Fleet Street Fox

Four weeks into my journalism course and it has been pretty fantastic boombastic. From shorthand to media law and court reporting to getting my first feature published in the Argus newspaper and today a talk that I had been looking forward to for quite some time from the anonymous,Fleet Street Fox. Hard hitting and brutally honest, it was a talk that inspired me to no end while at the same time scared the bejesus out of me. 

To be told that you will be called a liar several times a day, have countless doors slammed in your face, be the victim of the odd punch or strangulation, witness suicide, see corpses and become very accustomed to phrases involving the word 'fuck' and 'aunts' (as autocorect loves to put it) is a lot of information to absorb in 60 minutes. Oh, and did you know that when you're hit by a train at 70mph you're pretty much vaporised and all that's left are little fat droplets the size of skittles? Yeah, you might witness that too. It was at this point I realised she was not joking when she said some people's human-inhuman ratio tips over into mental illness. I think it's clear to see why. 

But I also heard how writing can take you all over the world. How a 3pm phone call could see you on the next train to Edinburgh, or grabbing your passport and heading for the airport, or being on the front line of ground breaking stories, watching and telling history in the making. 

How you can bring down a government, have the press office for the House of Commons or the spokesperson for the Queen on the phone in a flash. 

How you will know information that you may never be able to publish due to ethical and legal reasons but you will know and more often than not you will have the power to tell. And let's not forget experimenting with jaegermeister which seems to be a fundamental journalistic skill. 

People will read your stories, your words, take in the facts that you sourced. And that's why I'm more excited than ever about the career path laid out before me. 

Now I think I'll go get some fresh air like Foxy told me. 

Strengthen Your Strengths, Weaken Your Weaknesses

This is what happened when I went home for a weekend and was the only photo I had of remote relation to this post..

The apology for lack of blogging never gets tiring, oh no wait, it does. However, once again life has come at me full pelt and blogging has been forced aside to make way. Last Monday I started my journalism course and with only 15 weeks to become a fully fledged journalist and an absolute tank at shorthand it has been an intense week and a half. But I bloody loves it! For months now I have been itching to get stuck in and being unemployed and out of education is the worst so I am absolutely loving having hardly a moment to spare. 

Lectures are far more interactive and practical than university which is fantastic and so far we have covered lessons on Shorthand, Public Affairs, Media Law and Reporting. Not only that, but I now have my own patch of Brighton, Whitehawk and Woodingdean, to report on; I am pretty much living, breathing and dreaming journalism. No really, I am. After 7 hours of media law yesterday I dreamt about getting the word 'court' tattooed on my neck. Thankfully, I can report that my neck is tattoo free and like that it shall stay. 

Today was particularly interesting as a former editor of The Daily Express took our lessons and the tales that he enthralled us with were just fascinating. I don't think that there was a single student in the room who wasn't utterly gripped by his real life accounts of the world of journalism. I look forward to meeting him again in week six and the many tales that I am certain he still has to tell. 

So far, the course has not helped me to make up my mind as to whether I'd like to become a columnist, feature writer or a reporter. In fact, it has done the complete opposite and made me want to pursue each of these fields in more detail. What I have been left with is a feeling of being utterly inspired and that the hope of becoming a writer is a tangible dream.    

So until I get there, I plan to abide by a little gem of wisdom that Roxanne, champion of shorthand many-a-times has said; strengthen your strengths and weaken your weaknesses. 

"Sorry Miss, But You're Overweight"

For a while now, I have been teetering dangerously (ooh er) on the edge of being a healthy weight and being, dare I say it, over weight. My weight has stayed steady for a couple of years now and sure there have been times when I've wished I could shed a few pounds, there have also been times when I have shed a few pounds and there have been even more times when I've put a few on. But that's how my body goes and we get through it together and carry on on our merry little way. 

Until today that is when a great big, fat, over weight bomb was dropped on us, my body and I. So, this is what happened..

I went to see the nurse over a pesky cough I've had for ages and so she took my blood pressure like a good nurse should, asked me my height and to then step onto the scales. My blood pressure was fine, my height is below average but I've known this for a while and my weight...well, my weight went a little something like this:

Nurse takes weight measurement. Nurse takes BMI chart. Nurse looks at weight in correspondence to height and then looks confused. Nurse looks at me confused, wrinkles her brow, then shakes her head and looks at re-aligning her measurements on the chart again. And then comes the talk I've been waiting for, the one that I know the scales have been trying to tell me for a long while now, "For the love of God Melita, just put that doughnut down and stop stuffing your face already. Can't you feel us crumpling under your chubby, blubbery mass? Can't you see the needle spinning countless times, around and around, for crying out loud just STOP EATING! We judge you Melita, we judge you." Reality?

Nurse, "Erm, Miss Kiely, it says on this chart that you are over weight as your BMI is slightly over 25". Oh god, the words I had been dreading and preparing a speech along the lines of, 'BUT I'M ONLY A SIZE 10 AND A SIZE 8 ON A GOOD DAY, IN A GOOD SHOP! HOW CAN THIS BE?'  

But I needn't have prepared such a speech because before I had the chance to exclaim such confusion and outrage she threw her chart aside and cried, "But screw the chart. I am looking at you now and you, my dear, are not over weight!" And then we laughed and did a happy dance and slagged off the ridiculous chart that claims that somebody who is a size 10 and a size 8 on a good day, in a good shop is over weight. We slammed down our fury at a chart that embeds insecurities into so many young women and men (hey boys, we know you feel it too) when it does not take into account muscle to fat ratios, whether you exercise or smoke or drink or do drugs. 

And d'ya know what, I could have kissed that nurse today (Sandra, I think her name was) for throwing that chart aside and telling me to ignore it and that I was not overweight and that in fact, I was pretty damn healthy. And I could punch you in the face Mr maker of BMI charts, because fuck it; I am fine exactly how I am.