Half-life Isolation
*What a bitch to actually log in and edit this. For whatever reason, the first page of Blogspot keeps having an 'internal error' when it loads, and crashing out. The only reason I'm logged in now is because I had to sign in to comment on a post*
Anyway...
Yesterday was my first day at Whalley and Associates and it turned out to be OK. I’m not going to lie and say it was fantastic because it was a mixed experience.
On the positive side, people were friendly and directors kept checking up on me to see if I was alright. It’s also great to have a fast daytime Internet connection again, as well as air-conditioning in the stifling Durban summer heat.
On the negative side, apart from the 6am wake up and rush hour commute (which I haven’t done for over a year), I can’t say my work on the first day was gripping stuff. I spent the most of my time reading about tyres, as well as skincare products, skimming through brochures for copy to pare down for new products added to the Johnson & Johnson website. Oh, and I sat in on a meeting to do with the revamp of a mortgage bond website. Yes, that’s right. Website copy again. At a company that has one guy in their web design department.
Anyway, I think my biggest gripe, and it made me actually feel very down, was how isolated I felt. The creative department is completely full so I’m sitting mostly on my lonesome in one of the busy directors’ offices (he’s always running around). Now of course I’m encouraged to wander around and drop in on people, but it feels so out of character, as well as imposing, for me to climb up to the third floor and deposit myself there watching other people work. So here I am back in a half-life existence, sitting in an advertising agency where I don’t really have the chance to feed off other people’s creative energies.
I’ve just installed Winamp this morning, so at least I’ll have some music to keep me company. And, big yay, apparently my black 4GB iPod Nano arrives today.
In terms of the weekend, it was a good one, although I did absolutely no work on the freelance project I’m attached to (and wish I wasn’t now seeing as it’s going to clearly be one of those back-and-forth-for-months things). Instead, on the hot windless Saturday morning Paul and I went to Brighton Beach, which, surprisingly, was almost completely empty (apparently people don’t think of going to the beach on a Saturday, preferring errand running instead). It was low tide so we spent our time scrounging around the rock pools, some of which ere as warm as baths. Our most interesting finds were a shoal of 30+ fish hiding under a shadowy overhang, a Angelfish about 30cm long and a small spiky lionfish. Around the time we were thinking of heading home, Paul managed to slip off a rock and, badly skinning his shin and toes, so I had to drive us back to his place.
On Saturday evening we went to Diane, Mark’s sister’s, 21st- a themed dress-up where you had to go as the something with the letter D. Paul and I were the DA, with homemade posters and badges, Shirley and G were daisies, Mark was Derek Zoolander and my sister and boyfriend Jason were Disco. Unfortunately I forgot to get the pictures off Paul’s and my sister’s camera so people reading this blog will have to wait for those sometime later this week. Anyway the evening was fun. Some of us ate too much. Others drank too much...
and we all know who is who.
Sunday was just a very hot, lazy day where it made sense just to veg reading or watching TV, and swimming. I ended my last day of freedom by watching Zoolander with Paul.
Anyway...
Yesterday was my first day at Whalley and Associates and it turned out to be OK. I’m not going to lie and say it was fantastic because it was a mixed experience.
On the positive side, people were friendly and directors kept checking up on me to see if I was alright. It’s also great to have a fast daytime Internet connection again, as well as air-conditioning in the stifling Durban summer heat.
On the negative side, apart from the 6am wake up and rush hour commute (which I haven’t done for over a year), I can’t say my work on the first day was gripping stuff. I spent the most of my time reading about tyres, as well as skincare products, skimming through brochures for copy to pare down for new products added to the Johnson & Johnson website. Oh, and I sat in on a meeting to do with the revamp of a mortgage bond website. Yes, that’s right. Website copy again. At a company that has one guy in their web design department.
Anyway, I think my biggest gripe, and it made me actually feel very down, was how isolated I felt. The creative department is completely full so I’m sitting mostly on my lonesome in one of the busy directors’ offices (he’s always running around). Now of course I’m encouraged to wander around and drop in on people, but it feels so out of character, as well as imposing, for me to climb up to the third floor and deposit myself there watching other people work. So here I am back in a half-life existence, sitting in an advertising agency where I don’t really have the chance to feed off other people’s creative energies.
I’ve just installed Winamp this morning, so at least I’ll have some music to keep me company. And, big yay, apparently my black 4GB iPod Nano arrives today.
In terms of the weekend, it was a good one, although I did absolutely no work on the freelance project I’m attached to (and wish I wasn’t now seeing as it’s going to clearly be one of those back-and-forth-for-months things). Instead, on the hot windless Saturday morning Paul and I went to Brighton Beach, which, surprisingly, was almost completely empty (apparently people don’t think of going to the beach on a Saturday, preferring errand running instead). It was low tide so we spent our time scrounging around the rock pools, some of which ere as warm as baths. Our most interesting finds were a shoal of 30+ fish hiding under a shadowy overhang, a Angelfish about 30cm long and a small spiky lionfish. Around the time we were thinking of heading home, Paul managed to slip off a rock and, badly skinning his shin and toes, so I had to drive us back to his place.
On Saturday evening we went to Diane, Mark’s sister’s, 21st- a themed dress-up where you had to go as the something with the letter D. Paul and I were the DA, with homemade posters and badges, Shirley and G were daisies, Mark was Derek Zoolander and my sister and boyfriend Jason were Disco. Unfortunately I forgot to get the pictures off Paul’s and my sister’s camera so people reading this blog will have to wait for those sometime later this week. Anyway the evening was fun. Some of us ate too much. Others drank too much...
and we all know who is who.
Sunday was just a very hot, lazy day where it made sense just to veg reading or watching TV, and swimming. I ended my last day of freedom by watching Zoolander with Paul.
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