Welcome Rob

I am delighted to welcome Rob Pennington who has joined Instanta as our new Southern Area Sales Manager. This is a brand new position and represents a 50% increase in our sales force. Rob,40, is a northerner who is now based in Reading. He's keen on cycling,snow boarding and football and is a devoted father to nine year old Nathaniel.Rob has a background in the catering industry having worked for Bunzl in the past. I wish him every success and hope that he enjoys working for us.



Regular blog readers (I flatter myself to think that there might be such people) will have noted the absence of blogs on Wednesday and Thursday. This was due to my total immersion in figures in preparation for the audit which is starting soon. I have completed the accounts for the ten months to 30th June (our new financial year end) and I have to say that they look pretty good and our new owners should be pleased that the results vary little from those forecast when we were in our negotiations. My own personal targets run for a different period so I hope that the success continues.



Excitement mounts(sort of) in the build up to one of our regular ten pin bowling nights which is scheduled for Wednesday. Twenty Instanta players will be enjoying a couple of games of bowling together with some very unhealthy food and a couple of drinks at the Southport Bowl. I can't play due to my bad hip but I will be interested in the results. Marion and I will be in London watching the recording of Josephine's show "Perfection". And talking of perfection I wonder how many scores of 300 will be recorded. We haven't had one yet but I think that welder Kirk Harrison who had a storming game last time with strike after strike might be the first to do it.



My interest in the World Cup final is now negligible with the defeat of Germany by the boring Spanish who managed an extremely unimpressive series of 1-0 wins on their way to the final. The commentators keep saying excitedly that they are waiting for the Spanish to hit their real form but come on! Have they not realised that they have hit form and their tactics are designed to simply absorb pressure and win on the break? Which is a bit like their opponents Holland who do the same with added clogging (at least the Spanish are not a dirty side). Which means that Sunday night should have 0-0 stamped all over it. At least one of my favourite players, Dirk Kuyt, will be appearing in a World Cup final which will be one over on his team mate "superstar" Stevie G who is still worshipped in Liverpool whilst Dirk is referred to by most as a boring "workhorse" with no ball control. If I were the new manager and had to chose to keep only one of the two there would be no argument. Kuyt is the perfect manager's player. He does exactly what is asked of him for a full ninety minutes. Good luck Dirk.

When we retire in a couple of months I need to get myself a new mobile phone as I will have to return my company phone. I've been looking at the iPhone. Do you get the balloons with it or are they an optional extra?