Oh good. Fill me in on how it goes, will you?
She knows as well as I do how important our working relationship is with Scheduling, the department Rose worked in before her diagnosis and subsequent leave last week.
It is her job to create the final transmission calendar that goes out to viewers and as such her role and mine are entirely interdependent, with constructive co-operation the name of the game. But not only is her judgement impeccable, she loves the same kind of show as me: joyful, escapist, emotional watches which make viewers want to binge until it’s coming out of their ears.
I have no idea what to expect from her understudy – who I learnt only yesterday is on a transfer from the US office. I’m about to reply to Andrea when I realise that I’m no further down the line, thanks to the fact that two baristas are busy comparing manicures, while the other is making such a meal out of his cappuccino foam you’d think it was a Turner Prize entry. There was a time in my life when I wouldn’t have said anything. When I’d have reacted to an unconvincing ‘Sorry about your wait,’ with the standard British response – i.e. waving away their apology and reassuring them all that I can see they’re absolutely rushed off their feet.
But I’ve reached an age when, British or not, I just don’t have time for this sort of thing.
‘Excuse me. Sorry to interrupt but is anyone available to serve?’ I ask. I am pulling my most pathetically apologetic expression, but the glance they exchange still suggests they think I’m a snotty cow. At least I’m finally served though.
Coffee in hand, I dash across the piazza, making several turns until I reach the entrance of our building and push through the revolving doors. Teddy, the security guard, is on jovial form as ever. He’s an ex-marine, even though he looks like Santa Clausand is such a big softy that it’s hard to imagine him ever killing anything other than a sausage roll.
‘Morning, Lisa, and no I don’t want a hamster,’ he says, chuckling at his own joke.
‘Ha! Are yousure, Teddy?’ I smile. ‘I bet you’d provide a very loving home.’
‘Yeah, and my wife would never speak to me again.’
If only Brendan had been so considerate.
I take the lift up to the fourth floor. MotionMax+ has a swanky workplace by anyone’s definition, bright and mostly open-plan, with glass doors on the meeting rooms and thoughtful modern art chosen by someone who knows about this stuff. If I was being cynical I’d say it’s also designed for a company that’s conspicuous about looking after its ‘people’, hence the bowls of fresh fruit, well-stocked fridge and soothing meditation room (designed for yoga but mainly used as an extra storeroom).
My workspace sits amidst a quadrangle of desks, all of which are occupied by 8am, to my perpetual dismay. I hate being last in. It might be totally within the company’s family-
friendly policy and it means I can do the school drop-off first. But I can’t shake the idea that it makes melooklike a part-timer when I’m anything but. I can’t remember the last evening I didn’t spend at home catching up on work.
‘Morning all,’ I say, taking off my coat.
Daisy looks up from her computer. She’s 25 and peach-skinned, with a dress sense that is eclectic to put it mildly. Some days she turns up looking like Molly Ringwald inPretty in Pink– all floral fabrics and oversized glasses – on others, the look is closer to Gru fromDespicable Me, in dark, tent-like ensembles. Today is a Molly day, hence the lace dress, fuzzy cardigan and DMs.
‘Before you say anything, I can’t have a hamster.’
I tut and take a seat. ‘This is getting silly. You’re the second person to say that and I didn’t even ask.’
‘I know but I’msoeasily persuaded,’ she says. ‘My landlady had an Ann Summers party the other week. Have you heard of them?’
‘Er . . . yes.’
‘She insisted my flatmate and I went. I won’t even tell you what they ended up selling me . . .’
‘I can’t help thinking I’d have better luck selling nine vibrators than nine hamsters. Just let me know if you’ve any friends who might be interested, okay? I’ve only got one left.’
‘Oh, I will,’ she says eagerly, going back to the computer she’s no doubt been burning up since arriving at 6.30am. Daisy isverykeen. In that sense, she reminds me of myself at the start of my career, always willing to go the extra mile, refusing to shy away from hard work and determined to hit on the next big idea. But that’s where the comparison starts and finishes. Because, despite poor Daisy’s best efforts, she hasn’t yet come close.
‘Did you try out the air fryer recipe for fish tacos, Daisy?’ Her face brightens at the sight of Calvin, our intern, who appears from the staff kitchen dunking the bag in his mint tea up and down. He’s slightly younger than she is, very tall and slim, with light brown skin and an immaculate haircut with short dreads on top and a fade around the sides.
‘Yes and they were amazing!’ she replies. ‘The flat was a bit smelly mind, but they were almost as good as the halloumi popcorn . . .’
If ever I needed proof of how much things have changed since I was in my twenties, it’s the amount of time these two spend discussing their air fryers.
I realise they’re both broke – in Daisy’s case she’s saving up for the deposit on a flat, which is likely to take her until 2065. But I’d love one – ideally both – of them to come in onemorning and tell me they went out, got drunk, shagged someone they regretted and stumbled home at six in the morning with a hangover the size of Pluto.
That doesn’t seem to be how twenty-somethings roll these days. If Daisy really wants to push the boat out, she’ll go home on a Friday night to a glass of Blossom Hill, her cat and some knitting. When I was 25, this would’ve made me tragic, but it’s somehow become entirely normal.
But then, we used to regularly go to the pub over the road when I was at the BBC and have a half a lager with various journalists, who’d then roll back to work, presumably half-cut and primed to resume an afternoon of newsgathering. Nobody batted an eyelid.
I don’t say any of this, of course. All it would do is make me look very old.
