Friday 16th February, 2018

I have to concede that the posture improvement gadget I gave her last week didn’t go down well.  It was placed perfunctorily and unopened on my desk and the air was a little frosty as we all got into the car and went out for dinner at a nearby pub.  Note to self for next year though you would think I should have learnt this by now.  It never pays to underwhelm Sophie with her birthday present.  The point is my birthday follows quickly after hers.  It was yesterday since you ask.  She gave me a box chest freezer and half a side of a pig.

 

Hey ho.  Do you find a visit to Dublin brings out the worst in you?  It took my mother, when I was telling her that Lottie had been in Ireland earlier this week, to point out that it seems to do something to us Sandisons.  I might have told you before about the weekend my brothers and I spent there some years back when we went with our father – I think he was 73 give or take a year or two - to play a couple of rounds of golf and watch Scotland v. Ireland at Lansdowne Road.  It was tempting to leave him there, in a beer hall after the rugby match, at 2.00 in the morning dancing and singing raucously along to “Living next door to Alice” which was blaring out of the loud speakers.  A couple of hours later, after we had managed to find our hotel and the four of us crammed into our shared room, I wished I had.  Instead, I spent the few hours sleeping time available to us, repeatedly stretching out of bed to rap him on the head with my Titleist driver, in a futile attempt to stop him snoring.  

 

As I was saying, our youngest, Lottie, ( Miss Perse Upperself ) has just returned from Dublin where she’d been on an English literature field trip arranged by the school.  I remember wincing at the cost of this one when we agreed to sign her up for it towards the end of last year, but she wants to read English at University and persuaded us there was an interesting and full schedule including visits to museums, libraries, the James Joyce Centre and two theatrical performances.  It would be an invaluable educational experience she insisted.

 

She blew into the house late the other night in terrific form apart from the bags under her eyes.  “I had the most fantastic time.”  That’s as maybe say I, but did you learn anything?  “I learnt a couple of things actually Daddy.  3 million pints of Guinness are brewed in Ireland every day and 3.5 billion pints of Guinness are drank around the world each year.  And I had three pints one evening, but to be honest I prefer Harry Sparrow.”

 

Kung Hei Fat Chow and although we’re heading into the Year of the Dog I have to ask could life get any better for our pack of hounds??

 

 

 

 

 

Friday 9th February, 2018

Time will tell, but I can’t be absolutely certain Sophie is going to be ecstatic about the birthday present I’ll give her this evening.  I’m reasonably optimistic though.  The Fitbit she got for Christmas has been a surprising success.  Perhaps I was resting on my laurels, but I hadn’t been able to think of anything to match that until last Saturday morning when Sophie started moaning about a sore back sustained in the course of a protracted phone conversation with Hen whilst doing the ironing.  

 

I was feigning interest although in fact somewhat more engrossed by the challenge of trying to break my all time record of 12 correct answers out of 20 in the Saturday Telegraph family general knowledge quiz.  Having failed in that task what should I read about, elsewhere in the section, but an article about a marvellous little invention, designed to help improve your posture.  Obviously one shouldn’t do the ironing whilst attempting to hold the phone in the crook of your neck.  But the idea of this gadget is that you stick it on your back, between the shoulder blades, and it gives you a gentle electric shock or some form of vibration possibly whenever it senses that you are slouching.  Clever eh?  Just in case though I’ve hedged myself with the additional purchase of an amber and bay leaf scented candle from Jo Malone ( just a small one ), and we’re going out to the local pub for supper.  I know.  I spoil that girl.

