Friday 22nd December, 2017

Well well here we are.  The end of another year and much to my surprise I got quite a few contributions to last week’s Christmas competition.  

 

The first response, from an old friend who has clearly managed his affairs much more sensibly than me and has been able to retire, seemed to confirm my suspicions that this was a challenge to which not many would feel the urge to rise.

 

Do you know even in my more relaxed state these days I’m going to eschew a limerick competition where Triffid or Dyfed would likely feature.

Happy Xmas to you and all the family.

 

Others are made of sterner stuff albeit, at the risk of appearing a touch pompous, I would observe that you all have a slight problem capturing the true rhythm of the limerick.  Lear will be wincing in his grave.  But putting that to one side the winner is this effort mainly for the pun:

 

It used to be simple to do

Provide research and get paid a few

But new rules must be met

And though we’re very upset

Our clients, they’re probably miffed too.

 

Other commendable contributions:

 

I remember the glory days well   

Our service was easy to sell

Now commissions are limper

From Big Bang to a whimper

Mifid 2 is ringing the bell. 

 

 

There was an old broker from Threadneedle Street 

A nicer man you couldn't hope to meet 

Upon the advent of Mifid2 

The air at lunch went blue 

And the rest is control alt delete

 

There once was an author called John
Who imagined plants blocking the sun

He baptised them Triffid

Created a hell just like Mifid

And made all the brokers shout ‘run’

 

 

Oh Mifid2,

It makes us blue.

We need it 

Just like a stone in our shoe.

Cave, cave

The blessed EU...

 

This one didn’t doesn’t even pretend to be a limerick, but I rather liked it….

 

“What’s the point of MIFID2”

He said to me, “And I ask you.

D’you think in Spain, Italy or France

They’ll give it e’en a second glance?”

 

And lastly, before they get a little too blue-blooded….

 

There was fine old boy in EC2

Who hadn’t a clue what to do

In scope, out of scope?

There really doesn’t seem much hope.

Lets all raise two fingers to MIFID2

 

Yup.  Thinking about it most of the others are frankly unprintable.  Of course it’s a touchy subject and feelings are running high, but I have little doubt the rest had been written after or perhaps during a good session in the pub last Friday lunchtime if that sort of thing is still allowed these days.

 

Whether or not this is appropriate I will leave you to be the judge.  Underneath our Christmas tree are two presents tied together and bearing an intriguing label which reads.. “Dearest Jimmy, Merry Christmas with lots of love, Felix and Mummy”.  I spotted the package during one of my regular evening trawls prodding the prezzie pile.   Even though he is one of the good guys I felt compelled to ask Sophie why she and Jimmy’s boyfriend were given our second daughter a present together.  It transpires that other day Felix dropped Sophie a WhatsApp message saying he knew what he wanted to get Jimmy for Christmas, and that she would definitely love it, but being quite a lot over his budget he wondered if Sophie might like to go halves on it with him.  If you promise not to tell Jimmy…..it’s a set of silk underwear.  How good is that?!  In a millennials world perhaps there is nothing especially outlandish at this practical solution to a budgetary problem, but I’m not sure it’s an idea that would have gone down well with my future in laws back in the day!

 

Talking of Jimmy, she’s just sent me this.  Made me smile anyway.

 

 

 

My Christmas present to myself was 6 cases of cheap provincial Italian made from grapes cultivated on the hillside of an extinct volcano in the Cilento National Park.  Alas the trailer that the wine and three bottles of exquisite limoncello were sent over on has been impounded by British customs. Sebastiano, who sold me the wine tells me, there was contraband tobacco in the consignment too.  So it could be a dry old Christmas I’m sad to say.

 

Before I go though I have one more message for you.  Admire its form and structure:

 

You’ll be worried, I know, what to do

With the Bodhi Tree and Mifid2?

Insubstantial, but fun

Doesn’t suit everyone,

Do you want me to send it to you?

 

LET ME KNOW!

 

And on that note I’m rushing out on a panicked mission in the general direction of Jo Malone.  Wishing you and yours a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year when it comes.

Friday 15th December, 2017

Ever since it worked for me and I got lucky in an Old Course ballot when it was imperative I secured a tee time for a round with my Japanese boss I have kept a keen eye out for a penny on the pavement.  I recall exactly where I found that one. On the walkway from the St James Centre in Edinburgh leading across the road over to Baillie Gifford’ office.  

 

You will know the old adage obviously. “See a penny, pick it up and all day long you’ll have good luck”.  Of course, not only do you need a keen eye to spot them, and they are rare enough, especially in Edinburgh, but you need to do so at an opportune moment.  It is quite easy to catch ones fellow pedestrians unaware regardless of how adroitly one swoops to the ground to retrieve ones find. The happy combination of these circumstances are as hard to come by as hens teeth. 

 

Last Friday however I was trudging along Old Broad Street on my way in from Liverpool Street station when joy of joys I spotted a little blighter and the opportunity presented itself.  It was raining and dark and a delayed train meant I was running a bit late, but there was no one directly behind me so gleefully I plucked the coin out of the puddle it was resting in and popped it in my pocket happy in the knowledge my day was made.  Perhaps another client would sign a research agreement or maybe I would go and buy a lottery ticket I mused.  By midday however I couldn’t say anything out of the ordinary had occurred though I was relieved that the client, who had called in to cancel the arrangement we had made to lunch the following Monday, was able to bring it forward to that very day.  And I managed to get a table at short notice at Wright Brothers.  So fish and chips at the desk was at least avoided and we were having a pleasant lunch, but churlish though it may sound neither of these were quite on a par with a round on the Old. At risk of boring my lunch companion I started to tell him about that mornings find and reached into my slightly gritty pocket to display it. Thank goodness I hadn’t got round to buying a lottery ticket. It was a dime. What are the odds of that on Old Broad Street. Just a hop skip and a jump away from the Bank of England too. 

