Happy Birthday Sean

It's thirteen years since a teenage Sean Johnson came for an interview at Instanta and it feels like only five minutes. Assembly worker Sean is celebrating his thirty second birthday today and I would like to offer my very best wishes. Keen fitness enthusiast Sean spends a good deal of time at his local gym pumping iron and the results are obvious with him looking a lot more muscular than when he joined us. When we ran our regular five a side games we could always rely on Sean to put in a spirited display and he became a regular goalscorer.As my blog will be ending with my retirement on 30th November this will be my last birthday blog for Sean and I would also like to thank him for his support over the last thirteen years and for his excellent attendance record - keeping fit has its benefits.Thanks Sean.



It's always sad when a popular figure passes away. Especially when they are brought down by addictions to booze (eg George Best, Brian Clough). Alex "Hurricane" Higgins is no exception but, apart from the excellent obituary by Clive Everton in the Guardian which you can read here, there was too little mention in the media of his violence. I am sure that the official that he head butted when he was hurried over a drug test won't have such fond memories. The love of his live Siobahn left with a fractured cheekbone and the news of his death would have been an ideal opportunity for the press to bring the ugly topic of domestic violence to the fore and give it the much needed publicity that it requires.One incident of domestic violence is reported to the police every minute and two women are killed every week by a male partner or former partner (source women's aid).



Another thing that I won't be doing again after today is my daily trip to the post office. As our post was not arriving until after noon and the office staff were spending mornings twiddling their thumbs and afternoons overloaded with work, we took the decision to collect the post every morning. The men behind the counter in the sorting office are a great bunch. They are very friendly and extremely helpful and I will miss their cheerfulness. Tony Mercer will be taking over and popping in to the post office on his way to work which makes sense as it is on his route whereas it is a mile out of my way.



I am starting to get the hang of Twitter. I started tweeting progress on the field mice that had set up home in the garage. I caught two adults early last week and then on Friday there were no less than three babies in the traps. All were released safely to the park and there has been no mousy signs since so I think that the infestation may be over. Nothing to tweet about now. If anybody can recommend any people to follow, let me know. I am following comedians David Mitchell, Jack Dee and John Bishop. I am also following Cheggers (thekeithchegwin) after he was criticised for pinching other comedians' jokes (how precious of them). He tweets about half a dozen every day. Most are excruciatingly corny but every now and then there's one that raises a smile... "There are 3 types of people in this world...those who can count and those who can't "

And there are policemen who can't dance. And policemen who can.