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So off to Stockport, to watch my little ‘tinpot’ football team play in the ‘proper’ football league. I used the game as a target for me to drive the furthest since my crash.

 I’m the kind of person who would always get in the car and drive anywhere – for at least two years I had a job where I would drive on average 50,000 miles per year. Whenever any of my friends wanted to be taken anywhere, I would always volunteer to drive. I was told I was perfect girlfriend material and was often a ‘designated driver’ on a night out. I never believed I would ever think twice about taking the car anywhere, or driving under any circumstance. I wouldn’t go as far as to say that I have lost my driving ‘nerve’ more that I find myself thinking twice about something which had been second nature to me. I have family in Manchester, so combined the game with a family trip. Little did I know at the end of the weekend there would be a family bonus when I got to see an Aunt and Uncle that I hadn’t seen since 1975. It also allowed me to drive along one of my favourite stretches of motorway – the M62 between Manchester and Leeds, where you cross the Pennines.  It suddenly felt so normal to be driving again, as though all my reactions had returned, and my fears had disappeared.

As to the game, when the Daggers ran I out I really was ‘proud to be a dagger’. This is what the football league means to me, my little tinpot local football team playing with the big boys, after having earned the right to do so. The team played magnificently and the result did not do us justice. There aren’t many words that I can use, as I am already ‘blubbling’ as much as I did on the day we were presented with the Conference League Trophy. We didn’t get the result that we wanted but the team played their socks off. Overall, I think it was a very emotional day (for the right reasons) for anyone connected with the club.

Today is a significant day in my history.  8th August 1983 was the day I started working at Andre Deutsch.  Publishing seems like a different age compared to then - Andre still ran Andre Deutsch, Livia Gollancz still ran Gollancz, Macmillan ran Macmillan (who had recently installed the ‘revolutionary’ Vista system in their warehouse), the Chapmans were running Collins, the Cheethams were running Century, the Attenboroughs were running Hodder and Stoughton, Paul Hamlyn and Robert Maxwell were ‘dabbling in acquisitions’ and the talent which went on to form Bloomsbury was still employed at Jonathan Cape.  Michael Joseph and Hamish Hamilton were still independent publishers, and most of publishing lived within a square mile of  Bedford Square, which was perceived as the epicentre (Chatto, Bodley Head & Cape, Hodder, Michael Joseph, The Publishers Association, Book Marketing, even Heinemann Educational hadn’t yet moved out to Oxford).  I could go on and on, and name some more of the significant publishing names which were not yet absorbed - Sphere, Metheun, George Allen & Unwin, Secker & Warburg; but it seems like a lifetime ago.  It was before the ‘accountants’ had taken over, a time when ‘personnel’ was handled by the Managing Directors Secretary (they hadn’t invented the term ‘PA’), and the quickest way to make a book a flop was to tie it in to a television programme - I kid you not.   Bookselling seemed fresh and invigorated by a man who had opened about 6 new stores under his own name - Tim Waterstone, and names like Claude Gill, Dillons, Books Etc, Sherratt & Hughes, Mowbrays, Ancient House, James Thin, Hammicks and Volume One, were around and about. I was a young, enthusiastic office junior, who had a love of books and was chuffed to be working for the publishers of two of my childhood favourites - Riddles, Rhymes and Rigmaroles by John Cunliffe and Madeline by Ludwig Bemelmans.  I was in awe of “Mr Deutsch” and throughout the first 6 of my 7 years within his employment I always addressed him as thus.  The top floor of the building was known as ‘the flat’ and was decorated with Bemelman’s original Artwork from My Life in Art.  It was where Mr Deutsch’s chef, Piero, would cook delightful meals on a meagre budget to entertain Andre’s guests.  The wine served with meals was often referred to by those ‘in the know’ as ‘headache wine’. My first task was to photocopy the manuscript of Leon Uris’s The Haj.  It was 1009 pages long and they need 6 copies in time for a meeting.  The equipment for this task was a 1974 Rank Xerox photocopier which was situated in the basement of the building and kept company with a few cockroaches.  The copier had no sorter and no feeder - every sheet of paper had to be placed on the glass individually. It was a task that took me 3 whole days, but I loved every minute.  I feel thankful that 24 years on I am still in love with an industry that is almost unrecognisable from the above. Regardless of who owns what, I still feel the hairs on the back of my neck rise when I hear an editor or author talk to me about their latest passion; I’ve acquired the ‘production habit’ of sniffing a new book which has come to me straight from the printers; I still love hearing or deciding on the sales and marketing pitch for the book; I still scream out “Yes!” every time I conclude a deal; and I still feel a strange level of excitement when I open a book that has been recommended to me for the first time.  It goes without saying, that I still love the people that work in publishing. I hope that you are passionate and fulfilled within your job today as the day you first started, and if not, how are you going to rekindle your passion?  Whilst you think about that, I’ll locate a bottle of  ‘headache wine’.  At some point today I will raise a glass for you all. 

I was at a party this week to celebrate a close friend’s birthday.  Whilst talking to Joel Ricketts (The Bookseller) and Emma House (London Book Fair) they suggested two things to add to my list of 40 challenges.

The first is to watch the sun rise over London at a location near the Millennium Bridge.  (Suggested by Joel).

The second is to spend more than £100 on a pair of Shoes.  (Suggested by Emma).

Seeing as these both sound great fun and I’ve done neither before, I’ve added them to the list.

This is the time of year when the majority of CVs I see come from fresh graduates.  I know from experience that the Careers Guidance officers in most Universities offer CV advice, yet I repeatedly see CVs of between 4 and 7 pages long.  If you are a graduate and have no other experience other than summer jobs, employers really don’t expect you to have a CV lasting more than 1 or 2 pages.  Even experienced job hunters don’t have more than 2 page CVs.  So cut down the length, lose the chat and stick to the facts.  You don’t need to write in detail every single module of your degree course - state the essential parts that are relevant to the job you are applying for, or even just the basics. 

As one of my neighbours was sadly tricked into parting money with a bogus builder, the local police wanted to bring forward the introduction of a “no doorstep caller zone” in my street.  To do this they needed to have as many residents answerinq a short survey hopefully agreeing to this.  As the police needed to turn this around in a matter of days, I offered my assistance and delivered the leaflets along with a personal letter from me. 
One of the difficulties we anticipated would be a lack of response -  the last survey the police sent out was only answered by 1 person, aside from myself.  Fortunately, the personal letter seemed to have done the trick and we received about 20 back within 24 hours.  More trickled through within the week.   The police went ahead with the project and hopefully all my neighbours will somehow be more aware and treat all door-to-door callers as suspicious.