 

There is a postscript if one were needed for this lame little story. I was in Edinburgh on Wednesday night and caught up with an old friend for dinner at the New Club. My first return to the Club since an incident there with an old buffer which culminated with me singing him a song from HMS Pinafore to prove how good my memory was.   I had learnt my lines as Captain Corcoran at prep school in 1976. I digress.  There I was waiting outside the Clubs front door on Princes Street having buzzed for entry when on the pavement I spotted, indisputably, a penny.  The second one I have ever found in Scotland and quite probably a New Club members coin too. Hurrah for that.  I had a lovely evening and felt lucky enough for that to be honest.

 

I’ve had a torrid old week though with regards to our favourite topic MIFID2, but the good thing about the new regulatory environment is that as everything will be above board post January 3^rd 2018 it shouldn’t be a problem if I popped round early in the New Year with a lavish prize for the winner of this years Christmas competition.  YES.   COMPETITION TIME!!!  Your challenge if you care to accept it is to write a limerick incorporating the words MiFID 2.  I’ll try to come up with one too.  Let the mind roam free and may your fingers effortlessly trip out something witty and hilarious. 

 

Talking of MiFID this might just be the penultimate Bodhi Tree you’ll ever get if you don’t get signed up with us to receive this substantive and opinionated drivel so with that happy thought I’m off for dinner in London with Jimmy and her boyfriend.  Pip pip.

Friday 8th December, 2017

 

Brief update for you from France if you care.  I think it’s fair to say Hen has been slightly twiddling her fingers this last month or so, faced with a bit of a conundrum.  Not that she hasn’t kept herself reasonably busy.  She knows the hillsides surrounding Rennes-les-Bain like the back of her hands scouring them daily for mushrooms which she tries to sell in the local markets.  And then there’s always the wildlife to look out for.  I was talking to her yesterday as it happens when suddenly she broke off with an exclamation of shock.  “Blinking heck, there’s an otter crossing the river.  Or maybe it’s a beaver?  Or a squirrel perhaps.”  I asked her what size it was.  “Hmmmm….its about the length of a ruler.”  Really??  We concluded it was most likely a weasel or possibly a stoat, which many mistake for a weasel even though, wait for it, it’s totally different.   

The conundrum is that she wants to head south for the winter, but before that she needs the weather to break and the leaves fall for the opportunity of a job working in the vineyards pruning vines which will help pay for the petrol to drive 1,000 miles to the south west of Portugal!  Well the weather has broken.  Here’s a photo she sent last weekend…

 

 

 

Meanwhile developments concerning animals in another woodland area provided one of the great BBC headlines….more than 150 homes have been destroyed and 50,000 people evacuated but the good news…….

 

 

 

It’s not all a bed of roses in my world either I might tell you.  I went home earlier this week having decided, on the way back, to bake a cake that evening.  I had glimpsed a recipe for a delicious looking flourless orange almond cake in the Polpo cook book.  I don’t know about you, but I find it ever so irritating when someone looks over your shoulder when you’re working in the kitchen.  But she just couldn’t help it.  “Have you checked the measurements properly” Sophie said “I really don’t think you have”.  Pah I thought to myself ploughing on regardless and perhaps even more cavalierly chucking ingredients into a mixing bowl.  The consequence of chucking the additional 400 grams of  sugar which was meant to make a sticky syrup to pour over the cake into the mix combined with the fact I used three large tablespoons of baking powder instead one teaspoonful was an explosion in the Aga and a sticky burnt mess which we ( I mean Sophie ) is still trying to clear up three days later.  You pay for these unlucky little slips ups you really do.

 

On a happier note I got this message yesterday from a lovely person in our corporate access team in HK who I had been able supply with timely and comprehensive feedback from the various meetings we had organised for some clients at our recent Japan Forum.  

Thanks David! Please visit Asia soon!!

 

I might just do that if Sophie doesn’t stop banging on about my cake.

Friday 1st December, 2017

Slightly early one, but don’t get the wrong idea.  I just wanted to get this off to you in case I am a bit distracted later on.

 

Travelling home the other evening I got out of my seat, as is my want, to stand and stretch a bit during the final leg of the train journey from Audley End to Whittlesford Parkway.  This has the added advantage of meaning I am always first off the train, into my car and out of the station car park.  Anyway, as I stood there by the door my attention was attracted by a man furiously typing a letter on his lap top.  I really couldn’t help it, but through the window between us I was able to read what he was writing.  Now you would expect me to turn away and get back to my exercises and of course that’s essentially what I did, but not before I inadvertently gleaned that he was writing to a school-teacher to complain that his daughter was being picked on by a nasty little boy called Robert.  I left him to his epistle thinking what a horrid, horrid situation.  That said I probably wouldn’t have given it much more thought except that I stumbled just now, in a search for inspiration for something to tell you at the end of what has been a rather dull week, on a story I told you back in 2005. It’s a weird one, but true.  Here it is:

 

 

Friday 25^th November, 2005

“I don’t suppose you’ve heard of Alphabetical Bullying before. Neither had I, but this disturbing social phenomenon was articulated to me the other evening by my 5 year old daughter, Lottie. She bore the tell-tale sign - a nasty scratch on her cheek - of yet another grapple with one of our cats. You would think she would have learnt by now. She has been told off enough times for manhandling them by her parents as well as by the creatures themselves. I chastised her yet again, but, looking grumpy and affronted, she protested. "It wasn’t Pickle or Flowerpot.  It happened at school. Charles attacked me in the playground."

