604.

So, I've been away from my computer basically all week to take a brief trip into the world of work. Yes! I finally got a job, albeit in the form of a trial period for an unpaid position. I was working for a company called Shoot Experience, based in Hackney. They are the organisers of the London Street Photography festival, so it was a good opportunity to gain more of an insight into a creative field, somewhere much more specific to my discipline.

I only worked for two days, but due to the fact that I was down in Dorking and was up before 7AM to travel for nearly 3 hours door-to-door both days, it felt like much longer, so I was pleased to sleep-in a bit this morning. I feel that I got quite a lot out of the two days though, although there was a fair amount of admin, such as printing, stapling and laminating, I was also able to frame a couple of pieces that Shoot Experience were auctioning at their Fundraising Event (which was tonight).
I helped to frame the Vivian Maier photo, which was valued up to £1,500, not to mention beautiful, very nerve-racking! I framed Lot 19 (Polly Braden & David Campany, Burnt motorbike on the Greenway) and Lot 4 (David Gibson,Audition) unsupervised though, so it was nice to be able to put one of the practical skills that I got from my degree to use. I also packaged a lot of the prints, which is what I spent most of the first day doing. Yesterday I did some online promotion for their new event 'Capture Tower Hamlets', a photography competition/heritage project based throughout the Tower Hamlets borough. < plug > Click the link to find out more, and if you're a photographer in the Tower Hamlets area you can capture a pre-2012 Tower Hamlets to preserve images for future generations < /plug >.

Despite the success of the last couple of days, I'm not resting on my laurels and have quite a few things lined up when I come back from France, but it would be nice to continue working with Shoot Experience for a few days a week if I'm able to. I'm not sure how things will be after my next two (yes, two) recruitment sign-up interviews, hope not all the jobs that they offer me are in 'sales' though... *cringe.
I think I had a photography-related answering machine message too but was unable to contact the caller back as they didn't leave a number - bit annoyed about that because I got all of this and last week's answering machine messages all in one go yesterday (of which there were nine so that was good), then my phone ran out of battery...

Anyway, if you're quite finished reading about my life, here is a feast for your eyes. I found a lovely café down the road from Shoot Experience called The Ginger Pig, it does beaut food, I went there both days because I was too lazy to find anywhere else, I had a pancake breakfast on Monday and Eggs Benedict on Tuesday, yum. I've also included a few others, including the beautiful sky we had on Monday night (it's been weird weather recently, hasn't it?!) and some gratuitous ones of my cat and my cousin's hamster. Most of these were taken on my phone but I don't think they're too bad, it can be quite nice to have a camera on your phone sometimes.