Time for an Internship Update

I'm nearing the end of my internship at Project Bookmark Canada but I wanted to give an update before my final wrap up post. Truth be told, I started this post about two weeks ago but just didn't have the time to finish it. Now instead of six weeks left I have four...maybe. I'm not entirely sure when my last day is! So far, things have been really great. I've been doing a lot of reading and researching, with the odd admin days thrown in. I've got lots of pictures to share that will help tell the story of my internship so far, so let's begin!

So, this is a Bookmark! This is the one that's in my hometown of Midland (bonus points if you're from Canada and know where that is...points not applicable to family and friends) that had recently been graffitied (er, how exactly do you spell that?) The book the excerpt is from is The Queen of Unforgetting, a great read. My sister had given me the heads up that it had been tagged, I told Miranda, and she asked if I would be able to clean it the next time I visited my mom. No problem! We made a family event of it - my mom helped me clean it, my sister took the photos, and my stepdad supervised and pointed out spots we'd missed. As you can see we successfully cleaned it! Yay us!

The main part of my position right now is reading. Specifically, reading books set in Calgary (so if you know of any, let me know!) It's been really interesting and I'm enjoying the fact that I'm recognizing certain landmarks and roads as they come up in multiple novels. It's actually making me want to visit Calgary! My library card is getting quite the workout and so far I've only had one late book. Oops! It was bound to happen with the number of books I have checked out! What I've loved about this is the fact that I'm reading so much great Canadian literature. I went into this internship without much experience reading Can Lit but I've really enjoyed many of the books I've read so far. My favourite definitely has to be The Bone Cage by Angie Abdou. It's about a wrestler and a swimmer who are trying to make it to the Sydney Olympics and is such a good read.

One of the great things about this internship is that I get to work from home. It's a nice change from having to embark on a two hour commute, one way, every day to Toronto. I did have to venture into the big city for a meeting with the lovely Amy from Penguin but it was oh so worth it. I got to pick her brain about social media and then she brought me back to the office and threw some books at me. Not bad for a day of work!

I mentioned having to do some admin stuff. I've gone to Hamilton to work with Miranda at her home office a few times so far. The first couple days I went we organized and shipped off books and Kobos to winners from our recent Page Turner campaign. As you can see from the above pictures, there were a lot of books to mail out! I've also helped her with some bookkeeping stuff (and let me tell you...two bookish people trying to do accounting stuff is pretty funny) and receipting, which I'm used to with my background in nonprofits.

So there we have it. Once I finish my twelve weeks, I'll give you more of my thoughts on the overall experience. I still have no idea what I want to do with my life and I've come close to having a meltdown over the past week but I'll figure it out. Here's hoping I have some good news in my final intern wrap up post!