Well, of course, I couldn’t imagine such a thing would ever happen at the sweet little prep school we sent our baby darlings, but playing along with her I asked her why Charles had been so mean. 

"He doesn't like girls whose name starts with L" was her response. "He always attacks Lillie and Laetitia too".

"Oh dear me", I said sympathetically, " I hope there aren't any other bullying boys at your school."

"There are." she said. " Alexander......he doesn't like girls whose name begins with S".

She followed this with the name of yet another thug who apparently targets the J's.

By now I was beginning to accept perhaps she hadn’t been molesting the cats but still somewhat sceptically I asked her if any letter was safe. She didn’t even blink.

"If you’re an M that's ok......Mary never gets beaten up."

 

At the risk of turning this missive into something substantive I have a tip for you for 2018.  Keep a diary.  You never know when it will pay you back, but surely, every now and again, it will do.  Mind you I’m now wondering what has happened to Charles and Alexander.  Hmmm.  I think I’ll get Lottie, Lillie and Laetitia ( who remain Lottie’s best friends ) to track them down.

Friday 24th November, 2017

It’s not that I’m feeling flush.  Actually, as a sign of how tough times are, we are on a mission to convert the old Hen House into a very desirable AirBNB spot for anyone looking for a weekend up in Suffolk.  I’ll let you know when you can sign up.  That’ll be a weird weekend!  Anyway needs must as MiFID2 looms.  By the way, on that subject, I’ve been pondering what I can do to in order to keep in touch with you in the unlikely event you decide not to sign up to pay for Nomura Research.  My reading of the guidelines, and I’d be very interested to hear your take on this, is that I will still be email you without causing any undue problems with the authorities, so long as my email can’t be construed as providing “intellectual rigour using original thought, analysis or information”.   Pondering this briefly I conclude I don’t need to change much, if anything at all.

 

Hmmm. Oh yes, I know what I was trying to tell you. As its Black Friday we’ve decided to buy a new telly.  Well actually, if I’m revealing all, I should confess Sophie informs me she’s also ordered a new bed and a Dyson hoover.  Yeehaaa.  But anyway, our current TV is over ten years old.  So what we thought we’d do is move it over to where you’ll be staying and get ourselves a brand new one for the big hoose.  Well, not really big, but whatever, where we settle down in these long, dark evenings, to watch Masterchef, Strictly Come Dancing and, of course, Peaky Blinders is a lovely old room.   When I sit there I feel I am in the Captain’s Cabin on HMS Surprise, the boat in “Master and Commander”.  Without the decanters of port.  Oh dear I’ rambling this week.

 

I didn’t want Soph to think I was being impulsive so I asked her to measure our television and send me the dimensions which she duly did, somewhat reluctantly I might say.  Nevertheless I received measurements from her of both the screen and the TV set  as a whole, but it was only when I set out upon a bit of research that I realised I needed the measurement across the diagonal to get a proper sense of how much larger our replacement was to be.  I don’t know about you, but these days across a slightly dark room, log fire a-crackling, I can barely see Tommy Shelby, never mind make out what he’s saying in that Brummie accent of his. 

 

Well, when I Whatsapped Sophie to ask her for the additional measurement did I not get it in the neck.  “Ffs. Will be an hour or so x” was the cursory response.  I quaked in my boots.

 

And then I had a brainwave.  I had the width and the height.  I could do something with this.  I had heard about that fellow Pythagoras.   I imagine the first time was ahead of sitting my common entrance exam which I scraped through and then more specifically for my Maths O level which I only passed on the third attempt, but hadn’t he had something to say about this?  Admittedly I had to Google it just for a refresher purposes, but oh what satisfaction!!!  27.5” wide x  15.5” high = the square on the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares on the other two sides…….   32” on the diagonal!!!  I can’t tell you, when I popped into Richer Sounds, on my way to lunch at Wright Bros, to have a look at various models it was all I could do to stop myself relating this story to the guy helping me choose the 49” Sony over the Samsung.

 

So how’s that for research and analysis?  And am I still MiFID2 compliant???  Heck no!

 

PS.  Recall my adventures when I was looking for a taxi in East London last week?  Well I was walking to Liverpool Street last night when I passed a guy shouting repeatedly down his phone “5 Old Bro’ Street”…. I puzzled on this for a while as I wandered on and then it dawned on me.  He was French, needed a taxi and at least he had the wherewithal to try to order an Uber.  But I wondered how long it would be before they realised it was Old Broad Street, not Bro’.  (I know.  It loses something in the telling but it made me chuckle at the time.)

Friday 17th November, 2017

I know you feel I rail against my lot rather too frequently, so you may be surprised to hear that the other day I found contentment in the most trying of circumstances.  I havn’t told you a story for a while so if you are sitting comfortably here goes.  

 

My commute had been a shocker even by the standards of a Monday morning.  I arrived at the station to find that a points failure meant there were no trains running or scheduled to do so for another few hours.  Yes, I’ll admit it.  For a fleeting moment, standing there on the platform in the cold and dark and a hint of drizzle in the air, I thought of retiring home to bed, but being the dedicated soul I am, I got back in the car and drove all the way down the M11 to the outskirts of London where I took a tube into the City arriving at the office just a few minutes later than normal.  Go me.

