Day Two

My first day on the job was fairly uneventful. Mostly I was still getting organized and I needed to still talk to management for direction and get supplies.

So Tuesday morning I drove to Anaheim to meet everyone and take some meetings with editorial, management and design staff. It was a VERY strange ride as the route took me past the Disney Channel building where I used to work, past the Disney Studios where I used to frequent, past Disneyland which I came to know like the back of my hand. Past my old life. Like God was trying to tell me: "Yes, Disney is still there but you are not. Get over it."

The drive from where I live to Anaheim is usually a nightmare. You have to put your mind on "self control" mode to get through it because it isn't a drive so much as a literal crawl from the 101 past the 405 to the 134 to the 5 past the 10 and the 110 and the 60 and the 710 and the 91 and the 605 (you're getting the picture). But for some reason the freeways opened up and I made it in reasonable time: about an hour, forty-five. I got off the freeway and found the building (I'd been there once before), parked my car and wandered up to the 3rd floor with my computer and 19 competitive magazines held in a Disney Publishing tote (I had nothing else - really!)

Without exception, everyone was so nice and welcoming. No egos that I could sniff out. No attitude. Just nice.

What a relief!

Beckett publishes a ton of magazines - mostly small niche titles that are profitable on newsstand. They have a "Home Group" under which YUM will be housed, but I think that YUM could be a big book. The food category is stuffed (pun originally unintended) but YUM has a different look, a different feel and it speaks to a reader who is in a different state-of-mind; the person who is changing habits and settling into a simpler lifestyle due to a changing economic sensibility, but doesn't want to compromise on quality or experience. And I think I can tell that story. Because, well, I just did.

Okay - enough pitch - none of you are going to buy advertising from me. So after initial meet and greets and a conversation about the launch - I was treated to lunch by a great group of new colleagues at a local restaurant called "The Catch" and I had the absolute BEST chopped salad I have ever had in my life. It was called the Verdugo Chopped Salad and it has lots of shrimp in it and this amazing dressing but the service was slow and I was on a schedule so I only got to eat half and brought the rest back to the office for later.

A couple more meetings and introductions and basic trainings and I was ready to go at 4:45. I went to the refrigerator to get my salad for dinner (couldn't wait), gathered up all my stuff plus more that had been given to me (including a yummy "Amish Friendship Bread" starter from a gal in the office) and waddled back down to my car - which now felt like a 10 mile walk away. I knew it was going to be a bad drive home and I had left my CD case in Bob's car (damn!) so I was stuck with an AM news and weather station that is the only one I get without major static on my crummy radio which I won't repair because I refuse to pay $62.00 to replace a wire, but I digress. Anyway, this station repeats the same cycle of news, weather and traffic every 15 minutes - so I heard it 12 times. That's right it took me 3 hours to get home going at an average speed of about 2 miles per hour all the while pinned on all four sides by huge Mac trucks so I couldn't even see the sky and I am really, really glad that I don't travel with a cyanide pill. And I am so eternally grateful that my company is cool with the whole working-from-home thing.

But I had the salad to look forward to and that kept me going. Good thing I didn't realize until I was home that I had left it on the desk back in Anaheim.

Almost worth going back for.