social whirl

Well after  M and J the other night, we went to dinner with friends G and J in Oxford last night. The diary page in the Daily Mail will be full of it this morning. What a mad social life we now lead. It was great to catch up with them and they were very kind too.  Top friends. Now if only J will check into his e-mails this morning and check out the ‘Little Bird Told Me’ message from me, then my exciting new ‘what you really want’ service is off and running for Xmas. Come on J, the fate of a whole new industry rests in your hands. No pressure then…
pp

Advertisement

nov’s over

Well that’s nearly November over. Interesting month; C’s mum Isobel passed away towards the end of last month and we scattered some of her ashes and interred the rest just recently. Had my 55th bithday. Where on earth is time slipping away? Still no news from the bank re the UK house sale. Hey ho. C&I made a flying visit to our home in Italy and harvested the olives and got the oil processed and pruned half the trees. Loved that, molto bene. Our main car’s engine packed up as did our cooker element on the rayburn just yesterday. Deep joy. England lost out in the Euro 2008 qualifications but I picked up two major clients in football and cricket for my sponsorship consultancy. Didn’t see enough of my family nor friends but had lovely meal with C&K and looking forward to seeing L&S tonight and G&M, J&D and M&J shortly. Life could be a lot worse.

saturday; tough and redeeming

On Saturday we drove up to the Lakes to go and sort out Isobel’s effects. C’s brother was there and his wife L. For C and her brother it was a tough day. They weren’t much good at the clearing/sorting out . Understandably they spent most of the time going through the old photos and very personal items,  very slowly and reminiscing.  A caught a few tears between them on the day. For L and I it was easier naturally and we were able to make great head-way sorting out the stuff into various piles for disposal, sell-on whilst C and C did the allocations around the two families etc.  C’s sister has still to have a look through so there’s a little more work to do but I think C’s brother and L can handle from here on.

It was sad and poignant to realise that we may not visit the home of C’s parents again. We checked out George’s nearby grave and C and her brother had some tender moments together before we left. I know Carol was saddened on the way home but we chit chatted about life and stuff and it was a glorious weather day so the driving was ok. In fact C did most of it and I’m sure it helped take her mind off things.

That night we had previously arranged some of our old friends M and J. They came to our place and took us out for dinner and we had a great time. It was just the tonic we needed, especially C. They really are good friends, and know what we are going through at the moment, having been there themselves. Just talking things through is often a great help and we cannot thank them enough for their generosity. True friends.

pp

good week, woo hoo

Well I don’t want to tempt fate but so far it’s been an excellent week or so. My consultancy seems to be going from strength to strength: with 4-5 major sports/arts venues now talking to us (my great friends at Knapp Goodwin and I) about our ideas to renovate stadia etc and bring in new revenue streams. Our sponsorship work via my great associates at Sponsorfinder is really kicking off with several new high-level clients established from the worlds of sport, the arts, publishing and events. It’s taken a year to get this rolling but it feels like the tide is definitely turning. There’s always a cloud though and two good sets of friends of ours who have been based in the States for over 10 years have both been in contact within the last week to say that the American dream has probably run its course for them. The upside is that in both cases we may just see them join us in search of la dolce vita in Italy. How good would that be? Molto bene!

pp

no-one likes us; we don’t care

Well we just had two days over in the Gower peninsula at the wedding of Nathan and Suzanne, daughter to some of our oldest friends Lynne and Phil who we knew from University. It’s long time since those way off days in way off Aberystwyth. Phil and I played for the Uni team and Lynne and C were ever-present supporters on the sidelines. Happy days.

socialising and radio 4

Quite an odd combo you might think. But bear with me. Having been living like hermits for the last few months we’ve suddenly been surprisingly active on the social scene. It’s not likely to trouble the diary pages of the Daily Mail but for us it’s been quite diverting, having hardly seen a soul in ages, outside of the family of course.