 

After the start to the week I’d had and having put in a decent days work I felt I was owed a prompt departure that evening.  Anyway I had a 7pm appointment in Newmarket with the Real Tennis pro.  So I snuck away just before 5pm and made it down to the Central Lone only to find that some so and so had fallen under a train and the line was closed indefinitely.  Swearing gently at this further misfortune I pulled myself together and by way of the DLR, requiring a detour south to Canada Wharf, I eventually arrived in Stratford where I found a few other people had had the same idea.  I knew immediately that the taxi ride I had been banking on was a pipe dream.  Six miles lay between me and my car which I had left at Redbridge station.  Now I don’t know about you, but I rarely set foot east of Bishopsgate.  So I don’t mean to be rude when I say this, but I wasn’t at my most confident when I concluded that there was nothing for it other than head out into the night and tromp my way through this less than salubrious part of London.  Reassuringly a policeman pointed me in the general direction and I set off, nerves a-jangling, at a decent and concerted lick, albeit with frequent glances around me both for security purposes and in the forlorn hope that an unoccupied taxi would miraculously pop up.  

 

About fifteen minutes later I had pretty much given up hope of a lift and I’ll tell you I was beginning to regret that impulsive streak in me.  The side-roads to the right, which I knew I was going to have to negotiate at some point on my way towards the Wanstead Flats, another foreboding obstacle between me and my car, were getting darker and more ominous.  And then suddenly an Indian guy walking alongside spoke to me.  Obviously sensing my predicament he helpfully pointed out that there was a taxi firm’s offices located on the other side of the road.  A good idea indeed I thought and very nice of him.  But then he paused to ponder further upon my plight and told me he had a mate who was a taxi driver offering to call him for me. It seemed churlish to decline.  He dialled a number and had an unintelligible conversation after which he suggested it would be easiest if I followed him to where his friend was rather than risk the taxi getting snarled up in all the traffic.  Just five minutes away.  In for a penny in for a pound thought and we strolled on together down Leytonstone High Road.  He was a livewire for sure, but we had a nice chat.  I banged on about the trials and tribulations of commuting daily from Newmarket and he told me all about his legal processing business.  That’s serving writs to you and I.  We were having such a high old time I was a bit sad to say goodbye to him when we arrived at the appointed location.  There indeed, Eve Road I think, for the record, parked behind a portacabin, was his friend in what might have been a licenced cab though I can’t say I looked particularly closely.

 

Easing into the back seat I was chuffed with myself that I had the presence of mind to ask him how much it would cost – no flies on me eh?  We agreed on £20 and off we pootled.  Well didn’t I just have another great conversation with this fellow too.  We discussed his friend who had introduced us.  “My mate’s English.  He was born here, but I’m Indian” he told me.  He’d lived in England for 23 years and insisted he loved it.  It was home.  But he was born in Mumbai only leaving when he was 19 and that’s where his heart was.  Gosh we covered a bit of ground he and I.  Let me see.  We talked about the Indian diaspora, Bolton ( he arrived there from India and, would you believe it, my family lived for three years a while back ) , Zambia ( where his brothers ran an electronic goods shop ), the Chinese in Africa, Brexit ( briefly ), the restaurants of Leytonstone from where we went on to discuss the importance of exercise given unhealthy diets and sedentary lifestyles such as taxi-driving and stockbroking.  He agreed with me on this and whilst he was somewhat in awe of the fact that I had had set out with the intention of walking six miles he claimed that, remarkably, the last minute call up to drive me to Redbridge had interrupted him in his resolve to do 20 minutes on the treadmill that evening, the first such work-out he would have had in ages.  I was wracked with guilt needless to say.  Of course we then had a long chat about sport in general and specifically India’s most popular activities.  Cricket, obviously, hockey, squash and table tennis.  Table tennis??  It was when I heard myself telling him, whilst I didn’t like to boast, that I was really excellent at table tennis, probably the sport I was best at, and ambidextrous too, that it struck me this bro-mance was getting pretty weird, but luckily it was that point that we arrived in Redbridge.  The 5 miles had taken over half an hour, though they had passed in a flash. 

 

And would you believe it, my NBF refused to take any money from me?  Of course I insisted and we agreed he would accept the money on a promise that he would go for that run as soon as he got home.  And so we went our separate ways.  I had 70 miles to drive back to Gazeley which I negotiated in a happy state of mind indeed.  I cared not a jot that my commute that day had taken a combined 5.5 hours, nor that I missed my Real Tennis lesson.  Not the most riveting story ever.   It’s hard to beat the journey home I had when I met the girl with her bottle of Glenfiddich on the late night train from KX to Cambridge, but those were two super nice guys I’d stumbled across on my East London adventure.  And hey, I was back in time to watch Howard’s End.  “Only Connect.”  That’s what it’s all about isn’t it?

 

Talking about connecting, a dreadful thing happened this week.  We caught up over lunch at El Pastor in Borough Market with some friends we’ve only seen a few times since we were at University together, on one of their occasional visits from Australia.  I almost choked on my quesadilla when they announced proudly they were about to become grandparents.  Forget East London, this is properly scary.

Friday 10th November, 2017

Perhaps you missed me last Friday.  Remember I told you I was off to France to catch up with a girl in a van.  I meant to drop you a line on the Thursday, but I had a sore back.  Slightly lame excuse I know and it was such a silly thing I should probably quickly tell you.  

The thing is I was packed off by Sophie the previous Saturday morning to give Lottie’s horse a bit of a stretch in her absence that weekend ( DofE Gold training don’t you know ).  Uncharacteristically I took my phone with me.  Having a phone with one is a strict and sensible rule laid down for Lottie but one I invariably ignore, however on this occasion taking it was my undoing.  At the very far end of my ride I arrived at a bridleway which opens up onto a wide path and allows for a decent stretch of the legs.  It was at this point that I had the idea of videoing my ride and, spotting to my surprise that my current location enjoyed 4G coverage, I decided for some weird reason to try out Facebook Live-video for the first time.  