 

If I can continue with the theme of “ways to maintain a successful marriage” it is obviously important not to take each other for granted.  Nonetheless Jimmy’s reaction to the fact that Sophie came downstairs last Monday wearing make up, whilst intensely loyal, was also a little disconcerting.  Of course I was here in the office looking after you lot, but back at the ranch Sophie was on a mission to sell Lottie’s horse.  I could learn a thing or two from her with regard to the attention to detail required to clinch a deal.  A lady was coming round for a second look at Bertie.  Sophie had had me sweep the stable yard and move all the accumulated clutter out of sight before I was allowed to settle down to watch the Liverpool-Spurs match on Sunday afternoon.  First thing the following morning Sophie groomed the horse to perfection after which she went upstairs to apply the finishing touches to her own appearance.  It was back in the kitchen when she was waiting for the prospective purchaser to arrive and taking the opportunity to brew some coffee that she noticed Jimmy eyeing her up and down rather suspiciously.  Jimmy doesn’t miss a trick.  “Why are you wearing make up Mummy” she said in a somewhat accusatory yet anxious tone.  Sophie explained the lengths she was prepared to go to make a sale.  “Oh, phew,” said Jimmy, according to Sophie, sincerely relieved, “I thought it was because Gavin the electrician is coming.  I was a bit worried for Daddy.”

Friday 2nd February, 2018

 

Don’t read too much into the fact I’m emailing you a bit earlier today.  It’s mainly to give you time to jump into action.  Anyway, there I was thinking last week was the low point of the year, and certainly I’ve noticed it’s lighter for longer in the afternoons now which is good news at least I suppose, but otherwise this had been a quiet old week.  Still, at least Hen rang me this morning.

 

She began by telling me she had a cold which was an inauspicious start, but we are talking about Hen.  Never a dull moment in her life.  “It’s alright though, I’ve eaten a whole bulb of garlic so I’ll be fine soon enough”.  New one on me I must admit.  Good job she’s in France and its only her and a dog in a van.  She nattered on.  “All’s fine otherwise thanks Daddy. It’s rainy and the wind’s blowing 90kmph today so I’m bunkered down in the van.  I love it here.  Loads of work and I’ve met such brilliant people doing vine pruning.  There’s a nice guy who has built himself a log cabin in the middle of a small citrus orchard and surrounded by vineyards.  And a lovely young couple who are expecting a baby and live in a tepee.  Now Uncle Robert’s gone – thank ****  - I’m working for Eric the alcoholic, the one who looks like Dobby the house elf, who owns a lot of vines but really doesn’t like doing much to them himself.  He’s always insisting that we head off on adventures.  Well that’s what he calls them.  Usually I tell him to go on his own as I’ve got the pruning to do and need the money, but sometimes I go with him.  Yesterday we ended up at a petanque game.  The men playing it were so old most of them couldn’t bend down to pick the boules up so they had a magnetic contraption on the end of a stick which did the job.  The day before that he took me to a bar in a neighbouring village.  It was wonderful. We went in and there was absolute dead silence apart from the sound of cards being laid on a table.  Five old boys were sitting playing a game called Tarot, surrounded by about twenty others watching intently over the proceedings uttering not a sound.  When the game finished about ten minutes later the whole place literally erupted with banter and relief that the pressure was off.  I’ve never seen so much smoke and Pernod.”  

 

So, hardly earth shattering stuff, but one minute I had been at my desk thinking about the re-rating possibilities of the Chinese life insurance sector, the next I was in a wind-swept village in the south west of France.  Quite a skill, the story telling, and she’s got it that girl.

 

Talking of clouds I set up Family Sharing on my Apple account a couple of days ago.  I’d been mulling it for a while.  You can share the Cloud space between you; and calendars and all that good stuff.  Handy I thought.  I’m not a total eejit.  I knew very well it meant that all iTunes purchases now go onto my card, but, I thought to myself, no one pays for music anymore do they?  I’m not making this up.  The very next morning, the very next morning I tell you, ping….£13.99 onto my credit card for an iTunes purchase.  The new Beyonce album, Lemonade.  JIMMY!  She’ll be paying me back, don’t you worry.

Friday 25th January, 2018

I was away for a couple of days at the end of last week so maybe you missed me.  Nipped off for a sneaky three days skiing with two of the bambinos.  Important to start these post MiFID2 days and to brace myself for what is, I understand, the grimmest week of the year by pampering oneself. 

