I normally either use the final blog of the month to write about my work progress, or the first one of the new month. Here we are on the eighth of August and I have only just realised that I haven't done it yet. July wasn't a great month professionally, and I feel as if I have hit a bit of a brick wall. My to-do list keeps growing faster than I can do anything about it. I'm enjoying my radio work, and of course the shows are doing very well in both quality and listener numbers, but it is taking up a lot of my time and sometimes I wonder if I'm taking on too much. There's so much that I need to get done before the end of this year so that next year can be devoted to getting my film head on, but my trouble is that I want everything done as soon as I think about it. In my more reflective moments, I do find myself wondering if it is all worth it, or whether I should just give up and admit defeat. I know that I should be pleased with my progress, especially as I've only really been in the business since 2006 which was my career 'year zero', but the impatient perfectionist in me wants it all and wants it now. I'm at an age now (and in a couple of weeks will be at a different age) where certain things no longer have the same importance. When I was a kid I wanted to be a writer and work in radio, so my thirteen year old self will be happy enough if I go back in time and tell him that it does happen and he'll one day be hosting two shows a week in England and one a week in America. My sixteen year old self wanted to be an actor and be rich and famous, so he'll be a bit put out. Such ambition seems ridiculous to me now, and while I have come to terms with the fact that I'm never going to have my own helicopter or guitar shaped swimming pool, I wonder what my life as a thirty six year old would be like if I'd been as ambitious in my teens as I am now. These days I would stab someone in the eye with a bread knife to climb another rung of the ladder, the trouble is that every time I take a step up, someone extends the ladder so I can never see the top of it.
July saw me produce twenty eight hours of radio across three individual shows, (and an ocean). I also played at being a compare at two massive all day gigs, which was a great deal of fun. We've not had any live guests in for
The Sunday Alternative for a while, which is something I need to pull my finger out with. On a positive side though, I will be recording American sessions as of the end of the month so that will hopefully open up some more possibilities for me. I hope to do a faster turnaround of
Moonage Daydream episodes in the future, and I have started writing the third series of
Steve's LP Box. There's also more audio book output to come, and several live music possibles to try out.
To be fair to myself, I am happy with my lot. I'm a reasonably well known person in my city of birth, at least within one area of my work, so I've achieved something. Maybe I'm still annoyed at being passed over for the
Doctor Who gig once again!
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