You may well ask what was I thinking of? It’s not as if I was unaware of the risks in this escapade.  As the camera started rolling I told anyone watching that if they were lucky they might even see me falling off, and with that I kicked on and Bertie broke out of trot into a canter and a developing gallop as I clamped my legs tightly holding onto the reins with one hand.  Fifty yards further we were in full flight when out of the corner of my eye I saw catastrophe looming in the shape of red deer stag which shot out of a hedge immediately into our path.  I remember feeling quite proud of myself because I caught the approaching deer in the video feed, but this all happened the instant before Bertie spotted the creature.  When he did, and who can blame him for this, he startled and swerved sharply to the left.  I went right however and, still clutching my iPhone, flew out the saddle landing on my bottom in a humiliated heap on a mercifully soft grassy patch.  I shook myself tentatively off as I watched the deer and my daughters beloved horse careering side by side across the field into the distance.

It was at that point, dear reader, I decided to delete the video.  Partially out of shame, but mostly because with a loose horse to attempt to reconnect with it wasn’t a good moment really.  Nearly an hour later spent haplessly chasing Bertie around the fields and hedgerows of the Dalham Estate and eventually having to call on help from Sophie – you can imagine how thrilled she was – Bertie finally succumbed to the allure of some pony nuts Sophie held in an outstretched scoop and I was able to remount and gingerly we made our way home. 

So with all ending well enough, apart from my bruised pride and backside, it’s a bit of a shame the video is lost.  Bob and his friend Felix watched it in hysterics when I got home.  It had stayed on my phone for one showing only before disappearing into the ether.  

Ah well.  We live and learn.   

Friday 27th October, 2017

Fresh as a daisy me.  Stayed in town last night having hosted dinner for a visiting Philippines corporate.  That was a treat.  Our guest kindly brought three delicious bottles of wine to the restaurant.  Lynch-Bages 2001, Clos du Marquis 1998 and Lafaurie-Peyraguey 1989.   How wonderful is that?  I was booked into a Travelodge in the middle of nowhere, well, underneath some arches east of Tower Bridge, for the bargain basement sum of £79 and I must say I slept like a log, at least until the early hours when the rumbling of trains above my room and a strange noise next door – which transpired to be a car wash – roused me from slumbers and I pottered out, past the Tower and was at my desk before 6.30am.  Go me.  

 

I’ve stayed in an East End Travelodge once before.  Earlier this year in fact.  On that occasion, however, I thought better of bragging about how cheap it was.  Now that some water has passed under the bridge I can tell you I fell victim to a sting which added £40 to the overall cost of the evening. 

 

I had been invited by a very generous to friend to dinner at his club where he also treated us to the most exceptional line up of wines from the personal cellar he stored there.  Needless to say I was full of bonhomie when I made my way, albeit somewhat warily, along a dark foreboding street leading up to my hotel.  It was just as I was going through the safety of the hotel’s front door, which the night-guard had unlocked for me, I noticed a young woman sobbing uncontrollably.  There was a man nearby her and for a moment I’m ashamed to say I was tempted to leave things to him to sort out.  I didn’t, don’t worry.  I went over and enquired what the problem was. I wouldn’t say it was the gallant in me that changed my mind.  More like the couple of bottles of fine wine I must confess.  

 

It was a strange situation indeed.  Between her sobs I gathered she had had lost her handbag, phone and wallet.  She had nowhere to stay in London and missed the last train to Cambridge ( that struck a chord ).  When I asked where in Cambridge she lived ( that was me testing her story, nothing else ) she explained that she lived with her parents, not actually in Cambridge, but in Waterbeach or some such place. I can’t quite recall.  Up in the Fens anyway. 

 

In the cold light of day, which eventually dawned on my very sore head the following morning, it was so obviously a con-job that I don’t know how I fell for it, but there we were, sometime after midnight and struck by her plight I pulled out the last two £20 notes I had in my wallet and told her, somewhat ungraciously perhaps, that would pay for a taxi at least part the way home.  And off she headed into the night to spend my money on goodness only knows what.  Ah well I’d had a splendid evening and I suppose what goes around comes around. 

 

OK…early bath…I’m off to play Real Tennis.  I first took it up when we were renting in Cambridge twelve years ago.  I got totally hooked and although I admit I was a little disappointed at how difficult I found the game I nevertheless quickly established myself with a world ranking of 1,458 if I remember correctly.  Eventually though I lost interest when I found I was being beaten by 70 year olds.   But I’ve decided the time is ripe for a comeback and so watch this space.  My initial target is to get in the world’s top 1,000 and we’ll see where we go from there…..

 

Friday 20th October, 2017

Whenever I walk past Sweetings I think of Tate & Lyle, but not for the reasons you possibly assume.  Got to warn you, this is real scary stuff.  It is 30 years ago almost to the day I was taken for an excellent lunch there by a broker through whom just a couple of weeks earlier I had been buying quite a slug of Tate & Lyle stock on a story concerning the potential offered by the development of its artificial sweetener Sucralose.  It was a Tuesday and the second day of the global stock market crash.  What else to do on such a day other than to go for a big lunch?

 

Fortified by a bottle or two of Chablis and a couple of large glasses of port I returned to the office and calmly perusing the carnage around me it felt like a splendid idea to pay for lunch by averaging down with the stock now at the bargain basement price of c. £5.  I forget the precise numbers, but I think I had paid around £8 per share for the initial position.  The stock price continued to plunge to £4 shortly thereafter and whilst I’d like to claim it was all fine in the end I’m not sure Sucralose really caught on for another decade or so and the shares languished miserably across the breadth of the UK pension funds I was “managing”.  MiFID2…..I was asking for it I suppose.

