Clearing the Decks
It's taken three and a half weeks, but that magazine feature's finished at last. Soberingly, it'll be on sale on Sunday, gone forever by Monday morning.
Finally got to sit down and work through the first draft of Old Friends, including more detailed reads of Marc and Jonathan's yarns. Glad I did for a couple of reasons.
Firstly, it meant I was more able to appreciate how well the whole book hangs together. The guys have done some very fine work indeed - you're not going to be disappointed.
Secondly, it meant I was able to pick up on a couple of utter howlers in my story, moments of fumbled continuity between the three tales that would have had readers foaming at the mouth. One day, I might even tell you what they were.
Sent my amendments off to Simon and after almost a month of scrabbling I now have No Work. At least until Monday.
That ought to be a good thing, but it means I have to face up to something I normally strenuously avoid: tidying my office.
If I've got a job on, I tend to slip into Mad Professor mode with my work space. Piles of clutter accumulate, totter, fall and scatter: all, I kid myself, in a pattern that allows me to put my hands on anything I might need for the job at a second's notice.
The aftermath is never pretty. It can be, however, informative. So far, amongst the debris, I've found:
Three dead takeaway coffee cups
A hardback book about Factory Records
Three years' worth of my reviews clippings, waiting to be scanned to disc
An England shirt (2001-2003 vintage)
A double-feature DVD test disc of The Hills Have Eyes and The Ringer (a horror double-bill, then)
One square of carefully wrapped chilli chocolate
A toy lightsabre (Darth Maul)
Six dictaphone tapes (two of them unused)
My Ipod earphones (hurrah!)
I can also reveal that this actually turned up down the side of my desk.
But Ethiopia sounded better, apparently.
Finally got to sit down and work through the first draft of Old Friends, including more detailed reads of Marc and Jonathan's yarns. Glad I did for a couple of reasons.
Firstly, it meant I was more able to appreciate how well the whole book hangs together. The guys have done some very fine work indeed - you're not going to be disappointed.
Secondly, it meant I was able to pick up on a couple of utter howlers in my story, moments of fumbled continuity between the three tales that would have had readers foaming at the mouth. One day, I might even tell you what they were.
Sent my amendments off to Simon and after almost a month of scrabbling I now have No Work. At least until Monday.
That ought to be a good thing, but it means I have to face up to something I normally strenuously avoid: tidying my office.
If I've got a job on, I tend to slip into Mad Professor mode with my work space. Piles of clutter accumulate, totter, fall and scatter: all, I kid myself, in a pattern that allows me to put my hands on anything I might need for the job at a second's notice.
The aftermath is never pretty. It can be, however, informative. So far, amongst the debris, I've found:
Three dead takeaway coffee cups
A hardback book about Factory Records
Three years' worth of my reviews clippings, waiting to be scanned to disc
An England shirt (2001-2003 vintage)
A double-feature DVD test disc of The Hills Have Eyes and The Ringer (a horror double-bill, then)
One square of carefully wrapped chilli chocolate
A toy lightsabre (Darth Maul)
Six dictaphone tapes (two of them unused)
My Ipod earphones (hurrah!)
I can also reveal that this actually turned up down the side of my desk.
But Ethiopia sounded better, apparently.
posted by Pete Kempshall at 8:39 PM
2 Comments:
Dude, your link has died on the sky news thing .. its either that or you found Peter Brocks memorial down the side of your desk in a Being John Malkovich
Which probably would have been funnier ...
Thanks for the warning - link's fixed now (to Sydney Morning Herald instead of Sky, but the gist's the same).
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