Friday 6th May, 2016

 

The biggest miracle to happen to Leicester since I graduated from its university with a 2:1 in History and Economic History was confirmed this week and talking of beating outrageous odds it had been a while since I last went to the races.  So, ahead of the new season of Peaky Blinders and to give Bob a well-earned break from revision, he and I nipped into Newmarket last weekend for the 2,000 Guineas.  In a mood of unbridled optimism ( see attached photo…how could we fail? ) not for Bob the red hot favourite Air Force Blue.  He liked the look of a 14-1 shot called Galileo Gold as it was led round before the race and having studied the form guide with careful deliberation he decided to put £5 on the nose.  Well, of course GeeGee only went and romped home.  I must admit, rather churlishly given the euphoria of the moment, I pondered why these skills of application and analysis could not be translated to the exam room. 

 

But anyway, the joy was short-lived.  As we made our way back to the car Bob discovered he had lost his phone.  Ironically, it was just a couple of weeks earlier I had been noting to myself that I had had a good run on that front.  Big mistake.  Since then we’ve had two cracked screens and £11.68 in data charges.  And now a lost iphone 5C.  I did a reasonably good job of holding myself together, but fair to say it was a disconsolate pair that headed home until Bob, messing around on my phone, quietly announced he could track his handset on my Find My Phone app and it appeared to be under a tree next to the Parade Ring.  Half an hour later the jammy bandit was re-united with his phone and all was well with my world.   

 

That was until later that evening when, conscientiously flossing before bedtime, one of my fillings fell out.  Irony being the theme of the week how ridiculous, given my lame joke about dental appointments in my last missive, that I should find myself on Tuesday morning accepting the only available slot with my dentist later that day at 2.30.  Yup.  Someone is mocking me.

 

PS….talking about Peaky Blinders, which is a must watch, the other tip for the next couple of weeks is Grayson Perry, All Man.  Channel Four on Thursday nights at 10.00am.  We’ve missed the first episode which was last night and featured cage-fighters, but the one to make sure you see is in a fortnight and looks at the extent to which masculinity defines the City.  I imagine my friend Tom is quaking in his boots!  And so perhaps are a few other City worthies, but not me.  Unsurprisingly I’ve been cut so the producer told me a couple of weeks ago…. an unfortunate phrase given the subject, but a merciful relief to be honest.

 

 

Friday 29th April, 2016

Perhaps you read this week of the girl who arranged a once in a lifetime, surprise trip to Las Vegas for her partner whose 30^th birthday it was only to discover when they arrived at Birmingham Airport that she had mistakenly booked to fly from Birmingham Alabama.  

"Richella's face has just gone red and she's in tears," said Mr Marlow.

"I was like - we're not going to Vegas then.

"I was more gutted for Richella than myself because it was a surprise."

“I was like – we’re not going to Vegas then”!  I know.  I shouldn’t laugh.  They went to Amsterdam instead and after all I’m the one who on deciding to take his wife on a surprise trip to Sweden, muddled up his capital cities of Scandinavia and booked us on flights to Copenhagen.  

 

Talking about not laughing I was disappointed at the muted reception I got to this witty little moment I had on Monday.

 

A HELPFUL AND CONSIDERATE CLIENT to whom I had offered the opportunity to meet one of our analysts:

08:49:09 Good morning.

I have a dentist appointment first thing on 13th so will be in late but I am all yours after 11.00

DAVID SANDISON

08:50:40 How about a meeting at tooth-hurty.....?!!   LOL!

THE UNFORTUNATE CLIENT

08:51:30 Groan

08:51:58 2:30 is fine.  

 

And whilst still on the subject of silly things I’ve been meaning to tell you we had my youngest brother and his family staying a couple of weekends ago.  As A levels loom for both his eldest daughter, Ella, and, as you already know, for my son Bob, the conversation over dinner got round to their prospects in the exams.  If you think I’m mean about my children you should meet my brother.  He wasn’t disparaging, but perhaps he was playing down her chances just a wee bit.  Ella was having none of it though and put him right back into his place.  “I tell you, Dad, my friends all think I’m super-bright”…she paused for a moment.  “Mind you, I don’t have particularly bright friends.  The other day one of them asked me how they manage to turn trains around and my bezza Tracey thinks north is whichever direction her nose is pointing!”  I don’t make this rubbish up!

