Time
Wednesday, September 5th, 2007Well, that was a first. I turned up to deliver a two-day course – only to find that the course contents, unbeknown to me, had been rewritten. I realised there was something awry when the second person whom I asked: “So what do you want to get from these two days?” said something I hadn’t prepared for at all.
The course name was the same but the expected contents bore no relation to it. No good apportioning blame. I’m stuck there in a room with people who are expecting a commissioning course and how to deal with dodgy freelances, and they’ve turned up for an editing news and features workshop.
Fortunately, there was a bit of crossover. And equally fortunately, I tend to carry enough exercises and notes to keep me going for several weeks. Not good for my back, but a godsend when this happens. To make it worse, one of the delegates said that he had completed a commissioning course a few months earlier, and didn’t know why his editor had sent him along. Oh, trainers just love people like that.
Life was a lot more fun on Bournemouth, where I went to train Imagine Publishing. Good mags that look terrific, but the writing needs sharpening. One of those great courses where you suddenly notice it’s 4pm because time has flown by.
The only bad news was staying in a hotel that I’ll call the Sunset. Apart from the East European waitresses, I was the youngest person there by about 20 years. The walls were thin, and my neighbours spent the evening arguing, then banged on the wall because I was watching the football at 10pm.
I would also guess they were on the verge of incontinence from the number of times they got up during the night and walked across the creaky floor. Most embarrassingly, one old dear, waiting to board an over 80s coach trip to watch the tide come in, or something, winked at me. “Play your cards right, sonny…”