Commuting Reads category), and is licensed to Skill Pill as part of their digital training library.

Audrey Tang

Mean Business Event

Audrey, who has been interviewed this week by "The Crazy Mind" (read full interview here) is delighted with Transition's support.  She said "I've had the pleasure of working with David on one of his "Dragon's Den" events for Young Enterprise.  Finding that career you both love and succeed in is getting ever more difficult with so many choices, and so much instability, that having a focus, and the support from those involved in the Young Enterprise programme, is a wonderful opportunity".  She will be signing her book at the "Mean Business" event on Tuesday July 5th at The National Museum of Computing, Bletchley Park at a workshop and networking evening aimed at new and aspiring managers.  Appearing also as the keynote speaker to "Inspire your shared vision" is Sky 203's Coach Chris Browne.  Coach Chris is one of London's top Development Coaches with years of experience in motivating and assisting companies and individuals.  Coach Chris is also resident coach on the Chrissy B Show, (Great positive show) Where he shares advice and gives inspiration to the viewers who may have challenges in various areas of their lives. This show gives good, genuine practical, valuable, life changing information to help you to develop and enhance your life! (Catch it on Sky 203 or Youtube)

More to follow on this exciting event soon!!

David is covering the launch, as well as interviewing Audrey on Transition 3 - 4pm Thursday July 7th.

Be a Great Manager - talk to LifestyleMK's host Audrey

LifestyleMK's host, Audrey Tang's book "Be a Great Manager - Now" has been published by Pearson and has been released to Amazon and all major retailers this month.

Audrey has a PhD in Business and an academic background in Psychology and Law.  She currently runs her own training company CLICK Training and also offers an "Escape" Teambuilding Activity and workshop with A Great Escape, the escape room in Bletchley - home of UK Codebreaking.

The book is aimed at new managers - although it can certainly be used as a refresher for experienced leaders, and accompanies her "Practical Management" training programme, which is CPD Standards Accredited.

You can order Audrey's book from Amazon...and if you book at game at A Great Escape - she'd be happy to sign it too!

LifestyleMK recording at the original transmission block "E" in Bletchley!!

LifestyleMK are really excited to be recording this week's show at the original transmission block, Block E in Bletchley!

E Block in Bletchley Park was where the decrypted messages were transmitted to the British Commanders, and is now home to a number of businesses, including "A Great Escape".

A Great Escape offers an "Escape Room" - a live puzzle where teams of 2 - 6 have to solve riddles in order to find their way out - within 60 minutes.  The room is themed around the area itself, with a story featuring modern-day codebreakers in Bletchley and called "Enigma".  (To book, please visit www.agreatescaperoom.com - the previews are in and this game is no "imitation" *groan*).

Ken Ferguson

The show is delighted to have a feature from Ken Ferguson, writer of Escape Game blog "The Logic Escapes Me" (CLICK HERE) or follow him on twitter @escapaholic who talks about his passion for escape games, as well as what to look for in a good game.

A Great Escape is one of the many businesses investing in Milton Keynes - which was ranked as the "number one for job growth" in 2015 by the Centre for Cities.  ...and with a second escape game (Roomescapemk) also opening in the area this month, as well as one in nearby Kettering, Lifestyle MK will be finding out about this particular business trend.

With your host, Audrey whose book on management is out later this year (pre order here) - the show comprises its usual informative insights and other exciting guests this week - Resident Fitness expert - PT Robb and Vet Dr Jamie are both taking an in depth look at their own professions, the team also have guest features from Brunel Business School talking about why business matters, and pitfalls of cultural clashes in the working world.  We even have a special interview with Matthew Yeomans of

The National Museum of Computing

The National Museum of Computing (based in Block H of Bletchley Park - click HERE or @tnmoc ) who are putting on an Easter festival for families called "BYTES" running 25 March - 10 April - so don't miss out!

...and with wellbeing always in mind, presenter Ro Linton will talk about the work-life balance, co-host Gill will discuss the pros and cons of volunteering, and Dave's Man Cave aims to inspire you with the cool jobs out there.



Tune in on Saturday 12 - 2 on Secklow Sounds, or catch the show on Mixcloud at your leisure...it's not all work, work, work!!

ESCAPE THE ROOM in the "home of the codebreakers"

The Escape Game phenomenon is slowly making its way around the UK.  Based on the Japanese computerised "Escape the room" games, it was Europe that first discovered the enjoyment - and team building benefits of a "live" version.

