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See all posts for April2017

Listen to Einstein. May I present the all in one shredder, vacuum cleaner and sprinkler system...

  • April 28, 2017
  • Animals/Pets Kids/Family/Relations Life
  • View all 2 Comments
Why...

Do we do not listen to Uncle Albert. "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and to expect different results". Why do I think every puppy will be different? We have a new French bulldog (Clouseau). His capacity to munch his way through anything made from rubber to industrial grade titanium is remarkable. Today he managed to eat a handful of coffee beans, a mobile phone, a tax return and then chew up an entire ream of paper (500 pages). Obviously he did not consume the lot, but rather like a fox in a henhouse, managed to damage each page enough so it could no longer go in the printer, whilst actually only ingesting two sheets. He has developed a taste for the left ear of one of his elder brother pugs and my right leg is sexier than Beyoncé with a bark. He has an uncanny knack of knowing when I have just fallen asleep so his nip to a big toe wakes me up. I get mad, he looks at me with those big cow eyes.....then pees in a slipper. I have no doubt he would relish anthrax on toast and he still cannot understand why I stopped him chewing on a snail as if it was a gobstopper........ Groundhog Day. It happens every time we get a puppy. It should be no surprise....

..and another thing (continue to read this post)

Rare is only good for beef...

  • April 21, 2017
  • Entertainment/Media/Arts Life Technology
  • View all 0 Comments
Why...

Do we collect rare things that need repairing? I suppose my wife is blessed that outside of her all our family and close friends, the only thing that floats my boat are classic cars. Expensive but a snip compared to yachts, a string of polo ponies (or mistresses) let alone a drug addiction that would trouble the resources of Pfizer. However I soft soap all this malarkey by saying that these cars have proved great investments. The truth is however if I added up all the money I have lost by selling cars too early and instead had kept them in the garage, my caviar pot would be so deep a soup ladle could not reach the bottom! A baboon could have made money in classic cars over the last decade as the market just shifted. If you had owned a car you bought in 2008 for £150,000 it could easily be worth £1.5m now without lifting a finger ...except you do have to look after it. And this is when 'rare' bites you firmly in the butt. If you own a Renoir sculpture, an 1851 Franklin stamp or even a Disney cell from Steamboat Willie you have to look after it but not repair it. Much of the upside of owning something that is rare evaporates when it is mechanical and you find the grobulator needs replacing or the elegiac couplet is worn out. Tiny bits of metal take on a value as if made from kryptonite and suddenly an engine rebuild on your rare Maserati requires a second mortgage (or third if you used the second to pay for the darn car). The sucking of teeth when I ask a builder how much a bit of point work will run me is nothing compared to the shaking of heads and look of pity were I to need a new handbrake for a 'Duesy SSJ' or even a gear knob for an Alfa Montreal. Remember that ten fold increase in the price of the car? Well the parts prices will have shot up at the same rate!  A nut and bolt have to be weighed out on jewellers scales. Luckily technology, if not originality, has come riding over the hill like the 7th Cavalry. 3D Printers. Forget worrying if these machines are able to whip up an ICBM for Kim Jung Un or a fancy set of shoe lifts for the small but perfectly formed President Putin; what really matters is in a few moments this machine can make a window winder for a 58 Corvette! Yup suddenly the cost of making a spare part at last is on nodding terms to the price it sells for.

..and another thing (continue to read this post)

Did you suffer a Red Arrows moment today?

  • April 14, 2017
  • Uncategorised
  • View all 0 Comments
Why...

Do I still go to meetings that are gibberish and the jargon used means the conversation shoots right over my head......like The Red Arrows? A few years ago I was a partner of a consortium that bought a media group for US $ 250 million. Not exactly chump change but to some of the bankers involved this was really very small beer. However we were asked to produce endless permutations of business plans that seemed to cover every scenario from the precipitous decline in demand for TV movies in one particular territory right up to the consequences of a global outbreak of bubonic plague. Each version required the deforestation of a sizeable chunk of the Amazon rain forest as we were required to pour over these new numbers on paper. To me this careful scrutiny felt like I was inspecting the entrails of a chicken that had been sacrificed to foretell the future. (The chicken would have proved about as useful and a lot quicker). These endless sessions were liberally sprinkled with words like EBITDA, subordinated debt, super subordinated debt, coupons, debt equity swaps and probably Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. Whilst of course you need a business plan as a starting point that is all it is. A justification that allows someone else to lend you more money due to a good idea being backed with some logical numbers. I started to fantasize with my own permutations... "If Mark has twice as many bullets as Banker B and banker B has six times less bullets than Banker C who has a hundred bullets, how many bullets can we all shoot into Banker D?" In reality though these endless permutations are a get out of jail card for the bankers... They can at least bleat to their boss that if Nobbynomates.com, a brilliant site for people with halitosis does not quite take off as envisaged, they looked at every eventuality. "Well Mr. Countdacost I regret to tell you that because of this failure your bonus this year is only a zillion $ rather than a gabillion $." I am no wizard but I am always amazed at the amount of time spent looking at numbers rather than the business itself. I suspect out of 100 companies that survive their first year of trading 99% end up with a business plan that is not even on nodding terms with the one in their prospectus! If bankers are so obsessed with numbers they should only get a decent bonus if the actual numbers after year one correspond with those in the plan! If the business is a success but with totally different numbers, they should not be rewarded for the utter misery they put entrepreneurs through!

..and another thing (continue to read this post)

What is rss? "rss" is about getting live web feeds
directly to your computer.