Playing hide and seek games with my new editor

When a writer is tempted to pick fights with his editor in the name of writing an article, you know he’s run short of ideas. But that is not the case here. As a matter of fact, I have not run short of idea.

Besides, my new editor and I have enjoyed a perfect working relationship thus far, obviously apart from the usual squabbles about the deadlines. Once upon a time, I was very good at beating deadlines. These days, I am sloppy when it comes to beating newsroom deadlines. Unfortunately, that paper for which I write has now got an editor who is stricter on deadlines. So, for the last one week, we have been playing hide and seek games with my new editor online. Now someone is going to ask me how they play such games online. Well, with the advent of Facebook, Twiiter, Youtube, Googleplus and all other social media networks that are driving us mad, anything is possible online these days.

Anyway, this is how we have been doing it. On Wednesday 2pm, a few days after my graduation party, still stuck in grad hangover, I receive a friend request. From who? The Editor. And what do I do? I accept.  But the request comes with a message “Hey u,,,,Congs on grad...could you please send your article in by Friday,,,,,we want to avoid last minute hustling,,,Starting now. Thanx....Editor,,,,Standard”. I look at the message; read it over and over until I am convinced that at that particular point, the best course of action is to ignore it. I do just that.

Thursday 6pm, I receive another message, a chastening from my editor. “Zak,,,,unreplied msgs be rude...lol....nyway like for real”. And in my mind am like, like for real! So I reply that message. “Thank you will send you the article ASAP!” Friday Morning. The deadline is approaching, advancing and I still do not have the article. 1pm Friday afternoon and still my brain refuses to manufacture an article. While I am still worrying about the deadline another message comes in on FB. From the editor, again, “Hey hey” and yes I know what she wants when she hey-heys me but my brain has not manufactured any article as yet and I believe she has to stop stressing me and wait. So, I do what I did to the very first message she sent me. I ignore.

 
6pm and still there is no article on paper. And neither is there any in my brain. Fortunately, thus far the messages have not translated into incessant calls. So, I convince myself that my brain won’t manufacture an article that day. Therefore, I go out to have some fun.  It is Friday night you know. I go out to “eat some bulamu (life)”. Sheraton is where I end up. I go there to Croak and Rhyme (listen to some poetry and nice music) while I support charity. And oops there I meet the person I have been avoiding all the while, the editor.  Being the nice lady that she is, she throws in a joke about the article I have not written “So this is where you are getting my article from?” And I am like yes; “these are some of the places where we get these articles from.”