Yes, it’s that time again when you get to find out what a busy self-employed editor/writer/transcriber gets up to. I’ll carry on writing these while people carry on letting me know they enjoy them!

I’ve had another amazing month in February. I can’t really believe it’s going so well – I have described it as like that expanding foam you put into a space in your house – pff and it’s filled up the space allowed!  My new blog has been useful as an outlet through which to express myself from time to time! So, here’s a snapshot of what I got up to …

The first part of the month was heavily devoted to transcription – the client I worked for just before Christmas came back to me with another international conference to transcribe. My experience with minuting meetings and with non-native speakers of English really helped here, as I was typing out presentations and discussions by people from all around the world. Fun and interesting work, I got to share the work with some colleagues by recommending them to the client, but, my goodness, I typed a lot – I transcribed over 20 hours of conference (remembering that each hour of speech takes several hours to transcribe) and actually wore the letters off some of the keys on my computer keyboard! I put into practice the lessons I learned about avoiding RSI from the last lot, took lots of breaks, went to the gym every day for some heavy sessions on the rowing machine, and got through it fine. I like this client a lot, too, because they always come back to me quickly if I have a query.

I also did more transcription for two other regulars; a writer teaching people about marketing and a journalist interviewing musicians. Those ones were in British English and also interesting to do.

And I did do other things, too (somehow),  writing a library of 42 short articles for one regular client, articles on medical subjects for another, and putting together marketing letters/emails and web text for another.

I edited some texts that had been translated from Polish, Finnish, Dutch and Chinese, and ones written by people with French as their first language.  I edited the Moseley B13 magazine again – I do that for free and enjoy it greatly, finding out what’s going on in my local area and using my powers for good at the same time. I also did a bit of localisation for US and other clients.

There was some of the usual academic work – bits of theses, dissertations and articles. I had some more short essays from my coaching clients, who are all progressing through their Master’s courses nicely – it’s great to see their English improving as they take on board my suggestions and tips.

So a nice busy time of it! In other news, I got back into my giving back and networking, helping at a one-off local Social Media Surgery session, and attending Social Media Cafe as usual (I wouldn’t miss that for the world) although I missed the Central SMS owing to a clash with another meeting. In response to my need to have people to talk to now and then, and after testing the waters, I’ve established a Kings Heath Home Workers group on Facebook and blogged about it.

Coming up – I have some academic work booked in and I’ll be doing more transcribing towards the end of the month. I am hoping to get some time to work on my research project, as I’ll be presenting on my research at the Iris Murdoch Society Conference in September. I’ll be going to Jelly co-working session this Friday – now I’ve been to one and know how they work, I’ll be taking along some draft blog posts to write up.  I ran a competition in my newsletter last month and I’ll be announcing the winner later on today or tomorrow – if you would like to receive a short summary of Libro goings-on and interesting facts and links, do sign up here!

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