What happened?

I’ve moved to an unexpectedly dramatic part of Sydney. It wasn’t what I was expecting from the lower north shore.

There are condom wrappers in the gutter, cream whipper bulbs in the garden beds and I was woken yesterday morning by the sound of sirens. When the dogs and I started our walk we discovered three ambulances and six police cars lined up opposite our apartment block.

I put my glasses on to get a closer look but it was too hard to see what was happening. All I could tell was someone was being strapped onto a gurney.

Then the ambulance hooned off with lights flashing, behind three police cars with their sirens blaring.

Hours later police cars were still parked in the street.

I have no idea what happened.

Actually, that’s a statement that pretty much sums up my life at the moment.

I spend half my days in technical meetings where I barely understand a word people are saying.

I went to one meeting where we discussed how to archive the current website when its decommissioned and I was told you put it in an estuary bucket. That sounded oddly aquatic, but I informed my boss that we needed an estuary bucket, then went to another meeting with different technical people and asked how much it would cost to get an estuary bucket.

They stared at me and said: “Do you mean an S3 bucket?”

Ah.

Yes. An S3 bucket.

How much is one of those?

Fortunately I’m not a totally hopeless case in the digital world. I am feeling very jazzed about the weekly newsletter I write at my day job hitting a 50% open rate yesterday. While that might not be a result you’d be proud to achieve in an exam, the average open rate for email campaigns is between 17-28%.

I reckon working for weekly magazines has given me an edge – all those years I spent trying to craft coverlines that would sell 500,000 copies.

In my brave new digital world I get such a buzz out of deciphering what engages people online. I sometimes describe it as being like playing that childhood code-breaking game, Mastermind.

I enjoy getting to know new audiences and what excites them in an electronic newsletter.

During my magazines era the headlines were about celebrities. These days my newsletters are about the visitor economy and booze news. Vastly different subject areas, but I love the business stuff these days.

And I’d better get cracking because my drinks newsletter is going out this morning, then I’m off to another meeting about S3 buckets …

Have a great day.

Song of the day: The Police “Every breath you take”