In print

Can you see that?  The most important thing is that you can see a) my name, and b) that this is definitely a proper newspaper.  My technical adviser recommended a screen shot from the on-line version.  But I wanted you to see the real thing.  Page 6 of today's Times.  Aren't I clever?  Well actually not very.  The science editor was nice enough to say that what he did to my draft was just "tarting up".  I think it was a little more than that.

But somehow I managed to learn something from yesterday.  Today I wrote a piece on a Nature paper on a Samoan earthquake.  This time I got "okay, I'm going to file this with just a few stylistic changes".  Woopee.  Result.  Maybe you can have another picture of a newspaper tomorrow.  Depends on the subs and senior subs and the copy tasters and a bunch of other people who don't come in until 3pm but might work all night.

Then this afternoon it all went bad again.  New DH statistics on breastfeeding show not much change from last year.  Have a look and see if you can find a story in there.  Phone the NCT and the Royal College of Midwives.  See if they've got anything to say.  There's probably nothing.  But then me prodding seems to lead to the Royal College of Midwives writing and circulating a press release to all and sundry.  So now everyone's going to have it and will be writing something so we have to too.

So I scrapped about and tried to draw my quotes together.  I write nice things about the organisations who had helpful press officers.  I somehow forget the 500 words limit.  I knew what I'd written wasn't any good.  But it was nearly 7pm and I wasn't quite sure how to make it better.  A lot more than "tarting up" happened to my breastfeeding story.  Serious surgery.

Today's lessons: focus on the so what, don't feel you have to be nice about the people who spoke to just because they were nice about you, don't ever write too much....

It's only day three.