If the day you get your security pass marks the first day you’re really working for a company, then for me today was that day. I now have a smart red card to open all the doors I need to get through, and I no longer have to sweet-talk someone else into letting me in. As for the picture… hmmm. Well, it’s not my worst, as a swift browse through my cards of the past reveals. In vaguely chronological order:

Where did that massive nose come from? It’s me, circa 11 years old, on the under-16s photo card that went with the train ticket I used on the journey to school each day. I guess I can only be grateful the nose and face are now in better proportion to one another.

Post-16 the nose is less of a worry than the hair. Either I’d slept on it funny that night, or there was a gale blowing somewhere in the vicinity of the photo booth. Not one of my better efforts.

Perhaps the first post-school picture appears on this Link FM security pass. There are two problems here. First, the shirt, subsequently worn by Christine Hamilton in ‘Louis Theroux meets the Hamiltons’, or whatever it was called (I swear this is a man’s shirt - even the buttons do up the right way around). Second, the hair, which seems to have transmuted into some kind of dark brown ferret that’s trying very hard to make itself comfortable on top of my head.

Oh dear. All I can say is I was a student, which explains the early stages of a pony tail, which only got worse the following year…

Unfortunately it was about this time that I had my passport photo taken, which perhaps explains why I’m pulled out of line so often at airports. The only consolation there is that the hair is not quite so obvious in the passport. Even so, I’m glad it’s up for renewal next year.

Sadly (stupidly) I handed over my VNU pass when I left PCW two weeks ago, so the only one I have from my time there is the ITN pass that I used to get into and out of the building to present The Lab on Thursdays and London this Week on Sundays. Notice the presence of a collar on that shirt - very rare indeed, which suggests I may have been trying to make a good impression.

That picture was taken some time around 2000 or 2001 in the green room for Channel 4 News, which is only slightly larger than (although significantly grottier than) the old BBC London green room in Bush House. Perhaps not surprisingly, the room wasn’t green, which fits in with the pattern of every other green room I’ve been in.

And finally, most recently, my gym pass for Fitness First. I’m not a member there any more, having since joined Esporta where they don’t put your picture on your card.

I hope nobody was supposed to police your entry on the basis of this picture. It was taken with a webcam, and like all webcam pics it’s practically impossible to see. Unlike all other webcam pics, I’m not naked.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 21st, 2003 at 11:03 pm and is filed under Picture story. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.