Rounders

Jake has gone to stay with Nanny and Poppa for the weekend. Nicky took him to Winchester today, and then went to see Dawn near Ascot. Apparently they picked up where they left off several years ago!

Work today involved being in the office this morning and out for the afternoon in a strategy meeting, followed by office social - rounders and barbecue.

2 in 2 pay day today!

Sent from my iPod

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Why I should get a Cayman!

I've been in Brighton yesterday and today, in client meetings with our US colleagues, and we went out with them in Brighton to La Strada last night. I was sat with some of the US guys, and somehow we got on to the topic of environmentalism. They were telling me about an economist called Julian Simon, who apparently argues against pretty much everything that the green movement has to say. They were saying that he puts forward the case that we shouldn't be worried about using up the resources that the world has, because the sooner the resources get scarce, the sooner we, as a race, will be properly motivated to develop new technologies, and therefore, as can be seen from the lesson of history, the sooner everyone's quality of life will improve further.

Sounds insane to me, but hey, what do I know! Perhaps I should bin the Prius and get that Cayman after all!

Stayed down in Brighton last night, in the Queens Hotel near the seafront. We were going to try out the new Jury's Inn near the office, but it was full. Still, the Queens did a good cooked breakfast.

Good news on the Starbucks front. Had an e-mail from them on Monday thanking me for my message and asking for my address. I sent that over to them, and today a £10 Starbucks card arrived in the post. Nice one Starbucks - that'll do nicely for a couple of lattes and a couple of rocky roads!

Last lecture

I'm on my way home from London on the train, typing very slowly on my iPod touch whilst listening to Josh Groban. Hopefully this message will send when I get home and connect to wifi. I would use the PDA but the battery has died.

Been in the London office today to meet with colleagues from the US, followed by dinner at the Bleeding Heart restaurant. (The man opposite me on the train seems to be finding his mobile phone very funny and it's starting to annoy - I can hear him despite my noise-cancelling earphones!) Food was good, even if they do insist on putting the rather gruesome story of why the restaurant is called what it is on the back of the menu.

I'm reading the paper on the train and have just got to the obituary section which has an article about Randy Pausch who died on Friday. I vaguely remember hearing about him before. A college professor, he gave a "last lecture" after being diagnosed with cancer and being given a few months to live. The lecture was recorded and became something of an Internet phenomenon. It's all about making the most of the time that we are given - carpe-ing the diem so to speak. He also wrote a book after the lecture became so popular.

I must track down one or both of them.

27 Tiles

How long does it take to lay 27 vinyl floor tiles? If it's me, about a day and a half. Still we always knew that I wasn't really cut out for DIY. Having said that the bathroom is looking pretty good now - freshly painted walls, new cabinet, new mirror, and now new floor as well. Nicky did a great job of covering up my dodgy tile-cutting with a liberal amount of sealant around the edges!

I ache now!

Made it up and out in time for church this morning, and blagged my way through the hymns OK. Otherwise, the only other excitement of the day was popping over to Hempstead for a haircut. I bought a Sunday Times on my way in, thinking that I'd be in for a long wait, only to find the place empty - didn't even make it through one article.

Nicky has spent her hard-earned boot fair money on a water cooler / filter / dispenser machine. We now have chilled filtered water on tap, and a little juke box-looking, blue-glowing machine sat in the corner of the kitchen.

It's a Rocky Road

Yesterday I was working in Weybridge in the morning, but needed to get back to the office at lunchtime for a course in the afternoon, so I popped in to the Weybridge Starbucks before heading back.
Alas, when I got back to the office, all was not well, as the e-mail sent yesterday evening to Starbucks explains:

"Dear Starbucks

I am writing to you about a visit to the store in Weybridge, Surrey earlier on today. I was working in Weybridge this morning, and decided to buy lunch for myself and a colleague in Starbucks before driving back to my office near Gatwick.

It being Friday, I decided to treat myself to a slice of Rocky Road. I waited for my latte whilst my colleague picked up the bag with our sandwiches in. Having collected my drink we drove back to the office. Imagine my disappointment when upon unpacking our lunch, I discovered that my Rocky Road was missing. It being 30 miles from the office to the Starbucks store, it wasn't really practical to go back for it!

I wanted to let you know about this oversight and to ask whether there is anything that can be done about it, to compensate for my disappointment and lack of a Friday cake treat!

I look forward to hearing from you."

No reply yet!

Me - petty - as if !!!!

This morning Nicky was up at the crack of dawn and off to the Addington boot fair with a car load of stuff. Jake and I joined her at a far more civilised hour. The good news is that we came back with considerably less stuff, and around £70 or so more money!

Off out this evening with Neil and Sue. Everyone seems to think that it's funny that I have to get up and go to play the piano at church tomorrow morning!

Guitar Hero

Paul came to see us for the weekend last week, and of course we spent a few hours on Saturday in the pool hall. For the record I think that the score is 12-7, and for the avoidance of doubt, I'm in second place. Paul also brought his XBox with him, and Sunday therefore was spent mostly playing computer games. The hit game was Guitar Hero, and Jake was getting pretty good at it by the end of the afternoon.
This week Jake has had some good news - his end of year report from school was great, he is getting the teacher he was hoping for next year, and to top it off, we heard today that he's got a merit in his Grade 1 piano. So, I guess that he deserves his treat that arrived in the post yesterday - Guitar Hero on Tour. This is a version of the game for his DS, which comes with a special adaptor that plugs into the game slot with the buttons for the guitar. A great success - all we need to find now are his headphones!
We've been having a productive weekend - sorting out the playhouse and removing lots of toddler toys (which are now sat in the garage waiting to go to a boot fair), putting some new shelves up in Jake's room and getting all of his lego onto them, moving shelves from the study into Jake's room, making and putting up a new bathroom cabinet, putting up a blind in the shower room. We've even bought some new flooring for the bathroom and the shower room - but we haven't got as far as taking the carpet up and putting that down yet. Let's just hope it doesn't have to wait as long as the blinds!