This morning, I caved in and ordered some of the Japanese 10th Anniversary Beast Wars figures - Cheetor, Dinobot, Rhinox, Tigatron and Waspinator. These are the only models that interest me from that first run, because they're halfway decent plastic versions of the characters from the TV show (particularly with the new paint jobs). Terrorsaur, Tarantulas and Scorponok are pretty poor models in both beast and robot modes... but if I suddenly turn completist, I may pick them up as well. That said, BW Scorponok appears to have become one of the rarities, and can fetch a hefty price...
I also snagged the knockoff Generation 1 Mirage (it's a mold I've always wanted, but which tends to be either prohibitively expensive if complete, or irreparably damaged due to dodgy molding and weak parts) and the last two World's Smallest Dino(ro)bots, because the ones I have are pretty darned cool. Thanks to an 'End Of Year Sale' coupon code, I got a 15% discount on the lot. Hurrah.
Yesterday went far better than expected, despite my boss calling in sick (probably due to dodgy seafood the night before). Ads were signed off promptly, Classified didn't misbehave (although the rep left her folder somewhere stupid and then blamed my designer, when I'm pretty sure he handed everything back to her), features weren't too bad, and the magazine had been cut down in size on Thursday, so it was easily manageable.
Monday is still likely to be quite painful... and now there are even more reasons why it could be. The new editor is very full of herself (having learned her technique from the top editor by working as her editorial assistant), but lacks the creative eye that makes her boss tolerable. My designer showed me two versions of a particular page - her own, and the editor's - and it was obvious which was the 'right' version and which was haphazardly thrown together by an incompetent. Sparks may well fly.
Amusingly, when I mentioned this to the departing editor (who had been acting editor of Monday's mag for a month or two), she agreed that the new editor has "a very different technique" (putting it mildly). She was also a touch regretful that she wasn't staying to see how the designer who worked on her own magazine handles the top editor. She is completely unafraid to point out to any editor that supplied materials are rubbish, or that their ideas are bad. That's one of the reasons she's such a good designer... I wonder whether her new editor will see it that way.
The late afternoon/evening saw everyone off down the pub for yet another leaving do - for the aforementioned departing editor - which was pretty good fun until one of the salesmen started really creeping me out. Prior to that, I had couple of interesting conversations with a couple of them. I bowed out early (about 6.30) and came home under the influence of a couple of glasses of brandy.
Saturday, 5 January 2008
Thursday, 3 January 2008
The little rewards
Today didn't really go as planned or expected, in so many ways.
Workwise, we're not in an ideal position. I have one deadline tomorrow, and the next on Monday. My main concern is that I probably won't have a lot of time for next week's magazines until Monday, at which point it'll be a crunch-time deadline day.
Tomorrow's magazine isn't in desperately bad shape, all things considered. It dropped by 8 pages today, owing to a distinct lack of sales and being several thousand off it's projected target. On the downside, this meant that vast swathes of editorial had to cut, and much of the remainder had to be renumbered. On the upside, rather than having about 5 and a half pages of filler (free) ads, there are only two quarter page fillers, one of which is due to be sold tomorrow. It's a fairly small magazine, and what remains to be done is quite manageable... but even so, it prevents me from getting very involved in Monday's magazine.
I'm glad this kind of crap only happens once a year.
After work, the plan was to pop off uptown for shopping, food and fun. The shopping was disappointing (who knew Harrods was little more than a theme park these days? Who knew???), food was decent... but the day had been too depressing for the rest of the plan.
But just to show that no day can be all bad, I got home and found a parcel waiting for me: My latest eBay purchase, Galaxy Force Gasket Police Type. Like the standard version, he's pretty cute, with an oversized, double-barrelled weapon. Like just about every version of the mold, the pieces that attach the rear wheel to the body of the vehicle (and the two halves to the legs of the robot) are assembled incorrectly, but it doesn't really damage the model in any significant way.
Workwise, we're not in an ideal position. I have one deadline tomorrow, and the next on Monday. My main concern is that I probably won't have a lot of time for next week's magazines until Monday, at which point it'll be a crunch-time deadline day.
Tomorrow's magazine isn't in desperately bad shape, all things considered. It dropped by 8 pages today, owing to a distinct lack of sales and being several thousand off it's projected target. On the downside, this meant that vast swathes of editorial had to cut, and much of the remainder had to be renumbered. On the upside, rather than having about 5 and a half pages of filler (free) ads, there are only two quarter page fillers, one of which is due to be sold tomorrow. It's a fairly small magazine, and what remains to be done is quite manageable... but even so, it prevents me from getting very involved in Monday's magazine.
I'm glad this kind of crap only happens once a year.
After work, the plan was to pop off uptown for shopping, food and fun. The shopping was disappointing (who knew Harrods was little more than a theme park these days? Who knew???), food was decent... but the day had been too depressing for the rest of the plan.
But just to show that no day can be all bad, I got home and found a parcel waiting for me: My latest eBay purchase, Galaxy Force Gasket Police Type. Like the standard version, he's pretty cute, with an oversized, double-barrelled weapon. Like just about every version of the mold, the pieces that attach the rear wheel to the body of the vehicle (and the two halves to the legs of the robot) are assembled incorrectly, but it doesn't really damage the model in any significant way.
Wednesday, 2 January 2008
2008
So, on balance, 2007 was an OK year. Would have been great if it weren't for most of what happened in the office during December. It felt as though enormous progress had been made up until then.
But now here we are in 2008. It got off to a pretty good start with a shopping trip uptown (actually on the last day of 2007, but who's counting?) that would have included a visit to the Hyde Park funfair and other delights after that, but the shopping part was kind of tiring. Still there's a chance for a second attempt later this week, so who knows?
The first day back at work was weird. Got through it mostly unscathed but my copy controller was off sick (the old 'food poisoning' excuse), so that side of things was in disarray from the get go. While the magazine made good progress today, it didn't do quite as well as I'd hoped, considering my first deadline this year is Friday, and the second is Monday. Doesn't give me much wriggle-room.
The MD did not, in fact, move into the old Publishing Director's office (not surprising), and people did seem to be getting on with their work (what little there was) rather than doing the usual 'first day back' piss-taking. Of course, we were somewhat hampered by an office-wide telephone breakdown which took till mid-afternoon for BT to fix, but that didn't seem to hamper us too much.
There is also the underlying sense of things changed in the office. Its hard to put one's finger on it... but in the few moments when I wasn't concentrating on work, I could feel it.
Definitely looking to move on this year.
But now here we are in 2008. It got off to a pretty good start with a shopping trip uptown (actually on the last day of 2007, but who's counting?) that would have included a visit to the Hyde Park funfair and other delights after that, but the shopping part was kind of tiring. Still there's a chance for a second attempt later this week, so who knows?
The first day back at work was weird. Got through it mostly unscathed but my copy controller was off sick (the old 'food poisoning' excuse), so that side of things was in disarray from the get go. While the magazine made good progress today, it didn't do quite as well as I'd hoped, considering my first deadline this year is Friday, and the second is Monday. Doesn't give me much wriggle-room.
The MD did not, in fact, move into the old Publishing Director's office (not surprising), and people did seem to be getting on with their work (what little there was) rather than doing the usual 'first day back' piss-taking. Of course, we were somewhat hampered by an office-wide telephone breakdown which took till mid-afternoon for BT to fix, but that didn't seem to hamper us too much.
There is also the underlying sense of things changed in the office. Its hard to put one's finger on it... but in the few moments when I wasn't concentrating on work, I could feel it.
Definitely looking to move on this year.
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