Nik lives in Essex, UK and works in London as the editor of MacUser magazine. The posts and comments on this site do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions of values of his employers.
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The day started with a very complicated meeting with Microsoft, filled with acronyms and corporate speak (’we’re empowering smaller businesses to enter the digital decade’ etc). It all fell into place about 57 minutes into our alotted hour when one of the two presenters drew me a diagram on the whiteboard. Clearly he interpreted the confused look on my face correctly. If they had done that from the off things would have been much clearer but to give them their credit even I didn’t know how much I didn’t know so there was no way I could have known that I needed to know about the diagram.
Microsoft’s London offices are exactly how you imagine a new media company to be. An enormous projection of Sky News in the foyer from a projector slung down from the ceiling. If you sit in the wrong place you get it in your face and it looks like you’re popping your head out from between the lapels of Lisa Aziz’s jacket. Beside the low-slung chairs there is a machine that makes real coffee with real water, and below that a glass-fronted fridge well-stocked with chilled drinks. It’s so plush it’s almost a shame when your meeting starts.
It turns out, though, that that was the easy part of the day. We are heading for deadlines and all of my sections seem to be due at once. I’m looking after pcwexpert (16 pages), group tests (22 pages), reviews (23 pages) and flashback, as well as doing my usual bits and writing two columns. It’s been a horrible week and I think next week will be the same. Add to that the fact that the reviews are all due in by Tuesday and we will be pre-recording next week’s show at Monday lunchtime because Gordon is off to San Francisco later in the week and I guess it was inevitable I would end up leaving my desk late this evening.
I was glad when I did, though, as I went around to mum’s for dinner. Kim and Steve are around for the weekend, and they have brought baby James with him who by my reckoning must be about three months old. By the time I arrived he was, mercifully, tucked up and asleep in bed.
Dinner was great. I ate so much, though. In fact we all did, and now I feel quite bloated and a little ill. I’m sitting here typing this in bed, slunk down beneath the duvet so that as much as possible, while still being able to read the screen, I am pretty much horizontal. It’s making me feel a little better.
The reason for going around was to colleck Jess. She wasn’t happy about the whole idea of getting in her carry basket. I think she associates it with trips to the vet, but once in she was well behaved, and when we arrived back at the flat she wasn’t entirely kwwn on the idea of coming out. There were a few quiet little miows when she eventually crept out, and then she kept low as she crawled into each room in turn, keeping her tail down and her eyes very wide.
She seems to have settled now, though. She’s jumping up and down on the bed, purring like a little engine.
I hope she lets me sleep.
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