I suppose this was the week when my new world took off. The pace of production on the magazine has stepped up considerably and we've started pushing lots of copy and pictures through to the typesetters.
It's something of an inexact science at the moment,but Tom and I are both finding our feet.
First, on Monday, it was back to Lichfield to talk to landlords and leave business cards. It may have only produced a free pint of Golden Glow and a spectacularly good Packington pork pie (with English mustard on the side) but all the best businesses started somewhere, didn't they?
From Tuesday to Thursday, it's been hard but rewarding work. Ploughing through contributed copy, cursing my own computer slip-ups, hunched over the keyboard while Muffin, our wonderful half-Maine Coon cat, stares at me from his red bed, seemingly wishing I'd clear off and let him sleep. I've been so tired at the end of the day that I've been crashing into bed at 10pm, yet still not sleeping. And Carmel still thinks I'm sitting here all day watching daytime television.
Do other 'workers from home' find this? It's not a major problem and I know where I'd rather be, but it's taking some getting used to.
Then today, two small steps for mankind. The phone rings. A well-known national football magazine have been pointed in my direction by a former colleague. They want 800 words on Sullivan/Gold/Brady and West 'Am United by next Friday. And they'll pay me for it.
Shortly after, the inbox pings. Another former colleague has been doing some Google searching and wants to know about the magazine. I've got to go back to Funlop next Friday for a final farewell drink. I'll tell him then.
Thursday 21 January 2010
Thursday 14 January 2010
Snow, Skypes and social media
I really hope my mum would have been proud of me. It's been a wild week but in the front of my mind has always been that this was the time of year when Rita Warrillow was born(on 7/1/1938) and died (14/1/1987).
Thus it was that I found myself ankle-deep in snow in a churchyard in Worcestershire on Sunday, looking for her headstone amid the snow and frost. It's unfortunate that it is at this time of year but I will not forget; once you do that, a huge part of you disappears forever. Rest in peace, mum.
The rest of the week has been frantic; Monday: an afternoon of networking in some of Lichfield's finest hostelries; it may look like drinking, but in fact it's getting to know some very important people - and a very nice man paid me for my first commission so the least I can do is show you where to find him: http://www.maxamcards.co.uk/
Much of the rest of the week has been spent on the magazine. My joint-editor and I had a three-hour skype on Tuesday morning, drawing up what news-on-dead-trees journalists would call a flat-plan, then there were articles to write, people to chase up over features and pictures, articles to write for foreign magazines - I'm going to be published in Canada in the spring - and Plan B to draw up just in case Plan A fell apart, which it duly did at 10am on Thursday morning.
I even found time to squeeze in some learning. Before Christmas,Jo Ind (another recent Birmingham Post evacuee) put me in touch with Pete Ashton, one of the leading lights on the Birmingham social media scene. It took a while to arrange a meeting, but two hours in a freezing coffee bar in Birmingham city centre taught me more than I could have ever imagined about blogs and has, hopefully, made this one just that bit snappier than it was a week ago.
So thanks, Pete; thanks, Jo; thanks, Andy; thanks, Paul and Jim; thanks, Tom and Andrew...and thanks, mum.
Thus it was that I found myself ankle-deep in snow in a churchyard in Worcestershire on Sunday, looking for her headstone amid the snow and frost. It's unfortunate that it is at this time of year but I will not forget; once you do that, a huge part of you disappears forever. Rest in peace, mum.
The rest of the week has been frantic; Monday: an afternoon of networking in some of Lichfield's finest hostelries; it may look like drinking, but in fact it's getting to know some very important people - and a very nice man paid me for my first commission so the least I can do is show you where to find him: http://www.maxamcards.co.uk/
Much of the rest of the week has been spent on the magazine. My joint-editor and I had a three-hour skype on Tuesday morning, drawing up what news-on-dead-trees journalists would call a flat-plan, then there were articles to write, people to chase up over features and pictures, articles to write for foreign magazines - I'm going to be published in Canada in the spring - and Plan B to draw up just in case Plan A fell apart, which it duly did at 10am on Thursday morning.
I even found time to squeeze in some learning. Before Christmas,Jo Ind (another recent Birmingham Post evacuee) put me in touch with Pete Ashton, one of the leading lights on the Birmingham social media scene. It took a while to arrange a meeting, but two hours in a freezing coffee bar in Birmingham city centre taught me more than I could have ever imagined about blogs and has, hopefully, made this one just that bit snappier than it was a week ago.
So thanks, Pete; thanks, Jo; thanks, Andy; thanks, Paul and Jim; thanks, Tom and Andrew...and thanks, mum.
Thursday 7 January 2010
Sailing out into the new world
When I began this blog, I had a wild ambition to update it every day. Then, I got a tweet from a long-time friend and fellow blogger telling me I must be out of my mind.
Of course, she was right and I'm glad I didn't rush to write down some of my thoughts immediately after I left BPM Media Midlands on December 31. It was messy, it was unpleasant and it wasn't the way I wanted to end 17-and-a-half years.
But it's gone now and instead of being bitter, I can look back on the first week of the rest of my life - and it's been fascinating.
Much of the week has been spent getting my head around joint-editing an 88-page A3 quarterly magazine, something I've never had to think about before. The closest I've got was editing the Post's 14-page broadsheet sports section three or four times a year when my boss was on holiday. At least then we had a limited amount of copy coming in; at times this week, I've felt as if I was drowning under the flood of copy landing in my email inbox.
But with the support of my joint-editor Tom Rowland and the outstanding Andrew Welch, as well as the wonderful backing of my friends who I've told about this project, I feel much better tonight.
Martin Warrillow Publishing Services will be officially launched when I see my accountant in the morning, the bank have been very helpful and I am incredibly grateful for the flood of ideas which keeps pouring in from a long-time friend who I am sure would like to stay in the background for the moment. One day, I would love the pair of us to set up in business together - we'd be a great team.
Of course, she was right and I'm glad I didn't rush to write down some of my thoughts immediately after I left BPM Media Midlands on December 31. It was messy, it was unpleasant and it wasn't the way I wanted to end 17-and-a-half years.
But it's gone now and instead of being bitter, I can look back on the first week of the rest of my life - and it's been fascinating.
Much of the week has been spent getting my head around joint-editing an 88-page A3 quarterly magazine, something I've never had to think about before. The closest I've got was editing the Post's 14-page broadsheet sports section three or four times a year when my boss was on holiday. At least then we had a limited amount of copy coming in; at times this week, I've felt as if I was drowning under the flood of copy landing in my email inbox.
But with the support of my joint-editor Tom Rowland and the outstanding Andrew Welch, as well as the wonderful backing of my friends who I've told about this project, I feel much better tonight.
Martin Warrillow Publishing Services will be officially launched when I see my accountant in the morning, the bank have been very helpful and I am incredibly grateful for the flood of ideas which keeps pouring in from a long-time friend who I am sure would like to stay in the background for the moment. One day, I would love the pair of us to set up in business together - we'd be a great team.
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