The woes of a malfunctioning printer

Yesterday I was asked to proofread the new vegetarian cookbook which is going to be published soon. Unfortunately I do not have InDesign on my laptop so I came in early this morning to print it on my colleague's computer. Except it wouldn't print. Whilst opening the file I was getting all sorts of error messages about missing links, fonts not being uploaded and plug in errors. I figured out how to print it but then the printer stopped working and restarted itself. 40 minutes later my colleague had arrived and I gave up, hoping someone could help me later.

Instead I sent out some more invitations to the London Book Fair, this time to Brazil, the UK, Australia and the US. The Book Fair is open from 9am - 6pm and each appointment lasts half an hour and runs back to back leaving no break for the attendant, not even for lunch! I don't know how they survive..

I returned back to the production room mid-morning to try and finish off the stock check of all of the production copies so we could empty out the room for storage and start getting rid of furniture for the office move. "Production room" sounds fancier than it really is; it's a meeting room with bookcases against the walls. There can be several versions of 1 book depending on the publisher and the print run and hardback or paperback. This is what I had to sort through and check against the inventory list.

Just before lunch I was asked to update the pending business deals, going through e-mails to find out whether any books had been rejected by other publishers - this means that they don't want to join our print run and publish a book in their own name.

In the afternoon I worked on the office move, trying (and failing) to persuade the current tenants of the new property to allow a BT technician in a week early to transfer the lines over so we'd have internet when we move in (it takes 7-10 days for BT to do this..). The move is planned for Easter Weekend which is just before the London Book Fair so it's not optimal to be without internet during that period!

I then started proofreading (after the Editorial Director converted the .indd files into .pdf so I could print the documents!). The printer crashed and restarted about 4 times today, frustrating the entire office. I've brought some proofreading home with me tonight to do as well so that I can finish it quickly. It's 10pm now so I'd better get cracking!