 

Friday 22nd April, 2016

The Mammal Game © was invented by Bob on a long drive up north last summer. It was a rather sweet and innocent game as he devised it.  I forget the exact point system, but I think you get 1 point if you spot a rabbit before anyone else.  2 points for a hare.  10 for a munjac.  15 for a roe deer.  20 for a fox.  50 for a live badger….You get the point.  Our chances of winning have improved since Bob passed his driving test, at least I hope he will now have his sights firmly on the road, but he does have the eagle eyes of a fully fledged hunter gatherer and it is rare indeed that anyone spots more than the odd rabbit before he does.

 

So I set up a group WhatsApp chat with the rather lame purpose of allowing the rest of us to register the occasional point in his absence albeit it needs to be confirmed with a photograph of the observed mammal.  Last night as it happens was a tremendous one for me.  My train home had a protracted and unscheduled stop alongside a field between Newport and Audley End.  This allowed me to clock up no less than 50 points, alas all rabbits, captured in two or three photos ( of dubious quality admittedly ) which were whacked off gleefully to the group chat. 

 

 

Even though I got home half an hour later than scheduled I cared not a jot.  50 points.  Go me.

 

Alas the game has taken a rather sinister twist I think you will agree once you have scanned the screen shots below.  I have spared you the video clip which was something akin to a “snuff movie” albeit it didn’t quite capture the gory detail my wife Sophie had intended it to when she took it during a dog walk earlier today.  Goes without saying I am increasingly worried about what is happening to the dearly beloved quite apart from the fact I thought we were as one in our efforts to curb Bob’s bloodlust.  That aside the excerpts in green are my vain attempts to try to assert some discipline and focus in Bob and Lottie, but clearly this is water off a ducks back, even where my youngest Lottie, the so-called perfect child, is concerned.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Friday 1st April, 2016

Been a little while one way or another, but don’t get too excited.  I can tell you, things have not been going that well for me.  Cutting to the chase, ok, I beat Bob, but I didn’t come close to beating the GB 45-50yrs Female Team triathlete, when I ran the Crick up in Rugby a couple of weekends ago.  And I got walloped by another lady too.  She was 23 years old and 5ft 11inches tall, a former British schools cross country champion and currently modelling for Vogue.  I chatted to her briefly on the start line and, as you might imagine, tried very hard to keep up with her, but that didn’t last very long.  And, if that were not frustration enough, having set myself, in this my final attempt, the target of getting under 1 hour 20 minutes, I staggered over the finishing line 4 seconds over.  Aaaagh.

 

Further ignominy struck this week delivered by my middle brother who the day after I ran my fastest ever 10k, albeit my Garmin went a bit wonky which probably shaved a bit off my time, wandered out into Hyde Park and blitzed me.  I have since had really disturbing dreams about this and am planning a new attempt on Saturday if it’s not windy and I can find a decent enough downhill stretch.

 

What else?  Well in a rare exhibition of social conscience - recall perhaps that she began her year off not saving turtles in Costa Rica or building schools in Kenya, but with 6 weeks on the beaches of St Lucia – Jimmy went to help in the Calais Jungle this week.  The less kind members of her family had suggested that if ever there might be a way to persuade the Syrians to go home and take the chances with Assad then an encounter with Jimmy was probably it, but I was only joking.

 

No, I started this thing email doing my usual and bemoaning my lot, so let me get back on track.  Lottie, my 15 year old, is having her tummy-button pierced tomorrow.  My baby-darling??  Actually the truth is I’m surprisingly unfazed.  You become a bit inured to this sort of thing I suppose. I was trawling through some old stuff and found this from 2011….

 

 

 

 

Hard to follow that one isn’t it but how about this for inspiration.  My brother – I’m still talking to him despite his ruining my sleep – tells me that his eldest son formed a team for last nights’ quiz in the Station Inn, Lower Largo.  They called themselves  “And in First Place”……. They came last but that’s by the by.  They had their moment in the sun each round when the organiser read out the various team scores.

 

PS I’m quietly confident I’ll have a moment in the sun.  Well the Telegraph at least.  I’ve written to the Editor in response to one by a certain Mr. Frederick Forsyth in today’s edition.

 

Sir, 

Mr Frederick Forsyth's stance concerning the EU's true intentions should hardly surprise. He hatched an elaborate and compelling, if ultimately unsuccessful, plot to assassinate General De Gaulle, after all.

 

David JM Sandison

Bovills Hall

Gazeley

Suffolk

CB8 8RE

 

PPS Just on the off chance you are under the illusion that I lead a particularly action-packed life, I can’t tell you how excited I am about tonight’s episode of The Archers.  I can feel a big one coming on.

