SPAg blog

NELLIE IN HER LIMO.....

Lounging like a pro on her journey to the office!

MONDAY RUNNING STARTS AGAIN............

Apart from an unacceptable number of pathetic excuses: I forgot my new trainers, I think I've got malaria, the cat ate my homework.....!

The hardy amongst us set off (without Terry as he was late!) down Bermondsey Street, across to the Thames embankment, along to Blackfriars Bridge, up Borough High Street and then via the dimly lit backstreets before hitting the tarmac of Leathermarket Street. 

Brilliant effort by all the 'virgin' athletes - we'll make marathon runners out of them, you'll see!

 

ME IN CANNES FROM SARAH BRANQUINHO AT THE WORLD DUTY FREE CONFERENCE - IT'S A TOUGHLIFE, BUT SOMEONE DRAWS THE SHORT STRAW!

 

SHAME ABOUT THE THUMB PRINT! 

POPPYMAN

Poppyman is currently residing in our reception!  A pretty splendid lifesize model of a man made entirely from poppies who will be appearing at various functions between now and Armistice Day to support the national appeal for the British Legion - a wonderful client we work with every year at this time.

There are still a few gaps in his diary, so any requests for a personal appearance maybe workable.  Call Niki or her team if you have any ideas.....................!

SHE'S BACK!

The wanderer has returned.  Niki is back from her big adventure in Ecuador having braved tropical storms, angry militia and plate-sized tarantulas.  And all she has to show for it is a scarlet hooter and two bites on her bottom (and, no, we didn't enquire too closely!) But good to have you back!

(There should be a picture to go with this but new camera has died!!)

NELLIE'S LATEST (LAMP) POST

Morning all!  Reporting for duty with a stiff gait on account of being very active yesterday in Battersea Park. 

The boss is getting smart, I’ll give her that!  Now she takes two balls and the catapault ball launcher with her when we go walkies.  It has taken her a while to cotton on to the fact that she was never going to bowl for England and if she aimed for something she missed and if she didn’t it would be bullseye where it was least wanted ie like the frisbee straight into the baby’s pram – that created a right old furore! 

Anyway, now with her gadget she can fling the ball almost into the next county and I can tear off after it.  But when I return she is already swinging her arm ready to hurl the next one.  So instead of the unequal tussle we usually have when I won’t let go on the ball in my mouth she now knows that the sight of another ball skyward causes involuntary jaw-slack in me and off I go empty mouthed to do my retrieving.  There is only one slight flaw in this routine – it makes me damn tired in half the time.  Add in a bit of showing off on my part – back and forth over the park railings into the flowerbeds – and I am truly cream crackered.  No wonder the old back is playing up.

Still, only to be expected.  Have been lying stretched out in a sunbeam muttering to myself in my sleep, probably reminiscing about the early stroll round the Duke of York Square in Chelsea when I got to run on the gravel.  Strange thing – gravel – put me down on gravel and I may only just have been in the garden (you know what I mean!) but I immediately have to go again.  And she is never expecting it!  No bag in her pocket (how many times must she be told?) and two security guards watching, laughing and waiting to cause trouble if she tried to pretend it hadn’t happened.  In the end she cadged a paper bag off Patisserie Valerie – rather her than me!!

GOODBYE AND AU REVOIRS

Another beautiful morning. 

So Alia has headed off to India for her hols including a pilgrimage to the Ganges and Doo-dah has gone back to Yorkshire for some home comforts - how will we all manage for the next few weeks?

And Vic leaves today for greener pastures - she will be missed.  The measure of someone's worth is often in the way they conduct themselves during a notice period and Vic has been brilliant.  Best wishes and good luck at Peretti Communications - Francoise Peretti being an old friend and ex-SPA person - so really she is staying in the family.

Helen survived the run yesterday and then put me to shame by doing 15 lengths in the pool (I hate swimming, so no competition there!) 

Well done to Charlotte's mum for being named Fund Raiser of the Year for the British Legion at their awards ceremony yesterday for her bike ride to Paris.  By coincidence the event took place at the Union Jack Club where I had been an hour earlier in advance of our pitch on Monday.  But my day didn't end well as I over ran my meter by 14 minutes and the good burghers of Lambeth towed the motor to the Millwall pound - actually that should be 'poundS' - £240 of them!  Grrrrr.