Teams of 2 - 6 (some London games cater for larger teams) are "locked" in a room for 60 minutes and have to find and solve clues and decipher codes and puzzles in order to "escape".  Each room has a storyline - often "Mummy's Tomb", "Sherlock Holmes/Murder Mystery" and a "Heist" in the UK please visit the extensive blog by Chris M Dickson: www.exitgames.co.uk to find games, and learn more.

LifestyleMK's Dr Audrey, along with business partner Richard Atterton, is opening the first Escape Game in the Milton Keynes Area in March.  Not only is it in the area - but it's in BLETCHLEY - where better than the "Home of the Codebreakers"!?

Audrey says "We love Escape Games, and have been playing them around the world since early last year.  When the opportunity came to open our own we jumped at it.  Ours is designed by Pfeffermind Games in Berlin, and we have been able to adapt the story with them to suit a Turing/Imitation Game styled room."

There is only one room available at the moment and it can cater for a team of 2 - 6.  Please visit the website for more information  and to book:  www.agreatescaperoom.com

This week they are offering the chance to win one of 3 FREE GAMES on Friday 18th March (6pm, 7.30pm and 9pm) for their launch weekend (details on their fb page) and all games are offered at a 20% discount on Saturday March 19th and Sunday March 20th if you type in the code LAUNCH on booking.

Please keep checking their fb page: https://www.facebook.com/agreatescaperoom/  and website for more opening offers through March and April.

For a little more on the room, please check out the feature in the MK News: http://www.onemk.co.uk/Enigma-Room-live-escape-game-Milton-Keynes-open/story-28697765-detail/story.html

Website: www.agreatescaperoom.com
Fb: https://www.facebook.com/agreatescaperoom/
Twitter: @agr8escape

Happy Lunar New Year!! - we have an exclusive interview with Writer and Actress Lucy Chau Lai-Tuen

Actress and Writer Lucy Chau Lai-Tuen

With both Lunar (Chinese) New Year AND Valentines Day to celebrate next week, LifestyleMK are DELIGHTED to have an exclusive interview with Writer and Actress Lucy Chau Lai-Tuen (Lucy Sheen).

Lucy describes herself as "Made in Hong Kong and exported to the UK", she is an adoptee, dyslexic, and a successful playwrite and actor.

Here is a beautiful poem read by Lucy herself called "Chinese Water Thoughts": https://youtu.be/T4zCAr7-R3w

Lucy is currently promoting her debut documentary "Abandoned Adopted Here" in the WIRE FILM FESTIVAL: 

https://youtu.be/Z76ucoIGvWI (trailer)

She, and us here at LifestyleMK, would love it if you would view and LIKE the documentary.  Like our previous shows, "Oh Baby Baby" (last Saturday) and "Taboo Topics" the Saturday before, Adoption is an area which is common, yet not spoken about often.  Strangely enough of course, one of our favourite British Icons was adopted - Paddington Bear!!

The WIPER app download is free: https://gowiper.com

Lucy's documentary is here on WIPER: https://gowiper.com/v/w4guni6

Lucy is also hoping that you know of an venue in Central London that could be donated for a screening and Q&A session with Lucy herself.  (This event is to raise funds for an sister project which is a stage play about the adoption triad (birth mother, adoptive mother and adoptee called "Conversations with my Unknown Mother")

Tune in to LifestyleMK on Saturday Feb 13th to hear more!!!

...and follow Lucy Here:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ActorLucySheen/

Twitter: @LucySheen @AAHere and @CWMUMother 

For more information about Lucy, please visit her website: http://www.lucysheen.com

...and check out her interview with CineWomen for their Bicentennial Magazine http://issuu.com/cinewomen/docs/cin_wom_iss0011b7_cinema_art_dance/38

Plus - see her in action in her own works here:

There Are TwoPerfectly Good Me's: One dead, the other unbornhttps://you.be/Z76ucoIGvWI
Ungrateful a Paper Daughter
htpps://you.be/FMg2aSqrYf8

MEANWHILE:  Whether a taboo topic or not, we wish you a wonderful Lunar New Year with your families - may the Year of the Monkey bring you excitement, success and just a little bit of mischief.

LifestyleMK Saturdays 12 - 2, or catch us on MIXCLOUD

#lifestylemk

@draudreyt

@gili80

@davejsanderson