I realised something this week. I haven’t written about my new job yet. It’s now the end of week 5 and today had an amazing revelation.

I’ve worked in Digital PR teams and in a media agency, and now I’m in a creative agency. One thing I love is the people and how human they are. And also that they wear brogues. I work with Jed Hallam, who has a great capacity for wearing stripey shirts, and Graham Drew who has a similar capacity for wearing scarves. As an Art Director I think this is pretty obligatory. Our MD just won the company award for bad fashion. Combined my habit of living in one pair of jeans, I think we make a great team.

Today I got to the end of my notepad. At the back, in week 1, I started a buzzword bingo. And today I realised that I’ve only got one box filled out. And that comes from Tom Park who said described his time as “spare capacity”. And if that’s it for five weeks, I think I’ve landed on my feet.

Hadn’t done one of these in a while – here’s my July in 60 seconds. In which I learn sewage history, use Tweetdeck in Starbucks, see Burlesque boobs, and go to Shoreditch.

This weekend was Shoreditch Festival. Mysteriously, whilst taking place at Hoxton – a name I associate with the bar & grill – it wasn’t the skinny-trousered meme-fest I was expecting. This may be because I’m a South London snob. It actually reminded me of a very British fete from my childhood, despite the lack of school field.

The weekend threw rain and bright sun at us, and so it was spent jumping under a huge umbrella every ten minutes. Still, stretching along the canal was beautiful. I think the best part was alongside Punch and Judy that ran about, with small children smacking his rear with a baton, was the man dressed as a policeman with ‘Politeman’ on his back. “Go away” he barked at me.

Here’s some photos, though few the actual Festival itself. The canal was too exciting I’m afraid.

A new sort of river boat.

D&AD held one of the last of their Sharp’ner events on Wednesday and had a chat about the future of Blackberry. Joel Veitch suggested hope lies in the youth marker. “[School age kids] all want Blackberries. They don’t want iPhones or Android phones, they all want Blackberry.” Have a look at the video here.

A few weeks ago I was on a train stuffed with school kids, with a group of boys talking about mobiles. Not known for their ability to talk in hushed and muted voices, I started making some notes. When all but two had left the train, I asked how old they were and we had a chat about mobiles. Apparently, after girls, mobiles are pretty high on the list of things twelve year old boys want to talk about.

Some good things came up:
- These kids don’t have apps. Their next phones might.
- They’re more interested in cost of contract over handset.
- They mentioned wanting Nokia, Samsung and Blackberry models. They rarely mentioned models – just manufacturers.
- The phones they do have can’t hold the number of texts they want: “This phone’s rubbish. After 134 texts it says it’s full.”
- Some kids at school have iPads. Or rather, their parents do. “They have them at home – I’ve seen photos!”
- Kids will mock you for buying an iPad 1 now that the iPad 2′s on the market.
- “He could get a Blackberry tablet but he doesn’t want one. They’re £500 – might as well get an iPad for £600.”
- “My Mum works [for Nokia] so I get Nokias from her. But I hate Nokias. I’m getting a Blackberry Curve.

Obviously this is just a group of five 12 year old boys in South East England. It’s not scientific, but it is interesting. And it’s good to talk to people, rather than just do desk research. Blackberry came up a lot and really backs up the point made in the D&AD video.

The best moment was:
- “What’s 3G?”
- “It’s data transfer like bluetooth.”
- “I could swear the iPhone doesn’t have bluetooth.”
- “That’s because they want you to get all your shit from the iTunes store.”

Well, they’re halfway there.

This post appears over on (untitled) London’s blog.

These are adorable, aren’t they? We found ourselves at a loose end at the Brunswick Centre near Russel Square in search of a big gingerbread house (which turned out to be for children – some flawed research). Surrounded by children and French Connections, the square didn’t strike me as somewhere to find gorgeous cakes. I’d been spying at a lemon meringue recipe recently – it might be time to acquire an over the top mini-blowtorch and get cooking. I’m going to try and do little piped peaks like this when I do, I think they’re quite wonderful.