Hurrah!

Still haven't started my news round-up, but have just sold my first piece to a national. The Wordsmith is feeling very chirpy right now...

Best crack on with the dull stuff though.

Long bad Friday

I am such an idiot. I knew 2 weeks ago that today would be the deadline for producing a whole month's round-up of UK news stories for one of the publications I write for. It's the first time I'll be doing this column and I agreed with the editor that I'd file at the last minute so it would be as up to date as possible.

Did I use the intervening 2 weeks to collect possible stories? Did I hell... Now I have to spend my day trawling a whole month's worth of old news looking for the interesting bits. I am kicking myself. And I only need to produce 1,000 words. It's going to be huge effort for little reward, given the time I'll need to devote to this.

Something tells me it's going to be a long day...

Normal working life resumes

I've just had a pleasant 2-mile walk in the sunshine to the PC shop and back. I'm now in possession of a shiny new USB keyboard, meaning I can work again. The relief is immense. I'm going to have to buy a proper one though at some point. Forking out £20 is fine in an emergency, but I think I need to invest more in something that won't die on me after a year. My PC is 4 years old and this is the 4th keyboard I've had.

Still no printer - I need to do some research for that and shop around.

I unexpectedly got commissioned this morning to write a feature for a regional online media hub. No pay, unfortunately, but I've been offered the possibility to join the paid freelance roster later if this goes well. So now I'm off to write the copy of my life...