Oi. Paper Boys You Might Be On Summer Holiday Now

That doesn't mean that everyone else is. One of my pleasures in life is my daily attempt to complete the Guardian quick crossword in under three minutes before leaving for work. I don't always achieve it but get a lot of fun trying. During term time the newspaper arrives on the doormat at around seven thirty leaving plenty of time to fit in the crossword before leaving to pick up the Instanta post from the post office. But what happens when school has broken up and the kids are on holiday? I empty the dishwasher and go to the door for the paper, It's not there. I prepare breakfast and go to the door for the paper. It's not there. I eat breakfast and go to the door for the paper. It's not there. I tidy up the breakfast dishes and go to the door for the paper. It's not there. I check how my lousy Betfair bets on Big Brother are doing and go to the door for the paper. It's not there. By now you will be getting the gist of things. Today the paper arrived a good hour later than usual and I had to try and complete the crossword whilst brushing my teeth. So come on paperboys (and girls). What's the point of a daily paper if you can't read it in the morning? Not every customer in Southport is a pensioner (even if it feels like it).





We've got a staff meeting later today. This is where I give everyone a quick rundown on how things have gone for the last few months and what we've got planned for the future. We talk about things like wages and bonuses . I used to hold these regularly but this is the first since we were taken over in January as we needed to integrate with our new owners before moving forward. This is now starting to fall into place so I've got plenty of news to report to everyone. And if you phone between 4.40 and 5pm I am afraid that we probably won't be available. Apologies in advance. Our parent company Zip is holding a big annual conference in the East Midlands in a couple of weeks. This is themed on the title "The Best Is Yet To Come" which I suppose is in honour of me and Max who are making a appearance and speaking to the service team at the very end of the conference. It's a pity I never themed my staff meetings in the past. We could have had 'Who Nicked The Brass?" "Any Tips For X Factor?" and "Can Anyone Think Of Something Other Than Bowling For A Night Out?"



I've been treated for high blood pressure for five or six years now. It's been under control but I have had to take four pills every day to keep it there. However, due to the diet that we've been on for the last two months, I'm now almost two stone lighter and I think that this is having an effect on the BP as I have started to feel light headed, faint and very very tired now and then. A quick check has given readings of 110 over 60 which isn't too low but I'm off to see the doctor tomorrow in case my medication needs to be adjusted downwards.



There are signs that our furry little friends have returned to the garage and after one of them took the Green And Blacks organic chocolate every night for the past four nights without being caught (I have a feeling that they have worked out how to open the trap and are using it as a sort of mousy hotel), I bought four of these traps at the garden centre on Sunday and I hope that one of these will do the trick. The garage floor looks like a rodent version of the Crystal Maze. Lets hope that it's lock in tonight. Clearly mice with up-market tastes (none of your Cheddar or Cadburys for them) the old trap was probably not swish enough for them. Let's hope that they prefer the new sparkly white ones. If they don't I may get the following photo blown up and leave it as a warning.




Or maybe this will do the trick. It was banned from the London Tube. Sound effects have been added.

Another Day Another Dealer News

I have been busy this morning preparing a new edition of our Dealer Newsletter. These publications are published sporadically when we've got something new to tell the customers about and there's quite a lot of news in this edition. The main story is just how wonderful the new CT and WM boilers are. The electronics are truly the most advanced that you will find in any boiler and offer the opportunity for the user to program the machines to come on and go off at set times daily. This is a nice green feature to add to the ECO buttons that most of the boilers have and, with a built in filter monitor as standard, the unique features on these models make them unbeatable.



Empty desks like these are going to be a feature of the Instanta office when Marion and I retire late this year. So at the moment we are training Jenny, Gavin and Dave to fill those desks and Marion and I are trying to be silent in order to ensure that when we go things will carry on as if we were never there in the first place. It's quite difficult having to keep our mouths shut but it's the only way that we can make sure that our new owners have a problem free 2011.



It was wonderful to see our son Paul and his wife Josephine who made a flying visit to us for two nights over Easter. It's so sad that they are two hundred miles in one direction and daughter Sarah is more than two hundred miles in the opposite direction. They were showing us the wedding photos on their website. Unfortunately I can't copy them so I had to print and scan so forgive the quality of this. Whilst Paul and Josephine were relaxing in Southport, Sarah and her partner Duncan were snowed in in the holiday cottage that they rented for the break.I hope that they had a restful time.



Like all gamblers I tend to keep quiet about my losses but I am pleased to say that, after losing every week for two months, I finally had two winning accumulators at the weekend and my kitty has now risen to £975. I put £20 a week into this and draw out the balance on 31st December. Last year I managed to withdraw £1,000 so I broke even but this year if I am sensible I should be showing a profit come Christmas.

I'll close with a little film dedication for friends Mark and Nita of Workhouse Marketing who are preparing our Dealer Newsletter.

It's A Man's Game

I said yesterday that the world should be grateful for telly, email jokes and football. But I forgot to add that other important distraction - YouTube. And what's better than a YouTube video about football? I usually sign off the blog (another distraction that I forgot to mention) with a video but for a change I am starting with one today. This one's a cracker.



We could talk all day about it. I could see it being set as a topic for a university essay. Girls and football? The fairer sex? Should Rafa let Andriy Voronin wear his ponytail? The choices are endless. All I can say is sign her up for Liverpool. We could do with a bit of passion in the team.

As proof that my philosophy of honesty being the best policy is really true, I earned myself an unwarranted £22 this week. I put an accumulator bet on Betfair last weekend and took advantage of a special offer "If one side loses you get half your stake back". Imagine my surprise on Tuesday when £22 appeared in my Betfair account after two of my teams failed to win. I wrote to Betfair and suggested that they take the money back but they very kindly thanked me for my honesty and let me keep it. Mind you I'm not sure if I'll be popular with all the other punters who benefited from this glitch and were debited after I pointed out the mistake.



I'm off to Tesco to do the week's big shop when I've finished this. I hope that I don't have a repeat of last week. As I was loading the shopping onto the belt I was aware of something hitting my shins. I turned to see an old man flat out on the floor. I thought he was dead but as I knelt beside him I could hear that he was still breathing. He had somehow fallen backwards and fortunately my shins cushioned his head or else he would have cracked it on the rock hard floor. He lay unmoving for half an hour whilst he was being attended to by the first aiders and ambulance crew. In the meantime the lady on the checkout rang up my shopping. Life goes on. She and I both felt guilty but there was nothing that we could do to help.



I suppose that the highlight of the weekend will be X Factor. 15 million tuned in to last Sunday's elimination at one stage and that is an enormous viewing figure in today's multi channel digital age. It's a good show and, with the twins still in the running there's bound to be plenty more controversy this week. Tonight we'll be watching the final episode of "Collision". It's been good but the story strains credibility to the absolute limit. What are the odds on a car crash involving (in different cars) a paedophile, an illegal immigrant smuggler,a whistle blower, someone who wants to get rid of his mum-in-law (OK that one's quite plausible)and a pot smoker? Hmmm. And what are the odds on a service station having TWO Parry boilers? Beggars belief.Entertaining all the same.