… there were times when I thought the business wouldn’t be ready to start trading on 1 October 1994. But of course we were able to open our sole door, to our sole room in Garrard House, 31-45 Gresham Street, on that prescribed day. No death in a ditch for me.
Click and look at the images for that address and you will see a grand City building, opposite Wax Chandler’s Hall, which at the time of writing has been home to Schroders plc for decades.
In the autumn of 1994, though, it was an old 1930’s building, in a state of some distress, which was about to be emptied for the purposes of a massive makeover for Schroders.
There were just five of us on the payroll that first autumn; Kate Carty, me, Stuart Otter, Steve Taylor and John Thompson. Michael Mainelli was with us, in spirit and informally, but technically Michael was unable to join the firm until February 1995.
Kate Carty got something akin to cabin fever in those early months, as so few of us went nigh nor by the place. Yet somehow Kate and Steve got it together during that early period of Z/Yen’s life, such that our tiny business of just six people; the other four of whom were attached, managed to yield an office romance and then marriage which, like Z/Yen, has endured to this day (as I write 25 years later).
Kate (standing) with Elisabeth and MichaelSteve
One abiding memory from that room is the day in early December when we needed to splurge on getting our first year’s Christmas cards out. We thought this to be a very important marketing campaign…
…in truth the Christmas cards was our only marketing campaign for the first year or so of our existence.
A rare occasion when several of us were in the room at the same time; me, Kate and John Thompson.
In the early days of a business, everyone needs to muck in for all tasks, including stuffing envelopes and labelling up Christmas cards…
…but John Thompson seemed a little reluctant for such menial tasks.
I said:
I must be the highest paid envelope-stuffer in the City right now.
John, a competitive fellow who was being paid considerably more than me at that time, immediately jumped up and exclaimed,
No, I am the highest paid envelope-stuffer in the City.
In the annals of accountancy folk lore, 9 November 1994 will forever be an historic day, not that you would easily find a reference to it on-line…
…until now.
For that evening in 1994 was the very first Accountancy Age Awards, now operated as a separate venture by the looks of it and/or rebranded as the British Accountancy Awards.
And I was there.
Not just there, I was an honoured guest. For I had been one of the judges on one of the panels for that very first year of the Accountancy Awards. I had been on the judging panel for accounting systems, no less. Selected for the role while I still worked for Binder Hamlyn, although I had left to form Z/Yen in the meantime. Accountancy Age were told about the move but didn’t mind. Nor did Binders.
A few weeks or months earlier, while still at Binders.
According to my 1994 diary, I spent the afternoon of 13 September 1994 at the Accountancy Age offices. During those few hours, I and the rest of the panel “examined” several systems, to decide which were worthy of awards. You can imagine just how methodical and scientific that judging process must have been.
It was my first experience on an awards judging panel and I learnt a lot that afternoon to stand me in good stead since, whenever I have subsequently sat on (or in some cases chaired) such panels… mostly I learnt how NOT to judge awards from the Accountancy Awards experience.
But on awards night itself the judging was all behind me. My hard work was done. My black tie outfit was donned. I think I might have still been hiring black tie gear back then. It looks from my diary as though I worked from home that day, thus avoiding the worst excesses of “black tie day misery”: lugging clobber around all day, knowing you’ll have to change into that tux in some smelly bog, early evening. Or, in many ways worse, wandering around town all day in black tie, explaining to each client in the morning and afternoon meetings that you are so darned busy with back-to-back meetings that you are already dressed for a pompous evening do.
I have two lingering but fitful memories from the evening. The first relates to Bob Monkhouse, who hosted the show. I remember discovering that Debbie Barham was writing gags for Bob Monkhouse when he did this kind of gig, by mentioning this event to Debbie at a NewsRevue writers meeting. Debbie was a young, supremely talented comedy writer, whose subsequent tragic story was posthumously written by her dad in this book – click here.
I cannot remember whether Debbie and I had that conversation about Bob before or after the event itself. I do remember that, once we’d had that conversation, I’d get occasional e-mails from Debbie (she, like me, was a relatively early e-mail adopter) asking me for background information, buzz phrases or just something for her to latch onto when she was writing patter for similar commercial events, usually for Monkhouse or another serial awards offender, such as Ned Sherrin or Rory Bremner. Little did I know at that time how obsessive Debbie’s work habits would become and how tragically her situation would end.
But on the Accountancy Awards evening itself, I recall finding Bob Monkhouse’s jokes rather predictable but very professionally served. As was the food.
My second memory relates to George Littlejohn. By good chance, I was placed next to George. He was also an honoured guest, in his case in the capacity of a former editor of Accountancy Age magazine. George had subsequently moved on to bigger and better things; yes that really is possible.
George is a most interesting chap with a very good sense of humour. The latter came in especially handy that evening. There is always something incongruous/pompous about awards ceremonies done “Oscars-style” for matters less glamorous and more mundane than the Oscars. Accountancy Awards, for example, are, in my opinion, just a tad less glamorous and a smidgen more mundane than Oscars.
Perhaps George Littlejohn remembers the evening differently; if so, I hope he chimes in with a comment or three. We’ve kept in touch all these years, our business interests overlapping occasionally, but in any case we always enjoy meeting up. I occasionally run into George at cultural events, as indeed I did on New Years Day 2017 at the Curzon Bloomsbury – click here – which triggered me to write up this 1994 event now.
