I’m not really the type who enjoys writing about themselves.

I’m not a teenage girl with a livejournal blog.

I prefer to write about other people and the world around me, so I’ve been fairly lax on the blogging thing.

At the start of last week I was sent to property at Quest. Despite not really knowing an awful lot about the property market I gave it my best and really enjoyed myself. At the end of the week I asked if I could get another week and they were glad to have me on again.

On Monday morning only part of me was angry at myself for going to “work” when I could have stayed at home and played video games and listened to heavy metal for the week. I guess this is that being “responsible” thing I hear so much about.

This week at Quest I was working on general news which was a change of pace and more challenging than property.

The most challenging thing I found was deciding what was newsworthy at a local level. The local papers generally like upbeat, community based stories. For me with my interests in politics, video games, economics and anything that doesn’t happen in my local neighbourhood it presents a bit of a challenge.

When I was paranoid about what to write about Anthony Gough said its a good idea to come up with a few ideas and explain why they interest you and ask for a few minutes to pitch them to your editor. Another cadet in the office suggested I pitch an idea that is close to my interests.

So I came up with a few ideas. The growing public acceptability of tattoos, if Brisbane central needs more live music venues, how the smoking ban in Queen Street Mall is going one year on, and what stores will be opening at midnight for the iPhone 5 launch.

Unfortunately for me the two I wanted to do the most, tattoos and live music had recently been done so they were a no.

The smoking ban and the iPhone launch were given the go ahead so it shows why its a good idea to always pitch a few ideas.

It’s been an interesting week. I’ve been looking over at my stories from the start of the year and its good to notice a definite improvement. I saw a story of mine published that the subs only made one change to and that was just cutting one sentence for space, all those lessons from Desley really helped.

I’m definitely exhausted after two weeks in a newsroom, and I’m going to enjoy the weekend off. But I feel reinvigorated. I’m gonna write some stories next week to try and broaden my writing style, maybe submit them to newbytes or just do them for fun.

The classroom is good but there is a lot to be learned from working in a real live newsroom. I cant say everything about the experience was wonderful, but I learnt a lot. And it was good having PK and Hayden in the office to meet for our lunch each day. Good times.