"We will open the book. Its pages are blank. We are going to put words on them ourselves. The book is called Opportunity and its first chapter is New Year's Day."
- An apt quote as we commence 2013. 

You are cordially invited

to the State visit of the President of Indonesia comprising of the firing of a 61 gun salute at the Tower of London.

Please aim to arrive around 11.30 at Finsbury Barracks on City Road from where you will be transporting in the Regimental Mini Bus with a police escort to the tower. The guns will be setup and fired at 13.00hrs and we will then proceed to dine in 'Armoury House'.

Ladies are expected to be attired in smart dress and a warm coat and scarf is recommended. You will be issued with ear defenders to reduce the noise.

Good News

The Strident Student finally got her wish and has managed to secure a placement with the Department For International Development doing Aid/Charity work next summer in either Kenya, Sierra Leone or Somalia. It might not be most people's cup of tea but she's dead chuffed as it's part of her master plan. Until then she's slogging away at the Law conversion course and still hoping one day to make it to the realms of Advocacy.

Ms. Sensible completed and submitted her UCAS application and was rewarded with a conditional offer from Bath to study Natural Sciences so can now study in the knowledge that if she can get the grades she has a place at one of her chosen academic institutions :o)

Could this be a chink of light

Following the submission of a paper to the Board about the shopping list of issues which need to be tackled in order to make the function more effective it would seem I may have gained some recognition that someone needs to get a grip and address the situation. In the normal way of working, I have heard this anecdotally from a Board member but now need to be officially informed of approval to progress in the form of a 'Decision Sheet'... There was me thinking I had left the Civil Service in July 2001....

Another new stamp for the passport

Qatar! The landscape of which reminded me of the scene in 'Star Wars' when the X-wing fighters are dog-fighting.

I won't bore you with the work politics, nor whinge about the lack of progress.... suffice to say I did a whistle-stop tour of Dubai, Abu Dhabi, & Doha!!! The highlight of the trip was undoubtedly socialising with a few folk I rarely see. I managed to catch up with a few of the security crew and had an excellent but fairly messy night with the Sales team catching up on all the gossip, followed by a somewhat more civilised evening with Mr. & Mrs. Munro culminating with a bit of tourism watching the Dubai Fountain play to Lou Reed 'Walk on the wild side'.

I'm finding this job a real struggle at times. The politics and lack of coherence in the business makes it feel pretty un-do-able. No one has complained about what I'm doing, and I think that they do recognise the issues to some extent...Maybe it's just me beating myself up that I am not making enough progress, but if I was paying my salary to someone I'd expect more. This is my twelfth week so just a couple of weeks til the end of my probation, but after a phone call with one of the senior bods in the Middle East the backdrop has changed as they are seriously considering an external supplier to provide recruitment services to the Region which is potentially yet another barrier to getting anything done effectively.

Suffering from post sales marketing fatigue

due to spending a couple of hours with Linkedin and the retained advertising agency. I sooo hate sales pitches. I know what I want (don't I always ;o) and don't need all the spin or subtle pressuring. It was very interesting though... you can see the footprint of who has been looking at whom in finite detail, which really highlighted how much you can discover about someone on the net if you just put your mind to it.... Slightly scary stuff