Well this is weird. I just lost an invoice, as in one that I was sure I had raised a couple of weeks ago. Here's how I discovered it, and what I'll do to make sure it doesn't happen again.
The invoice
I don't raise many invoices manually. This one was to a friend, whose domain name I manage. It's a fancy expensive domain so, when it renews, my company bills his company for it.
I raised it the other week. I remember doing it. And yet now: no trace. A puzzle.
Discovering its loss
I know I'm not going entirely mad because, in reviewing my Small Business category 13 Money earned, spent, saved, & owed this morning, I saw a task due next week:
▷ Check that [name] has paid his invoice
▷ Due: 25 Nov
– and I thought to have a quick look. So I'd done some things right:
Set a quick reminder to myself, in a trusted place.
Made sure that I actually saw that reminder, by reviewing my system regularly.
I'll show you how I do this in the upcoming series 'Task and Project Management using the Johnny.Decimal system'. Will be released on JDU in the next couple of weeks.
The vanishing act
I went to look for this invoice in the only place that it could possibly exist: my Stripe console. It just isn't there. No trace.
I'm deeply confused by this, but whatever. No point dwelling; let's just make sure it doesn't happen again.
Deliberate record-keeping
Last time, I raised the invoice in Stripe and that was it. Other than leaving myself the follow-up task, I didn't record its existence anywhere else.
If only I had a predefined ID for this sort of thing. Oh wait, is that 13.23 Invoices & sales for your work at the door? Oh, come in old friend.
Update: found it!
Talk about real-time updates. Gripping stuff.
So there isn't only one place that this could possibly exist. There are two: the other being my Xero account.
This makes our solution more interesting. Why did I choose Xero over Stripe in this instance?1 How would I know which to choose in the future?
Solution: new ops manual
This is a textbook ops manual. Next time I need to raise an invoice, I need to be following a process. Last time, I just made it up on the fly.
So here's what my new 13.23+OPS1 Raise an invoice says:
Raise all invoices directly in Xero, because this integrates with your accounting system.
Raise the invoice, and create a note at 13.23 with its number and a link.
Create a new customer record at 33.11 and from there, link to 13.23.
That's it. Three easy steps; but now they're unambiguous, and I won't make the same silly mistake again.
100% human. 0% AI. Always.
Footnotes
I'll tell you why. Because this invoice has nothing to do with Johnny.Decimal, really. In my mind, that's what the Stripe/Xero split is. Stripe was JD stuff, Xero was more fundamental company stuff. Logically, I now understand, this makes no sense. ↩
In Markdown, a universally-handy text formatting language, you create a link like this:
[Title of link](https://…)
Easy enough, but there's a bunch to remember there. Which comes first, the title or the link? And which is in square brackets, which in regular brackets?
Get any of those things wrong, and your link won't work.
'Name and address please, sir'
Let's do the stuff inside the brackets first. When you get pulled over by the cops you'd never be asked for your 'address and name', would you? Same here.1
Name and address in that order.
Addresses contain numbers
Those regular brackets () live on the keys 9 and 0.
Our creative system here at JDHQ is in heavy use with production of the upcoming JDU series 'task and project management', seeing me create ID 50092 yesterday. We'll crack that hundred before long.
Previous creative projects -- recording the workshop, say -- tended to sit in their own isolated world. They take up a bunch of disk space, and if you're on a laptop you don't want to (or simply can't) carry those files around forever.
You produce a series, upload the final videos, and archive the original files. So it feels simpler to have all of those files in one folder, and you can just move that folder around.
This is a problem, though, if you ever want to re-edit those videos. To correct a mistake, say. Now you have to get the vidoes off 'the archive drive' and put them back either exactly where they were, which involves you remembering exactly where that was, or you have to re-point your video editing software to their new location. DaVinci Resolve calls this 're-linking the media'.
Neither of us are video editing professionals. This is an exercise fraught with danger that often results in us looking at this dreaded screen. We're not the only ones.
