0 - 60 in about five seconds

What a difference a week makes. Last time round I was bemoaning the fact that I was back, eager and hungry but that the rest of the world was still on holiday. This week my clients have hit the ground running, with the result that new work, new ideas and new proposals have been flying around me at dizzying speed. I'm now in that so familiar position of being work-rich and cash poor, but with the prospect of evening out that imbalance.

Yesterday just summed up my current working days. Before 9.30am I'd interviewed four senior managers in China, Malaysia and Singapore on one project. At the same time, my printer was churning out copy on another, and I spent the next hour reading that. Then, on the train ride up to town I got a call from a past contact who was selling me the opportunity to be involved in a pitch his management consultancy is making. For a full five minutes non-stop he babbled management speak about my essential role in bringing their proposition to life for the client. "So, do you want me to help with the communication strategy?" I asked. "No," he replied,"not quite." "Well, do you want me to present to them?" I enquired, and he replied: "not quite." "What do you want me to do then?" "We have the ideas and some great visuals - can you put the powerpoint together?" he answered.

The call was quite short after that. I'm not a powerpoint jockey - in fact I'm not even very good at slide creation. These guys had hit the common misconcepton of what comms is about. They had their plan, had made their decisions and only wanted a packager. I want to work further up the food chain whenever I can, so declined their offer.

The next few hours covered two client meetings, both for longstanding clients, the second of which is so hush hush that I'm not even sure what it's about.

Then back to base to encounter a slight delay on project four of the day - hopefully to be picked up this morning - before taking a call from client number one offering project number five. None of the projects are huge, but they'll mean a number of very long days in the next few weeks. But that's great - for the bank balance, but more so for the grey matter. This year has to be a step-up - and in a time when the work's definitely harder to find - but it's a good start.

Suddenly energy is catching!