..lying in the depths of my imagination.

There’s an awful lot going on just around the corner. Some of it is public knowledge; we’ve been awaiting a new website from Reading Room for a while now, and it looks like that is mere weeks away, post proper usability testing.Then there’s the website I was talking about recreating the other day, which needs finishing touches, one more to rebuild and another to build – at least the creative’s in the bag on that one.

I find this all quite exciting. I admit I never used to be this ambitious and focussed, but then I hadn’t yet found The Job. You know, the thing you finally realise you could do for a good long time, and be passionate about. I always thought that would be writing, but I didn’t necessarily expect it to be online writing. This job fills me with confidence because I know there’s a large part of it I can already do, and that I have a genuine interest in learning what I don’t know. And interest is surely half the battle when it comes to learning? Things come easily to people who are enthusiastic, or at least working hard does. This job makes me want to work as hard as I possibly can because it’s interesting and often fun.

I also find it a bit scary and nerve-wracking. I mean, after all, there’s a lot to do, and J and I both have long holidays planned in the next month because when we booked them none of this was specifically on the cards. I can’t help feeling the tension is part of what makes it interesting, though; I suspect we do better work when we’re slightly under pressure because it forces a special sharpness of the mind. It’s impossible to get distracted when there simply isn’t the time.

Speaking of distractions – positive ones – I’m reading a garbled mixture of Howard Jacobson’s The Making of Henry, Frank Skinner’s autobiography, rubbish free daily papers and a peppering of technology blogs, pet columns and, of course, Disney stuff. Jacobson is almost cruelly observant – it’s unsettling. I warm to his character only to realise I’m empathising with an object of ridicule; affectionate ridicule but ridicule nonetheless. I suspect that’s Jacobson’s point – that we’re all faintly ludicrous. Alarming, but undoubtedly true. Frank Skinner is honest to the point of discomfort, but I am fascinated by his discourses on Catholicism, and some of the stories are laugh-out-loud funny (funnier than any of his acts, in fact!). The rest you can read for yourselves.