With the creative pattern, the path to the file never changes. It's always (truncated for simplicity) D25/50-59/50082/file.mov.
What changes is whether the original video files are actually at that location on disk. On my laptop, I've told Syncthing, which keeps our files in sync across the world, to remove those files. Lucy, our editor, still holds a copy.
I'll eventually remove all of these files from both laptops. We say that I'm 'dehydrating' those folders. At this point, launching DaVinci will look like the screenshot above. But the only thing I'll need to do if Lucy wants to edit a video is 'rehydrate' those files, synchronising them across the network from our server in Melbourne.
Nothing changed from DaVinci's perspective. Nothing ever will. Bye bye, red timeline of confusion.
Yesterday I added a bunch of new resource links to several IDs in the Small Business System. And one of them led me to start an imaginary food truck business.
Sensible, governmenty links
Turns out there's a lot of great small-business-related information out there. But it can be hard to find if you don't know where to start (or have the time).1 We originally planned to include a few curated links in most Small Business IDs. There aren't many yet – I add new ones as I discover and vet them to check they're reputable.
Since we're Australian they're mostly from our Government or 'sensible' government-adjacent organisations. But I do try to find things that are relevant no matter where a business is. For example, there's links to some good general advice in:
14.42 Technical cybersecurity, and
14.43 Behavioural cybersecurity.
But if you need country-specific guidance, hopefully anything we find can help you search for similar advice from your government.
This may or may not be a useful feature, but we thought we'd give it a go and see if it evolves into anything.2 At the very least I'm learning heaps of stuff about running a small business that I didn't know before.
Refining search
At the same time I also try to think of new keywords for JDHQ's search feature (remember you can just type / to activate search).
So if you've tried to find something in Small Business (or elsewhere) and search didn't surface it, let us know. The words we use to describe something in Australian business might be different to yours. But it's easy to add keywords that will help you find what you need.
For example, we learned from a Decimal this week that it's common to have an 'operating charter' in American business. So I added that to the examples list for 11.11 Structure & registrations. And now it appears in search.
My imaginary food truck
The first link I found for 11.12 Licences, permits, & accreditations is from the Australian Business Licence and Information Service (ABLIS). ABLIS has a handy tool to research licences, regulations, council approvals, and compliance requirements for different businesses. So I thought I'd take it for a spin.
I pretended I wanted to start a:
Simple food truck business (aka 'mobile food van operation'),
Located in central Canberra in the Australian Capital Territory,
And I would operate as a sole trader.
Figure 22.00.0166A. Simple Joe.
I then answered a short series of questions about how I thought my business would run. And I got back this list of 40 (!) things that I might need to consider. To anyone out there who has a business that involves any regulation, I tip my cap. I had no idea how much there was to know.
I was just playing around and some of my results were more important than others, like safe food handling. But there's so many other hangers on that might be relevant – there's an entire code of practice just for having a movable sign! But I think my favourite is the Workplace and Telephone on Hold Music Licence.
Like many people, Johnny and I have pretend-talked about having a simple hospitality business.3 However, I reckon if more budding entrepreneurs went to a licencing site like ABLIS before committing money to their idea, they might find it quite sobering.
I'm not saying don't dream big dreams.
The world needs successful small business owners – you make daily life so much more interesting than big corporations.
Just try hard not to procrastinate reading all the tediously boring government regulatory information before taking out a big business loan on a food truck in Canberra. 😉
From Lucy
100% human. 0% AI. Always.
Footnotes
Of course everyone probably just uses AI now. But given its lacklustre citation skills I would personally always check what reference sites it's using for serious business stuff. As a former science writer this is a habit I will never drop, sorry Chatty-G. ↩
A library of recommendations for go-to, trustworthy small business sites from around the world? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ↩
Not seriously, we're not qualified. But we often do back-of-the-envelope maths and logistics to see if something is food truck-able. At the moment though, we wish someone would start cheap filter-coffee-only carts in Australia, hint hint. You can even use our proposed business name – Simple Joe. ↩
I was trying to book a flight from Rome (FCO) to Bristol (BRS) yesterday. That's where we'll be at Christmas: my sister lives there. Lovely city, worth a visit.
easyJet flies the route, which is handy. Their advertised fare is €70. Not bad. So 2×€70 is about AU$250. Bearable. Within our budget.
