After reading "iLife: The Missing Manual" I've settled on using "Film Rolls" for my organising structure.
I try to tag - sorry - keyword all photos that include 'me' so I can have a Smart Album of self-portraits (for example). Apart from that I just use rolls because you can shuffle photos between rolls (or make new ones), give the roll a title and a timestamp, and it means that most batches you import are already in an ideal organisational unit. Just turn on the option to show film rolls in your Library.
I agree with a lot of the article (and the comments): I can only really listen while commuting, because I *cannot* work and listen to spoken word audio at the same time. Lots of people do - but I know I can only do anything well if I do one thing at a time.
How up to date is you iPhoto library?
Does timeshifting work?