 

Friday 18th March, 2016

One year ago almost to the day, I was confessing to you how I had broken my New Years Resolution and had found myself at lunch on a Friday eating fish and chips at my desk.  It’s been fish and chips again today fair enough, but hurrah for this, at Sweetings with a bottle of Pouilly Fume and a fine old friend.  And I would be feeling very chipper except for one thing.  On Sunday, as you will probably be aware given the refined sense for the rhythm of life that reading this missive affords you, I’ll be running the Rugby School “Crick” again.  This is my fifth ( and last ) time participating in what is the longest standing organised cross country race in the world.  It has been run on largely the same route through the countryside around Rugby for the last 177 years.  It’s a pretty horrible prospect at the best of times, but this year I have worked myself up into a particularly heightened state of anxiety about it. 

 

The run follows footpaths, across fields, ditches, puddles, railway lines and countless stiles.  It’s mostly uphill and always seems to be into a stiff breeze.  Furthermore at 10 miles, and I don’t want to seem like I’m swanking here, the issue for me at least is not so much about finishing it, but the time I do it in.  Aside from the poignancy of it being my swansong the added pressure comes from the fact that last year I lost the title of the first parent past the post which I had held for the preceding three years.  I’m may not be the most competitive fellow you’ve met, nonetheless believe me when I say I want to win this honour back.  Together with a modicum amount of training, I’ve found the time to do a bit of research on the person who beat me and who, I gather, has the temerity to run again this year.  Turns out she is an Australian triathlete who has lived in this country for twenty years and represents Team GB ( for her age group  - which is reasonably advanced ) in Ironman contests.  What is it with these women in my life?  First Georgette Lenoir ( whose women’s world record time in the 1922 Olympic 800 metres I have yet to match ) and now this one….she’s called Tamara Hardman if you must know.  I suppose she had to do Ironman with a name like that.  

 

And if that wasn’t enough I’ve got a head to head going on against Bob who is also running this thing.   This is not going to be a repeat of last year when I passed him at the 6 mile mark as we made our way along a footpath by the Oxford Canal.  He didn’t seem very bothered at the time.  He was more concerned that a handful of jelly babies had fallen through a hole in his pocket and were trapped in the lining of his shorts frustratingly out of reach.   No.  This year there is a small wager involved and I’ve told all his friends in house about it.  Bets are being taken.  Tee-shirts commemorating the contest have been designed.  Bob is fired up.  Lots of pressure.

 

So, this has the potential of going very wrong especially as on Saturday night I’ve got a boys night out in Cambridge.  In fact, let’s accept it, I’m toast.

 

Talking of competitions my sister in law has just sent me a photo of an egg one of her hens laid weighing in at 133 grams.   Do you know how amazing that is?  Enormous.  I sent you a photo of one my own hens’ eggs, a few months back, so proud was I of it.  That was a meagre 96 gms.  So fair do’s.  Big respect to Debbie and if anyone can beat her egg please let me know.  ( boom boom! )

 

Friday 11th March, 2016

Friday 11^th March, 2016

Had such a nice time yesterday with my NBF Mr Gambhir from Godrej Consumer.  In between sitting in various client waiting rooms, ignominiously excluded by clients carefully guarding the finer arts of corporate interrogation, I had a good chat with him about his blog and the importance of having a goat, I mean, goal. 

 

I’ve got a new goal.  I’m going to build a brick oven in my garden and bake my own bread. 

 

It’s been a while since I talked to you about my bucolic existence so indulge me please.  The plan began to take shape when I was in Chamonix, yes I was, the weekend before last, where I had a fascinating chat with one of the girls about her soughdough starter called Doris.   That’s the starter’s name not the girl.  She’s called Sophie inevitably.  I assume I don’t need to tell you what a sourdough starter is.  Doris has lived in my friend’s fridge for a decade.  She’s pretty special therefore but, and this is what a good friend she is, she offered me a little bit of Doris.  At the risk of seeming churlish I decided however I would try to create my own.  After an inauspicious beginning - I discovered the sell by date on the wholemeal flour I was using was February 2014 -  “Fred” is now bubbling happily away and in a week or so should be sweet beery smelling, yeasty and we’ll be good to go to make sourdough bread. 

 

But oh yes, I forgot about the brick oven.  Truth is I’m not much of a handyman.  The oven will have to wait till Easter when my parents are coming down to stay.  A job for my father I think.