Not so fast, of course. We'll need to upgrade our baggage as easyJet's default allowance is basically a bag of crisps. This is the first screen that you see after adding the base flights to your cart.
Figure 22.00.165A. easyJet's bundles.
That's … not as cheap any more. The middle column is what we need: it's the addition of the 'large cabin bag' I'm looking for. That's another €70 per person.
And we only need one of these upgrades: we can fit our larger stuff in Lucy's bag, and mine fits the 'small under seat cabin bag' constraints. But this screen is all-or-nothing. Two, or none. Double the cost.
AU$500 is no longer bearable. That's wonder-if-we-can-get-the-train-instead money, or the dreaded what-if-we-flew-to-Heathrow-and-caught-the-bus option.1
We started looking at options. And then I thought…
Always look for the trick
These companies employ people whose job it is to design these 'dark patterns'. Be smarter than them.
I selected that leftmost column, 'get light'. No extras. And lo-and-behold, what happens in a handful of screens?
Figure 22.00.0165B. easyJet's baggage options.
Well he-llo there, an option to add a bag to a single passenger for a mere €42! That's €100 less than what we were initially presented. A massive difference to us.
This sort of thing is really common. But if you see the first option and think, that should be illegal! -- well maybe it is. Maybe you just have to find the hidden option. Always look for it.
100% human. 0% AI. Always.
Footnotes
Normally I'd love the option of taking the train from Rome through Italy, France, and under the Channel, but the week before Christmas? Nah, let's not mess about. ↩
This holiday season, give the gift of organised. Buy anything from JDHQ, and we'll gift the same again.
Just sign up for anything. Your welcome email will include a link: fill in the form, tell us who it's for, when you want them to receive it, and add a message.
Whatever you signed up for, we'll send them an invitation for the same. Simple.
It won't be automatic (I'd have to build it; too hard) but if you upgrade your account while this offer is on, just drop me an email and I'll look after you.
The small print
Offer ends Wednesday 31st December 2025.
I.e. purchases made after this date will not receive the gift link.
Final date for redeeming gifts is Monday 5th January 2026.
I.e. this is the last date that you can complete the online form.
Last date that I will send a gift link to a recipient is Saturday 31st January 2026.
I.e. if you have a friend whose birthday is 1st February, that's too late.
In recording the upcoming (soon, I promise) JDU series on task and project management, I'm switching out my real Things database with a test database so I can show some simple examples rather than all of my own actual stuff.
This is easy enough: just move a file from one place to another place. I'm using the 'leave Finder windows permanently open in a known place' trick to great effect: I have a new Finder window (not the usual one I have open in that video) with 2× tabs open specifically for this.
One tab is that ~/Library/… location as per the Things article. That's my live Things database. And the other is some other location where I'm storing copies of that database as I swap in my real file out for the demo.
My nemesis
So I rebooted, and that Finder window went away, and I had to set it up again.
Aaannnnddd … I didn't know where that second folder was. The one with the demo databases. There it is again, my nemesis: I don't know where a thing is.
Fortunately you can search for stuff, and you can search by file type, and in macOS this is quite intuitive.
That search field in your Finder window understands file types. So here I'm searching for Things Database, and when I select that item it shows me only those items. This quickly revealed the location I'd chosen, a few weeks ago.
~/tmp
I have a folder called tmp (not backed up) which is exactly what it sounds like. I use it for stuff I know you won't need forever, and it's excluded from backups so I don't send gigs across the wire unnecessarily.
That's where I'd put this stuff. 🤦🏼♂️ Why? I don't know. A quick, lazy decision.
