Having done an internship previously, the day before I began at Quest I remembered the previous long hours of boredom and annoying busy workers with meagre questions, and I wondered why oh why had I put my hand up for this excruciating form of self punishment.

I proceeded to turn up an hour late for the first day. This wasn’t intentional. I had taken a wrong turn on my way and then when I finally put myself right, couldn’t for the life of me find where the building was. Turns out it had Quest emblazoned in red over the front.

I thought my lateness wouldn’t really register on these industrious journalists, so I didn’t stress too much, and indeed I was right not to worry. I proceeded to sit in a chair for a few hours, reading the entire newspaper, asking a few questions of the steely female editor, and contemplated chucking in the towel.

Fortunately, fellow Jschooler Oliver had been rerouted to Mt Gravatt Quest, after the Wynnum editor had to take personal leave. We were able to bounce our early frustrations off each other and bemoan what the next four long days could hold.

Before lunch we were both given a media release to work on, mine to be around eight pars. I interviewed a local budding artist and learnt that honing skills in drawing blood from a stone would be useful (i.e. getting interesting, long comments from the budding artist).

Once that was done, the rest of the afternoon seemed like it would proceed like the morning had and I escaped home after confirming with the editor that as it was a public holiday, things were slower for interns then usual and to see what the next day would bring.

Tuesday came around, I wasn’t late (by too much) and the male editor suddenly had a variety of tasks for us to pursue for the next couple of days. I felt acknowledged as he showed me his program for building the paper, I was given an intern pack (with surprisingly helpful information) and I set about getting my tasks done.

I felt more comfortable, more prepared and the steely female editor didn’t seem so steely. I did have to chase up the male editor for a few details he had promised to give me but had forgotten and my interviewees weren’t available so the day was again fairly slow, but with tasks allocated for the next few days, I felt more upbeat in my outlook for this experience.