The Elite Blog

What you see is what you get!

9 June 2010

By Paul White

Just in case you were wondering, Stephanie Lunn of Lunn HR has not developed a stutter. Her N..N..Nineteen Referrals was a reference to Paul Hardcastle's 1985 hit "19", which was the average age of soldiers fighting in the Vietnam War. I just thought that I would point that out for the jounger members of the chapter.

Talking of which, Elizabeth Hicks of Irwin Mitchell Solicitors, with a mere s..s..sixteen years of experience as a Family Lawyer could not possibly be expected to have understood Stephanie's reference. Along with life's other two great certainties, I would like to add a third - that Elizabeth can be relied upon to do a stunning ten-minute set, including her hits "Resolution - extended dancemix", "Retain (professional objectivity and respect for everyone involved)" and the anthemic "open 'n' honest in all dealings", which had us all singing along.

From your countless emails, postcards and letters, there is a grass-roots movement for a Shakespearean theme for this Blog, so I will do my best/ with this request.

This reminds me of when I was in the "Scottish Play", when a character had the line "Forsooth, my Lord, I thought I saw a moving grove", where Birnam Wood appears to be advancing upon the castle at Dunsinane. The poor guy gave us all sorts of variations on this; moving grooves, grooving mauves and (my favourite) mauving grooves. It was quite psychedelic!

I played the part of Malcolm in that play, which leads me neatly onto Malcolm Forbes of Regenesys Web Designers. The Shakespearean phrase that he evokes is from Hamlet (III,1), "Oh, what a noble mind is here o'erthrown!" Malcolm is puzzled by his brief, namely to design a "Green Booking System" for a Golf Club. I contend that he is not being called upon to design an ecologically-aware computer system, but to provide an on-line booking system for the greens, so that thirty Golf Club Members do not all try to play on the same course at the same time.

A former Boss of mine used to quote "[That Play] Act II, Scene 5" a lot, when exasperated. What he was quoting was "I cannot do this bloody thing!", which I'm sure we've all felt at some point.

We had four Visitors today, with Peter from Glass Hairdressers returning to showcase his services. I really cannot see how a Brazilian Blow-dry would be a sizeable task and therefore a profitable one. The main issue would be positioning the stirrups, after which it's pretty much clean shaving.

Daniel J Fealy's (to me) surprising referral of his Kosovan friends to my Visitrix, Siobhan Cleary of Guava Productions shows that all sorts of weird synergies can arise at BNI, so one should not be backward in coming forward, nor pre-judge that a Plasterer could not possibly help a Documentary Producer. I've learnt a lot of stuff and some I have to re-learn!

I found common cause with Florence Lebrun of "The Laundry" not-for-profit recycling firm. I do a lot of recycling myself, mainly jokes. My own alias is Monsieur Leblanc, so we colours should stick together. Vive La France!
After the meeting, I was regaling her with an article I had seen, where the materials of a cracked and therefore defective motorcycle helmet lead to a nasty smell being produced, alerting the owner to obtain a new one. Sounds like a wind-up, but it's not: http://bit.ly/cD8u22

If anyone wishes to hear my version of Sonnet 138, "When my love swears that she is made of truth..", do approach me at the next meeting and register your interest. If we can get enough people together, I should be able to book the Albert Hall for the event.

"When shall we eight meet again?" was the question from Hel(en) Wakeman-Jones, our Events Co-ordinator and Party Planner. She was referring to the now infamous gathering of the eight female Chapter Members for an "Eight-To-One". With the chandeliers still in a state of disrepair from the last one, the number of Wine Bars willing to host such an event in the London area is dwindling rapidly.

With the sad departure of Adrian Nettleship, our Photographer, a vacancy has arisen for Deputy Under-Assistant Trainee Visitor Host, which Stephanie has asked me to occupy. After my illustrious predecessor, it will be a hard act to follow, but I will give it my best shot. It reminds me of the Salad Days, when I had the same role under Elizabeth Hicks. Ah, what glorious memories!

Who won the "Silver Tongue" this week for Best Sixty Second Pitch? We all did, apparently, so well done everyone! I still took it home, as I reckon that I have every right to.

Nice use of Apophasis, Steph! This is a rhetorical device, where the Speaker claims not to raise an issue, while the result in "not mentioning" it, actually leads to it being mentioned. Therefore, I look forward not to being called the "Thinking Woman's Crumpet" again. Doh!
Vivat, Crescat, Floreat!

Permalink: http://www.bni-elite.co.uk/BNIBlog9thJune2010 (copy'n'paste)

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