 

Bit stressed today actually.  It did not start auspiciously.  In freezing dense fog the Prancing Horse roundabout on the road out of Newmarket towards Six Mile Bottom came upon me rather more quickly than I expected, even though I have approached it almost every day at the same sort of time for the last nine years.  I went straight over the top ( missing the horse thankfully ) rather than round it.  It’s a monkey I need to get off my back I feel as I sit here waiting for news of how Bob fared in his fourth attempt at his driving test which he is sitting this afternoon in Rugby……

 

 

 

PS…..after a fine lunch courtesy of one of my many Monaco based friends I have just heard from Bob….he passed!!…..blinking miracle…..the ensuing exchange on WhatsApp family group made me laugh.  Thought I’d share it with you.  It appears I once said I would buy a Landrover Defender if Bob got 3A’s at A level.  Even if he had forgotten about this and appears to be happily cruising towards his unconditional offer from Oxford Nobooks it appears Jimmy hadn’t.  “Take one for the team would ya!”  Classic:

 

 

I’ll see too.  (I think I’m safe, mind you.)

 

Friday 19th February, 2016

Happy to say that we have the pleasure of the company of Mr Vivek Gambhir, the Managing Director of Godrej Consumer Products, in London in a few weeks time.  It’s just for the one day so alas we are very constrained on slots.  You can try me, but I can’t promise anything.  Be that as it may I think I’ve told you before I have a soft spot for this excellent company.

 

Reflecting on the early days of my career in financial markets as a fund manager with Barings I would probably have to, grudgingly, concede that I was not really a numbers focussed sort of guy.  I wasn’t as hapless as an Aussie broker I knew who, when allowed to sit in on company meetings and offered the opportunity to ask a balance sheet question, would inquire with a straight-face “What’s a balance sheet?”.  But I suppose I did rely more on a psychological, rather than numerical, approach to navigate Asian equity markets.  I had – still do of course - an open mind as to what might constitute a source for conviction one way or another and to that end have maintained a keen eye on corporate mission statements.  You see some gems travelling around the region, but rarely have I been so amused than by one on a poster in the reassuringly shabby reception room of Godrej Consumer Product’s office on a visit to India a few years back with an enormous long only client of mine. 

 

We had driven north out of bustling Mumbai into the countryside and down a drive which led to the Godrej Group’s site, a large plot which seemed more like a plantation than the headquarters of one of India’s leading corporations. Nevertheless, despite the rural and agrarian setting, the motto on the admittedly somewhat gnarled poster seemed a little incongruous for a company whose primary business is in household and personal care products.  “Having a goat is a state of happiness”  I read out slightly hysterically to my client.  “Best company moto ever”.  He looked at me not a little condescendingly and told me the word was goal.   He then fell into a drainage ditch.  All in all, it was a great visit.

 

Talking of goals, Mr Vivek Gambhir maintains an interesting blog which I found via a link on the corporate website.  Flicking through some recent posts of his it seems that goal setting remains central to this splendid company’s ethos and spirit.   Take the one below for example which I enjoyed very much.  I am already planning a family meeting to set out some targets for each of us in 2016.  Seriously….I am.   Should have implemented this long ago.  Ill disciplined rabble that they are.

 

http://www.monday-8am.com/goal-setting-with-your-family/

 

Regrettably I missed an opportunity to do this last weekend as we had close to a quorum.  Hen paid us a rare visit as she was photographing an 18^th birthday party in Newmarket.  Her rates are going up by the way though they are still very good value if you care and are planning a jolly.  She is extremely professional and absolutely doesn’t drink when working, but there was a bit of a scare the day after her job when she complained of feeling dizzy and unwell and indeed was subsequently physically sick.  It wasn’t an excess of alcohol or one of the canapes – as she does allow herself a few of those.  No.  Turned out that morning she had wandered into the kitchen and found a half full glass of water.  It was a bit cloudy she had noted and paused for a moment apparently contemplating whether it was Bob’s backwash.  That thought would have put most of us, but not Hen.  She necked the water from what transpired, on later investigation into the source of her sickness, to have been a receptacle for a selection of wild flowers and undergrowth that Bob had assembled a few days earlier and given as a rather manky and wilted Valentines Day gift to his girlfriend. (Yes….a girlfriend!  Who knew eh?).  Yuck.

 

Just in case I have insufficiently bored you today I can’t resist including a quote from Ronnie O’Sullivan – one of my sporting heroes – bemoaning a dull day ( on which, incidentally, he had rattled off 300 unanswered points against a hapless opponent ) at the Welsh Open snooker tournament in Cardiff earlier this week.

 

"Today I've had a haircut, I've been in the Chinese, I've been for a coffee, I went to Bill's cafe for a couple of hours, I've had a kip, I went to Marks' and bought a bit of grub. What a day. It's certainly not glamorous."  Welcome to my life Ronnie!

 

You know that “Japan Matters” product of mine?  In a moment of quiet reflection yesterday I worked out that if I stapled all 53 editions together I’d have a book not far short of the length of War & Peace.