 

I’m feeling a bit under the weather actually today so this will be short and …..sweet ( sorry ).  Whilst I’m having a bit of a moan I might as well tell you I was up in Scotland and had a bit of a shocker really.  My Easyjet flight was three hours delayed on the way up and an hour and half coming back.  Serves me right I suppose as I failed to wear the lucky OG boxer shorts I normally don for my trips up North.  Still, I was cheered by a story from someone I had meant to meet on Tuesday evening, but regretfully had to cancel.  He was very understanding responding ruefully by recounting that he had been in London on business the day before.  He had got to Euston in fine time to catch the sleeper up to Edinburgh.  Clambered into his bed and went out like a light.  Not passing aspersions, but I suspect he was probably quite well oiled.  Anyway, when he woke up the following morning he found to his complete surprise that the train had never left the station and he was still in London.   Too good.

Friday 13th October, 2017

Humph.  I got told this morning by my regular travelling companion on the 5.37am train from Whittlesford Parkway that I ought to have a session or two of cognitive behaviour therapy.  I’m not entirely sure what he meant by this and I really wasn’t doing very much at all to merit any particular comment from him so early in the morning.  We have basically agreed upon a comfortable silence at least until Tottenham Hale.  I suppose he might have been reacting to the sound of me sighing as the tannoy in our carriage reverberated with an announcement which had just been repeated for the third time on our journey into town. 

 

If you were in my shoes I’m quite sure it would irritate you too.  I can recite the whole message verbatim.  “You must have a valid ticket to travel on one of our trains.  If you do not have a valid ticket you may be liable to a penalty fare.”  How utterly banal and condescending don’t you agree?

 

This was not the first time I’d heard this.   It has been going on now for about three months.  In an early attempt to bring them to an end I emailed customer relations and was informed it was for the benefit of blind customers who were unable to read signs posted around the carriage bearing similar warnings.  This struck me as ridiculous.  What about people who are deaf and blind?  I rang them and they briefly appeased me by saying they were planning to reduce the number of times they made announcement.  Next, when it seemed to me that the recording was being played with even greater frequency I resumed my railing and engaged in a Twitter exchange with one of their team members who said it was not GreatAnglia’s fault, but was required of them in the terms of the franchise agreement awarded by the Department of Transport. 

 

Well that was that…..talk about a nanny state…..and from a Conservative administration what’s more.  I wrote a searing – though polite – letter to my MP.  Coincidentally his reply was waiting for me when I got home on Wednesday evening after a particularly tortuous journey, over one hour late, having had to stand all the way to Bishops Stortford on the stopping train and listen to the hateful recording on no fewer than eight occasions.

 

 

 

 

This cheered me up a little I suppose.  So yes, perhaps I do have a bee in my bonnet and maybe CBT is the answer, but I’m hoping my new best friend Matt comes up trumps before I sign up for the treatment.  PS I’ve promised him two days of my time canvassing at the next General Election if he does.

 

Talking of one’s state of mind, people always say when you’ve come back from holiday the best thing for you is to immediately book the next one.  So I’ve only gone and done it!  A Ryanair flight to Carcassonne in a couple of weeks’ time for a long weekend catch up with Hen, her Galgos, Myrtile and her Daihatsu Jet van Mowgli which is parked illegally by a river somewhere in the wilds of Roussillon.  Boy I feel good!

 

PPS A book recommendation for you:   Cycling to the Ashes: A Cricketing Odyssey From London to Brisbane by Oli Broom.

Friday 6th October, 2017

Once in a while, I think you will agree, I come up with some pretty handy ideas for you lot.  Oh yes I do.  Todays is an absolute cracker though I say so myself. 

 

When you find yourself some dark evening this winter mulling over your holiday plans for next year please make a bee-line to  The Slow Cyclist website if only to get their contact details.  

 

Waste no time trawling through their admittedly very interesting blog, looking at the pretty photos or reading other customer’s testimonials.  Just trust me.  Get a group of you together and book a cycling holiday in Transylvania.  You don’t need lycra or shaved legs.  You won’t get eaten by a bear or bitten by a bat. The cycling is not especially challenging though you will enjoy yourself all the more for getting into a bit of shape and sitting light in the saddle. Sophie, if this is not a bit disloyal of me, was awarded a prize for being the most improved cyclist, but also the slowest.   You’ll come back refreshed and fitter having spent hours in the clear air traversing the most wonderful unspoilt countryside with astounding wide sweeping views reminiscent of Africa.  You’ll stay in charming hostels eating simple, but perfectly delicious food and drinking adequate Romanian wine.  You will sleep well.  You’ll learn loads of stuff.  The Slow Cyclist team make it incredibly easy for you with their slick organisation and relaxed good humour.  You will have a ball.

 

In the spirit of providing you a balanced picture if for whatever reason you decide to do a cursory bit of your own investigation, you may find reference to the fact that Prince Charles owns a guest house in Transylvania, in a village called Zalanpatak.  You might well be tempted to go there…as we did.  I even packed a smart pair of trousers and a natty shirt for our evenings there just in case I bumped into his nibs.  It’s a lovely enough spot, but it provided me with the one disappointing moment of the week and a possible brush-up with the authorities.

