The Elite Blog

I can see clearly now the rain has gone.

19 March 2010

By Paul White

Cead Mille Failte! ("You're barred" in Irish.) A hundred thousand welcomes to all on St Patrick's Day upon our regular Wednesday Morning Breakfast Club, where we refer business to each other. It works, as I can write that we passed fourteen sizzling, hot-to-trot referrals this morning.

If you do Crosswords, one answer that always appears to the question "archaic word for Gaelic" is "Erse", which my wife (from Tipperary) steadfastly maintains is baloney. As in many other matters, I must accept that she is correct.

When I walked into the room this morning, I thought that I had got the wrong place. People were standing around in Comedy Irish Hats, some of which had blinking lights. Barry Neil of Ambient Computers Ltd demonstrated his technical wizardry by knowing how to activate this facility.

What's it called when you can remember something completely obvious, like your Company's name? It's on the tip of my tongue. Wait a minute and it will come to me. Ooh yes, a "memory lapse". Whatshisname from Thingummy suffered from this condition this morning and my heart goes out to him.

This reminds me of when I was going out with a girl at College and I just could not remember her name for the life of me. I could hardly go round asking people what her name was, after she had agreed to go out with me. We arrived at the East India Club, which has the advantage of Visitors having to sign in. At the door, disaster struck! We both ran into my former Schoolmate called Eddie Hutt and she was very miffed not to be introduced to him. She was onto me and shielded her name, as she wrote  it down. Curses!

As the previous engagement had been at the Cumberland Hotel, where she was the only female present, as none of the other twenty male-only Hall of Residence attendees had thought of bringing a girl along.

The final nail in my coffin, as far as Bethlee Jones and I were concerned, was an outing to the theatre. In addition to my buying a seat directly behind a pillar, I also had the worst (and only) nosebleed of my life during the play. She was rightly not very impressed with me.

I certainly had some terribly bad luck with her. This reminds me of what Napoleon once said: "yes, I know that marshal ney is a good general, but is he lucky?"

Due to Marion Broomes of Keys2Finance during the Education Slot stating that Walking Around While Talking (WAWT) was my Trademark, I decided to ring the changes this week by not walking around while talking. I stayed put and the results were dramatic. Helen Wakeman-Jones, our Events Organiser (both professionally and for the Chapter) entrusted Kathryn Jones into my Will Writing hands and I hope to God that Kathryn is no relation of Bethlee's and does not hail from the Tredegar area of the Principality!

I must make a private apology (as no-one ever reads this) to Dexter Coles of SP Litho, for suggesting that I hooked up Liz Emtage of Emtage Ceramic Design, as I circulated an email stating her eagerness to attend our Chapter. I am perfectly happy to acknowledge that Dexter met Liz independently at Toastmasters and apologise for any inconvenience caused. A donation has been made to a Charity on Dexter's behalf.

Sod's Law is "if anything can go wrong, it will". Do you know what "Coles' Law" is? That's right. Thinly sliced cabbage.

Elizabeth Hicks' of Irwin Mitchell Solicitors is always a delight to meet on Wednesday mornings, even through sleepy-dust encrusted eyes. Despite having the "Court Case of my life" on at the moment, she was her usual charming self. I always find her a breath of perfumed air at meetings. Of course, having an army of maids, servants and flunkeys at home does help!

We once had a Brazilian Maid, but we had to let her go, as she never used to hoover down the middle of the carpet. for some reason.

And may you be in heaven half an hour before the devil knows you're dead.

Vivat, Crescat, Floreat!

Permalink: http://www.bni-elite.co.uk/BNIStPatricksDay (copy'n'paste)

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