Journalism on the Road

I’ve been out doing interviews today as part of a series of profiles of top researchers and international students that I’m writing for Stockholm University’s English-language website.

Since I dropped my Mac PowerBook outside a client’s office over a year ago, I’ve had to borrow a (whisper it) Sony Vaio for working on the road. Not my favourite thing, but I manage.

If truth be told I don’t really enjoy working in a PC environment, particularly as I’ve grown used to using (Mac only) Tinderbox for my notes.  But it does have it’s flip side: I’ve rediscovered my note-taking skills, honed at university the better part of two decades ago, and the joys of a spiral notebook.

Pen and paper is fine for interviews but in between meetings I bashed out four rough drafts in Word.

Using the latest incarnation of Microsoft’s premium word-processing software slowed me down quite a lot because all the menus were different to what I was used to.

If anything, today taught me that I need to get to grips with Office once again. Well, either that or that I am lost without Schreiben for painless word-processing.

Away from the safety of my office (and my Mac) I was also free from the distractions of Twitter, a regularly updated NetNewsWire and email. This meant I was actually able to get quite a bit of writing done despite stationing myself in a rather noisy café.

Would a MacBook Pro (Air?) or iPhone make days like these easier? Possibly. But stranded in a foreign landscape of no internet connection, a PC and having to use a pen and paper I survived even if I didn’t thrive.

What do you need when you’re out working on the road?