 

Whilst most of our group travelled there by bus, three of us cycled 45 miles into a head wind on mountain bikes including a 2 mile hill at 6% just before the end which finished us off.  We arrived gasping for a cup of Earl Grey and a biscuit.  They had Earl Grey right enough, but as for biscuits there were none.  Not even a Duchy Original.  It was probably the sugar deficiency, but this crisis assumed immense proportions.   There was nothing for it other than to get tucked into many beers whilst playing a few hands of a bridge sitting by a fire in a shed overlooking the central courtyard.  Dinner followed.  This, in the context of all the other good stuff I have raved about, was nothing very special if I’m honest.  Yellow pea soup which we suspected came out of a can and a Romanian version of scotch eggs.  I didn’t eat very much as the red slipped easily enough down.

 

Anyway, at some point that evening I wandered up the stairs to a gallery overlooking the small dining room and there I spotted hanging on the wall an oil painting, a portrait of HRH Prince Charles.  We had been told that he comes each spring with a party of friends to walk in the hills and to paint the spectacular display of wild flowers in the meadows above the house.  So I eyed the painting critically, imagining one of his friends had asked him to sit for this on a rainy day perhaps, or possibly even it was a self-portrait.  I don’t have a particularly good eye for these things but I thought it a very passable likeness and even took a photo of it to show those downstairs.

 

 

It was only then we noticed, that although there were liberal stains of brown paint used to capture shadows above his eyebrowns, there was an incongruous dark spot on the Prince’s forehead.  I went back upstairs and took the painting off the wall to have a closer look.  It may have been our location, more likely the fact I’d been drinking on a disappointingly empty stomach over many hours, but there was something of the cavalier in me that evening.  I’m ashamed to say I had a wee pick at the patch on his forehead.  This didn’t seem to work so I licked my forefinger and tentatively rubbed at the blemish.  To my joy, with the application of a good deal more saliva and an increasingly vigorous motion, miraculous was the result…..

 

 

 

In the cold light of day, rather than a slip from the artist’s palette, I’m inclined to think it was bat poo that had splattered his Highness’s portrait and so I may get away with this bit of impromptu restoration, but given the lack of biscuits and the possibility I might have defaced the Royal image, an act of high treason, I think I’ll steer clear of Zalanpatak for a while.

 

 

Friday 22nd September, 2017

Under the Bodhi Tree indeed.  Under the weather more like this morning.  I arranged a dinner at J&B last night along with a collection of other brokers to mark the retirement of an enormous long only client of ours who was there as our guest.  I could bore you with the list of wines we drank ( we finished with D’Yquem 89 and Taylors 85 ).  The highlight however was when one of our number read out comments our client had written about him in various broker reviews over the years.  The wines may have been expensive, but these are priceless:

 

·          "Has got bored as the market has collapsed"

·         "Almost appears to care about the account"

·         "Has dwindled rather like his company’s share price"

 

Oh yes.  Perking up a little.  I meant to tell you about a funny thing that happened this week.  A cousin set in motion the most ridiculous chain of Facebook posts I have seen in a long time when she asked her friends for help identifying a song that she was hoping to use for some project she was engaged in at work.  There was little to go on.  “It’s quite tinkly and has men and women singing ‘badabadabadabada’ overlapping each other.  It has a 70’s, fuzzy, soft focus feel to it”.  It was a wild goose chase to all intent and purposes except that she also said the song had been the subject of discussion between Rob Brydon and Steve Coogan in an episode of The Trip.  Well, there was only one thing for it really:

 

 

 

 

Anyway, back to matters of health.  I’m in the office on Monday however away after that for 8 days cycling through the Carpathian Mountains of Romania so you’ll get a welcome break from this ridiculous missive next week.  I admit I have done a bit of training and took myself off last Sunday for a 30 mile burn on the mountain bike.  All was going well till mile 20 when, enjoying a whizz downhill, I came round a corner where to my surprise a substantial ford presented itself.  Throwing caution to the wind I free-wheeled in legs akimbo, but the water was deeper than I had expected and the ground an inch thick with algae and weed. The bike went from under me and I hit the deck.  I was soaked to the skin and suffered a VERY nasty wound on the front of my left knee.  I thought, better than calling Sophie to the rescue, cycling the remaining 10 miles home with blood pouring down my leg was much the less painful option.   The rest of the afternoon was spent hanging around for a plaster and a packet of antibiotics in Bury St Edmunds A&E….shame on me.

 

I got quite excited albeit a little surprised when I found online that typically the weather at this time of year in Transylvania is sunny and temperatures in the range of 28-30oC.  That was until it was pointed out to me I had googled Transylvania, Louisiana.  Anyway if a mountain bike holiday wasn’t a daunting enough proposition after this brush with death Bob has sent our whole party into a spin by sending a video clip of Romanian shepherds tackling a marauding brown bear.  I hesitate to share this with you because a friend who reads this email coincidentally is also going cycling in Romania next week and I don’t want to ruin her holiday too.  I’m thinking she’s probably already on her way so hopefully she’ll never see this.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aYfwvBWAzVs

 

 

 

Friday 15th September, 2017

I told you the other day about reports that came through to me that our youngest, Lottie, was having her hair dyed purple.  It transpired she didn’t and it was just a rather puerile attempt to wind me up, but the worm is definitely now turning.  I regret to say she has started life in the Perse sixth form with a bit of attitude in evidence.  Her skirt on the first day back was just a little too short; the black trousers she wore the following day cut illegally above the ankle, whilst her top was a florid black and brown shirt bought when she was at Reading Festival.  There has also been just a suggestion of some lippiness.  She related over supper that she had corrected a young English teacher who had spoken grammatically incorrectly in one of their lessons.  Then on Friday she surpassed herself for the chutzpah of it.