 

The 23^rd January is specifically the day that the “blues are at their bluest” I read.  I made a big mistake that day actually.  Travelling in to work I tapped into Spotify on my phone and decided to listen to an 80’s hit list radio stream.  By the time I got to the office I was a nostalgic wreck only getting consolation from the fact that I’d been able to remember the words to almost every song that had come, so at least, I concluded,  Alzheimers is being warded off.

 

On that subject and perhaps to demonstrate that I’m not really the glass half empty sort of guy I think many of you believe me to be, something incredible happened this week.  I decided that I would like to understand better some of the driving forces behind SRI funds and ESG investing and so I paid some of my own hard earned mullah to enrol on an online course.  Is there no end to the lengths I will go for my clients I hear you ask?  It took a few hours over a couple of evenings to work my way through this before I reached the denouement which took the form of an extensive and challenging series of multiple choice questions.  I only went and nailed it!  95%.  Go me.  But what’s so incredible about this I hear the more cynical amongst you saying?  Well, unless you count my success in getting my Day Skipper qualification, which was more a practical test and in all honesty I only scraped through the theoretical side because Sophie was mouthing the answers to me behind the instructor’s back, this is the only exam I have taken since my Finals at Leicester University whenever that was.  I know.  I’m very proud.

 

Small aside.  I feel you’re due an update on Hen.  She’s on good form earning money pruning vines in the South West of France particularly as her boss, “Uncle Robert” she has to call him to get round the restrictive French employment regulations, has left her to it and gone back to the UK for a few weeks.  She is not a fan of Robert, despite the fact he has provided her with a job.  He is 60, a gossip and a snob according to her and resistant to the various attempts she has made to moderate his behaviour.  The message in the attached photo adorning the inside of her van is directed at him.

 

Last night my journey home was delayed as I had a quick desk dinner after work with a visiting high heidyin.  It was Burns Night so I can call him that I think.  And oh yes, didn’t we just have to go to the same old joint our desk head always chooses?  I’ve lost count of the number of times he’s dragged us all there these last five year or so.  It’s convenient enough, but a bit of a dive, The Don Bistro.  We didn’t hold back.  The whole desk in fact was giving him grief about the venue until I asked for some mustard to go with the famous Don Burger I’d ordered in lieu of haggis.  The waitress came back with a slightly sheepish look on her face and apologised for the fact she hadn’t been able to find any.  “We’re running out of a lot stuff like that” she explained. “The restaurant is closing down on Monday”.  There is a God!

 

After being reassured by the waitress that she was quite happy to be looking for a new job we celebrated wildly and I only caught my train home by a whisker.  Then just before we arrived at Whittlesford I noticed an iPhone left on a seat across the carriage from me so I picked it up and took it home. Interesting story actually because its owner, bizarrely I thought, didn’t ring it.  As I contemplated how I could possibly reunite them in the absence of them contacting me I recalled an episode of Silent Witness in which Jack picks up an unknown victims phone, presses the home button and asks Siri whose phone it is.  I did just that.  Siri was essentially stomped unfortunately.  “Thank you Angela, that’s an interesting question” was the response.  So at least I knew the owner was called Angela.  This morning, still no call, but, although the phone was locked, various messages popped up on the home screen, including one from Strava suggesting she send kudos to someone, presumably a friend of hers.  Being a Strava “athlete” myself I searched the guys name, scrolled through his list of friends, and there was Angie So and So of Saffron Walden which is in our vicinity.  From that point all I needed to do was a cursory Google search and hey presto I had her work details, a firm of architects in the City, sent an email to reception, and, sorry about this, but you know how I like to tie my little stories together, Bob’s your father’s brother.  Angie and I are now bezza’s and the phone is wending its way, Special Delivery, to North Essex.  Really, no patting myself on the back for a good deed done.  Considering the number of times I’ve ( or more precisely the baby darlings ) been reunited with lost phones, this was pay back time.