Where should it be?
Where it belongs: in the folder for this project, which is 21.41. And a note in my JDex so that if I search there, it'll surface.
Beware of 'temporary' folders of any nature. Your Desktop and Downloads are temporary folders. Don't store things there. You'll lose them, or you'll be frustrated as you have to look for them.
The other day we had breakfast in a cafe with a TV showing an organise-your-house type of program.
This is right up my alley. Ten years ago Johnny gave me a book by a Japanese author called Goodbye, Things that had a big impact on both of us. So given that we're in Japan I was excited to see the end of the show.
When the 'experts' were finished the residents pulled lots of zany shocked delighted faces. But I was disappointed. They didn't throw anything out! It was more like a sliding puzzle where they just moved stuff around.1
I don't see the point of a re-organisation project if you're also not going to get rid of anything. I'm too addicted to that fresh-start feeling.2
Canva stress
This was my state of mind as I began a long-avoided P3 task labelled 'Decimalise Canva properly'. There was more than 2 years' worth of work-related mess in there. Some files had IDs, most didn't. And the IDs pre-dated the Small Business System that we use now.
I really like making things in Canva. It's easy and fun. But I don't really like being in Canva, all the buttons make me dizzy. So about 10 minutes later I thought "bugger this" and deleted everything in the account.
Canva calm
All that's in there now is an empty area folder called 50-59 Portfolio of creative outputs, ala the creative pattern. Ready and waiting to hold new folders labelled with IDs for future creative jobs.
Figure 22.00.0162A. Canva, Kondo'd.
I could have spent all day re-naming old files and creating links in our current JDex for them. But I was honest with myself and knew I'd never actually re-use those files again. And so I purged. It felt great.
Procreate refresh
This inspired me to do some organising and tidying in the Procreate app on my iPad.
Figure 22.00.0162B. Procreate, neater stacks of similar items.
Again, I deleted a lot of old stuff (freeing up at least 2GB of storage). I grouped existing files into logical 'stacks' of similar work. I made filenames clearer and added IDs where there were none. And I've promised myself that when I start a new creative job in the future, it will be labelled with its ID from 50-59 (pinky swear).
Figure 22.00.0162C. Procreate, files with IDs.
It's far from perfect, but it's a lot better. I tried to:
Be realistic and make an improvement in the time I had,
Get some 'comfortable awareness'3 of what's there and could be re-used,
Give myself a bit of that fresh-start feeling.
I know I can't delete all my old files because that would be madness. But I do think it's good to delete some files on the reg. It feels healthy. And I think that tiny Japanese apartment would have looked way better if they'd had a proper purge. So I'm going to keeping poking around my digital life, neatening and deleting as I go.
Hot tip: circle masks
I just learned how to do this – if you've ever wanted to crop a regular photo into a fancy circle, you can do this really easily in Canva:4
Upload your photo in to the 'Uploads' area,
Open a new blank canvas in the dimensions you want,
In the 'Elements' tab search for 'Frames',
Find the circle and drag it on to your canvas,
Go to your Uploads and drag your photo onto the frame,
It automatically crops it into a circle,
Make it the size you want and hit download.
Figure 22.00.0162D. A duck in a circle.
Canva is fuuuun.
From Lucy
100% human. 0% AI. Always.
Footnotes
Which included a ridiculous amount of stuffed animals for an adult couple who live in a tiny apartment. ↩
There's even a video dedicated to this at 43 in the Workshop where Johnny basically says "don't bring a whole lot of old crap into your beautiful new zen house that you've just designed". 😬 ↩
A concept that's being explored in the new task and project management course we're making for Johnny.Decimal University. ↩
An account with basic features like this is free. There are paid tiers if you want more features or storage. ↩
I'm trying to get better at leaving myself a log so I know what I was up to when I come back to a piece of work.
Whenever you do a thing and put it down unfinished, to return to later, you're sure you'll remember exactly what you were doing. But who knows, it might be days until you return to it.