 

I arrived home to discover she was up in her room supposedly knocking out some prep.  At the risk of interrupting her finely honed academic focus I tentatively knocked on her door as I called to say that I was back, but I need not have worried about disturbing her train of thought.  She shoved her i-phone to one side and looked up with a self-satisfied and mischievous grin on her face cocking her head to reveal a freshly pierced ear.  A small gold stud now adorned her pinna, if I’m to be anatomically correct, just up from the ring in her lobe which has  been there since her 15^th birthday. 

 

“What ho!”,  I exclaimed to myself, holding onto my sense of equilibrium which had survived a relatively unchallenging commute back from the office that evening.  There’s a lot of that sort of thing about these days isn’t there.  I’ve even noticed some of Sophie’s friends have multiple ear piercings.  “Looking good Lottie! When did you get then done?”  “Oh, long story” she said gleefully.

 

It’s not massively interesting to be honest so I’ll spare you every bit of detail. Suffice to say, she had discovered that she had been unilaterally signed up for a session of orienteering during Friday afternoon’s “activities” slot.  If that was not unappealing enough, it involved a trip to the outskirts of Cambridge to traipse around the Magog Hills.  No, up with this she would not put.  She and a friend decided they’d never be missed if they didn’t actually get on the bus.  Instead they settling down in a classroom for a peaceful afternoon on Snapchat but shortly they were discovered by a teacher who, whilst not knowing which activity they were meant to be doing, at least was aware they were not meant to be sitting around in a classroom and so duly despatched them.  With the afternoon now stretching idly ahead they settled on a wander along Hills Road to Costa and there, sipping a soy latte or whatever, they agreed that they might as well make the time count.  So they walked a little further down the road to a tattoo and piercing parlour where the job was done.  Chutzpah….yes, that’s the word for it at this point.  Don’t worry.  I’m watching her like a hawk now I can tell you.

 

Friday 8th September, 2017

 

The horrendous events in the Caribbean notwithstanding it’s been a bit of a quiet old week.  In the good old days we used to go sailing in the BVI.  You may recall me telling you how I once managed to lodge the catamaran on a coral reef and what an outcry that caused from the family not least given their ecological sensitivities.  I really didn’t do much damage, other than to my self-esteem.  Irma, however, has totalled the place.  Seriously though, what an absolute mess.  Awful.

 

I did at least manage to drag myself out for a run mid week.  With the exception of the odd brush with reefs I pride myself on my sense of direction, but on this occasion too it failed me.  Diverted from my regular route by some work being done to the canal path I decided to cut the run short and head straight back across town to the work station.  Below is my Strava feed tracking the route I took.  Talk about a meander!  What it doesn’t show is how, when I eventually realised I had been running north instead of south and was deep in Hackney, my pace picked up quite handily and after a further period of disorientation I literally whizzed down the A10 back to more familiar territory. 

 

 

 

Enough about me and my paltry jog.  My brother Jamie nipped up and down Mont Blanc yesterday though he took a guide with him.  Set off at 5.45am and was back in time for supper.  He was slightly humming and hawing earlier in the week about whether or not to do it, but in the process of helping him with some cursory research on the practicalities of scaling the mountain in a day I stumbled across a website on which climbing folk record their thoughts about taking on the highest peak in Europe.  I think this was the entry which clinched it for him.

 

 

Ah the patter.  Wouldn’t that inspire you too?  I have to admit I don’t know what “bojo” is specifically.  Maybe you can help me Iain?

Friday 1st September, 2017

I went up to Scotland on Saturday morning, after crowing loudly in my missive the day before you might recall, pretty confident that I would win our family golf competition, which for almost a decade I had essentially made my own.  Alas I headed back south on Tuesday – annoyingly the day before the new bridge opened - with my tail between my legs.   If I’m honest with you it’s been the same story for a few years now.  I might blame Father Time catching up with me except that the winner this year was my Dad, 81 today in fact.  Happy to him. 

 

No.  I’m just rubbish at golf these days, though a bit unlucky to boot.  Striding forthrightly down the 1^st I found that my ball had trickled off the course and was lying one inch out of bounds.  A passing group of South Africans offered to kick it back into play and I must say I was very tempted to accept their help, but honour got the better of me.  Little good did a clear conscience do.  I scored a pathetic 9 stableford points on the way out.  A greasy sausage roll with a healthy dollop of HP sauce at the half way hut revived my fortunes briefly, but by the time we got to the 18^th my number was pretty much up and just to rub salt into the wounds my drive ended lying on the tarmac of Granny Clarks Wynd from where, you will know, it must be played or a penalty taken.  As I approached, a 9 iron at the ready, two Italian ladies walking by stooped and handed me my ball.  I required a birdie at the very least and for the second time that day a sneaky little devil jumped onto my shoulder.  Don’t worry.  I brushed it off and ended up in the Valley of Sin anyway so whatever.

 

Enough of the golf talk.  Speaking of tails between the legs Hen has achieved one of the key elements of her plan when setting out on her road trip through Europe.  She has taken on a Spanish greyhound ( galgos ) from a dog rescue centre in Cartegena.  I wasn’t going to include the photo below, but I can’t resist it.  Too sweet.  Myrtle and Hen.  And, if the mood takes you, you might like to lob the charity, Galgos del Sol, a penny or two.  They do an amazing service in a country where it seems dogs are really not cared for very much to say the least.

 

 

 

Very satisfactory lunch today, other than being let down by someone hence depriving me of some decent banter and a mound of sushi.  The compensation was that with some unexpected time on my hands, and a fancy dress party to go to tomorrow evening, I found the most terrific shop up by Old Street station emerging from which I Boris Biked it back to the office bearing a Bugsy Malone trilby, shiny white tie and braces and an inflatable machine gun.  Sorted.