Daily Archives: March 29, 2007

Double Take

The new covers for the seventh and final Harry Potter book have been released.

Throughout the entire series, I have been glad that my country sells the UK-based designs, because I prefer them.

Until now.

I am stunned to see that I actually prefer the US cover to this book. I may buy the adult cover of the UK edition instead of the junior cover, despite my obsessive need to have matching sets on my shelves. None of the covers, US or UK, really interest me this time around. Not that the series cover art has ever been anything to hang on a wall, but this time it all seems particularly bland.

Music, Consultants, and Colds

The sun, the sun! I’ve been greedily soaking it up for the past couple of days.

We had our final regular rehearsal before the spring concert last night, actually in the church where we’ll be playing. (Due to scheduling issues our dress rehearsal will be elsewhere.) It took almost half the rehearsal to accustom ourselves to the very different sound of the room. It’s hard to hear the other sections when everyone is playing, and the sound is somewhat muffled and oddly amplified. Not in a bad way; there were times where we sounded like we were an ensemble twice as big as we truly are, for example. As usual, it took me a whole movement to sort through the different sound to actually hear what I was playing. It’s going to be a lovely concert. (Concert! This Saturday night at 7:30! Cedar Park United Church in Pointe-Claire! Here are all the details!)

Yesterday I had my first face-to-face interview in over ten years. (Most of my jobs have been as a result of networking and being familiar with the employers beforehand, and my freelance work is based in telecommuting.) It went well; so well, in fact, that I am now an official consultant working on-site at one of the local megacorps. (For those familiar with HRH, it is, ironically enough, one of the places at which he’s been trying to land a job for a couple of years now. Taste that irony!) An inside referral secured me the interview, and the two-week contract (with possibility of renewal) seems tailor-made for me and my abilities and qualifications. The heads on the project are people who care deeply about the work, and for whom I developed quick respect during our interview. So naturally, now that I have the contract I am wibbling deep inside and worrying that I will let them down, as well as making the individual who referred me look bad. It would be really, really nice to not have to field my own inner critic every time I get a job. It sounds like I would have to actively work at not making the situation better, however, and I am nowhere near as wibbly as I was last night. This morning, I am Professional Editor Girl again.

The project sounds engaging and moderately challenging for me as well as interesting on a I’m-doing-a-good-thing level. Nothing like promoting reading comprehension while sorting words and — ahem — editing a dictionary. Seriously — how cool is that? I get to edit a dictionary. It’s like a dream come true, if I’d ever presumed to have this particular daydream. (Granted, the work will also be frustrating due to its nature, but still! Editing a dictionary!)

One of the curiosities of this contract is that I will be travelling elsewhere to work, instead of working in my home office with cats and tea and other comforts. I haven’t done this in five years. Public transport is now my friend again. It’s an hour of travel, broken into three twenty-minute chunks so I can actually settle down and read without worrying that I’ll miss my stop. I’m told they will provide everything I need, but really, I will have to burn a few data CDs’ worth of music, bring tea and a mug, a dictionary (because I have learned never to assume that any office has a reliable dictionary, if a dictionary at all, and sure I could use an online dictionary but I always suspect them of being Not Quite Real), my good headphones, notebooks, and so forth.

Eep. I will have keycards and such. And, I’m told, an office in which to work, which probably means a small unused conference room with a computer brought in. My lower back already hurts at the thought of office chairs.

Also, another small freelance contract landed in my in-box last night. It will have to be done in the evenings, now that I am an official nine-to-fiver for the next two weeks.

Liam and I have both developed colds. I thought it was the general spring allergy thing, but it is not.

That is all.