BEAUTIFUL MORNING...........

Unfortunately Helen and I have had to spend the last 24 hours at Champneys in Tring plotting projections for 2008 - it's a tough world!

However, in case anyone is tempted to think we have only been indulging ourselves, well we did before dinner last night.  We had a body scrub and massage, so not only have we smoothed out all things financial but we shall be slipping out of our own beds when we get home!

Helen tried very hard to avoid the all important company run this morning by not bringing her trainers.  Sadly for her it was possible to buy a pair in the resort's shop so there's no hiding place and we are about to take ourselves off to do some serious panting in the mellow mists of a beautiful Hertfordshire countryside morning.

Still all good things must come to an end so after another couple of hours hunched over the laptop we will be returning to London.

The cats are on the way back!

Update from the Director of Security

Morning all!  Am treading a little tenderly this morning having been newly diagnosed with early arthritis in the rear end. I attended, in the course of my duties as Head of Security and Director of HR, the company ramble on Saturday.

Gazooks, how lazy are some people?!  There I was up and down the hillside checking out the minefields and other natural hazards all the while my staff were having a casual wander and chat.  Don't they know this would never be allowed in the Forces - thank heavens that I never slack in my duties.

In spite of the pesky arthritis, I am pretty damn fit after doing my usual three mile early morning run every other morning with the company CEO.  But why or why does she insist on taunting me by making me endure the squirrel infested landscape of Kensington Gardens (I will get one some day!) but I do get my own back - one poop and scoop is always factored in, but never the follow up.  Ah... The fun I have watching her try and poop a scoop with a tissue or a couple of leaves because she only thought to bring one plastic bag!

Still, can't hang around chatting - work to do.  Must take up my sentry position on the landing and keep a look out on the park.

CRISIS CONTROLLER - CHECKOUT MAGAZINE - OCTOBER 2007

OCTOBER'S CRISIS COLUMN

It is funny how even writing this column can take on a life of its own. The odd reader or two may recall that last month I wrote about the devastating impact of the then, newly confirmed, outbreak of foot and mouth disease. Unfortunately, in the course of the intervening week the second outbreak was reported just as most restrictions had been lifted.

My two main messages last month in that column were that we must all – retailers and consumers alike – pull together to preserve the good name of British beef and was it not high time that a proper vaccination programme was instigated to ensure death and destruction on that scale would never again cast its shadow our farming herds.

As I was writing it I was suddenly struck by the fact that I could and should actually do something to help and not simply sit on the sidelines. My PR agency represents many of the best food producers and food retailers in the UK and several of my colleagues, like me, are of farming stock. Consequently we understand and feel deeply about farming crises. I had been particularly struck by the TV images of a heartbroken farmer about to assist in the decimation of his much loved herd and in the same segment a local villager lamenting the cost to that farmer of his hard earned reputation for excellence now lost forever.

I have often written in this column about the way it is possible to crisis manage and recover reputations in even the most dire of circumstances, surely then it was possible to offer to achieve this, pro bono, for the farmers in question. Thus a letter from me led to a meeting in the same farm yard that only weeks earlier had posted such terrible images and there I met a father and his son and their wives – whose dignity and integrity shone through.

Not for them self pity or undue focus on the financial compensation no doubt due to them but a commitment to pick up the pieces and get back to the rhythm of life they had always known. I was astonished at their fortitude and the fact the farm shop was reopening within six weeks of the crisis erupting. What we could contribute was the right sort of media attention and by the time this column appears I am confident many people will have seen and heard on TV and radio or read in the newspapers or the farming press the good news that they are back in business.

The other thing that I learned, which just goes to show how wrong the layman can be, is that vaccination is not the answer. Our worldwide reputation for excellence in our British beef is because no strain of foot and mouth, even through vaccine, is ever present in our stock which is why the British beef gene pool is so respected and valued. So in spite of the terrible trauma of the cull of their herd, the Surrey farmers still believe it was the right thing to do.

Sara Pearson