 

Oh yes also this week I watched one of the most remarkable programmes I’ve seen in a very long time.  If you have Netflix you really must see this: 

 

Chef’s Table, Season 1, Episode 3. It is absolutely wonderful.

 

So all in all the most miserable week of the year has been quite good fun actually.  Still, glad it’s Friday.

Friday 12th January, 2018

Happy New Year to you and yours.  I’ve given up crisps for 2018.  What’s your New Year resolution?

 

Now I don’t want you to think we’re getting soft and tree huggerish, but there have already this year been some strange developments at home.

 

I hadn’t really thought so much of this particular story until I went to get a newspaper from the shop in the next door village last weekend.  “I hear your wife did a very brave thing the other day” Mike the store keeper ( who used to play for Spurs incidentally ) said to me.  I was a bit slow on the uptake, but fortunately he elaborated.  “Taking on the gypsies.  Next time tell her to ring me and I’ll help” he added, feigning boxing punches.  Ah. With ya.

 

Regardless of whether or not it was appropriate for Mike to use that word to describe the men who, two days earlier, had been careering over fields in a battered blue Volvo estate ( almost certainly stolen ) in hot pursuit of two dogs and a hare it was indeed the case that Sophie had interrupted her walk to ring the police and report them for trespass and illegal coursing. The Newmarket constabulary sprang into action with commendable speed.  Sad to say, however, three police cars and a helicopter, not to mention Sophie’s directions and on the ground intelligence, proved inadequate and the men nonchalantly evaded capture and drove off at some speed, no doubt on their way back to Essex, directly past Sophie who was standing at the side of a field and still on the phone to HQ.  The two gents in the back seat leaned out the window cursing at her roundly and promising dire reprisals.  Sophie doesn’t seem unduly worried thank you very much.  The irony of this story perhaps will not be lost on those of you who have read my emails over the years, but of course Bob was much younger than he is now and didn’t use a car.  Most of the time he spent crossing the very fields these guys were damaging he wasn’t even wearing shoes!

 

The other thing to report is that although, what with Bob and the pikeys, our house and surrounding fields couldn’t generally be considered the safest places for local wildlife we’ve set up a hedgehog sanctuary.  I know!  What are we like?!  It started when Bob and his girlfriend found a poor little baby one shivering under a car and in a very sorry state.  We tracked down a lady living just a few miles away who has a fully fledged rescue centre for the creatures.  She took the orphan under her care and named it Sophie.  It was touch and go, but she finally managed to get Sophie to take some liquid at about 2.00am ( some people are amazing aren’t they ) and the hedgehog was on the road to recovery. 

 

The centre is full to over-flowing however and so we decided we had better try to help.  It happens we have a couple of old pigsties so we spent a morning clearing them out of the useless clutter that had accumulated there and threw in a few piles of straw.  Hey presto…the perfect environment for a hibernating hedgehog.  We now have eight males in one shed and seven females in the other and there they will stay until spring comes along.  It involves a little more work than you might imagine though not that much really.  Water and food and mucking out their den.  That’s about it.  Which is fine because it’s not like you can bond with a hedgehog particularly.  They tuck themselves up, invisible under their bedding, and sleep all day.  At night-time if you put your head torch on, tip toe across the gravel and open the top part of the door quickly enough you will see them scuttling back into the corners which is kind of sweet.

 

But hey….is there someone in your family who is the gullible one?  Ours is Jimmy.  Living in London at the moment she asked after the hedgehogs on the family WhatsApp chat earlier this week.

 

“Are they happy?” she wrote. 

“Yup.  Partying like crazy every night.  Neighbours are complaining about the noise” one slightly impish group member replied.

 And we all just knew she would fall for it. 

“Really?  (worried concerned face)” came her immediate response. “What is the noise like?” 

 

Hook, line and sinker.  Maybe I’m being unfair.  If you too are unsure how noisy hedgehogs can be and have access to Youtube click on the link below, but be sure to have the volume turned down or you could seriously damage your hearing.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sgw-achKVM

 

 

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.