I particularly recall the last award, Accountant of the Year, being delivered with extreme fanfare, won by a big-haired young woman. Her excellence as an accountant I couldn’t possibly question, but it seemed (to us at least) that she had primarily been chosen for the award because she would utterly look the part in the press photos. In any event, she rapidly got busy, kissing Bob Monkhouse spontaneously, looking elatedly happy and supremely excited about it all. Meanwhile, the flash guns went on firing and the thumping music went on blaring. George and I couldn’t stop giggling for quite some while.
Still, the event must have been a great success – it is still being held every year, at the same venue I believe – for sure it was again at The Brewery, Chiswell Street in 2016. The event even has its own website and strap line – click here.
So perhaps it’s no surprise that there is no record on-line from the 1994 event; who needs it? As another great George, Santayana in this case, succinctly put it:
Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.
Seeing these documents made me laugh. In the first few weeks of establishing The Z/Yen Group, while we waited for incorporation documents to come through, we traded as me personally, then assigned the business to the corporation.
Rather unexpectedly, we sold so much business during those few weeks, I had to register for VAT in my own name for six months.
I wanted to make sure everything was above board, so I put absolutely all income through as VATable business, including my NewsRevue income.
I don’t suppose Harriet Quirk saw much in the way of writers’ VAT invoices, not that she really needed to do anything with them because it seems I sent them retrospectively on receipt of the dosh and just wore the VAT charge myself.
What a trooper.
Spot the royalty values going down in those early weeks/months of the new business – I guess I was concentrating on matters other than comedy too much.
INVOICE – FILE COPY
VAT REG NO GB 646 1995 04
FAO Harriet Quirk Date: 12 October 1994
News Revue Tax point: 1 October 1994
Canal Cafe Theatre
Delamere Terrace
London
W2
INVOICE TO: News Revue
ACCOUNT REF: NR01
INVOICE NO: 02005
In respect of songs and sundry patter for the News Revue show (known as Edinburgh run) during August 1994.
£
ROYALTIES 45.96
VAT @ 17.5% 8.04
————-
TOTAL £54.00
========
This amount has been received, with thanks.
INVOICE – FILE COPY
VAT REG NO GB 646 1995 04
FAO Harriet Quirk Date: 24 October 1994
News Revue Tax point: 24 October 1994
Canal Cafe Theatre
Delamere Terrace
London
W2
INVOICE TO: News Revue
ACCOUNT REF: NR01
INVOICE NO: 02006
In respect of songs and sundry patter for the News Revue show (known as Alex’s run) during early Autumn 1994.
£
ROYALTIES 32.34
VAT @ 17.5% 5.66
————-
TOTAL £38.00
========
This amount has been received, with thanks.
INVOICE – FILE COPY
VAT REG NO GB 646 1995 04
FAO Harriet Quirk Date: 21 November 1994
News Revue Tax point: 21 November 1994
Canal Cafe Theatre
Delamere Terrace
London
W2
INVOICE TO: News Revue
ACCOUNT REF: NR01
INVOICE NO: 02007
In respect of songs and sundry patter for the News Revue show (known as Kerry’s run) during Autumn 1994.
£
ROYALTIES 43.58
VAT @ 17.5% 7.62
————-
TOTAL £51.20
========
This amount has been received, with thanks.
INVOICE – FILE COPY
VAT REG NO GB 646 1995 04
FAO Harriet Quirk Date: 9 January 1995
News Revue Tax point: 9 January 1995
Canal Cafe Theatre
Delamere Terrace
London
W2
INVOICE TO: News Revue
ACCOUNT REF: NR01
INVOICE NO: 02009
In respect of songs and sundry patter for the News Revue show (known as Robert’s run) end 1994.
£
ROYALTIES 15.49
VAT @ 17.5% 2.71
————-
TOTAL £18.20
========
This amount has been received, with thanks.
There was one more VAT invoice for NewsRevue in quarter one of 1995, before I deregistered from the VAT regime and never had to invoice NewsRevue again:
INVOICE – FILE COPY
VAT REG NO GB 646 1995 04
FAO Harriet Quirk Date: 14 March 1995
News Revue Tax point: 14 March 1995
Canal Cafe Theatre
Delamere Terrace
London
W2
INVOICE TO: News Revue
ACCOUNT REF: NR01
INVOICE NO: 02011
In respect of songs and sundry patter for the News Revue show (known as Christmas run) end 1994 and early 1995.
£
ROYALTIES 9.60
VAT @ 17.5% 1.68
————-
TOTAL £11.28
========
This amount has been received, with thanks.
I left BDO at the beginning of August with a view to most of
the others joining at the start of October 1994. Michael was not permitted to
join until early 1995. So for seven or eight weeks, I was technically on my own,
setting up Z/Yen.
In Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy, there is a story about Golgafrinchans, a race of humanoid beings on another planet, who were the true ancestors of humanity. The Golgafrinchans divided their society into three distinct groups; thinkers, doers and middle-folk, the latter group of which were deemed useless and so were launched off into space, purportedly to be the advance party for a relocation of the entire society, but in reality to enable the thinkers and doers to stay put and thrive on their own planet.
Now I like to think of myself as part thinker, part doer,
but there were times during that late summer when I wondered whether I has been
launched as a Golgafrinchan-style advance party.
Not that I was entirely on my own. My diary shows an evening session with Michael on 9 August, which resulted in a massive “to do” list for establishing Z/Yen, “Z/Yen Notes”, available for inspection here.
In addition to the tasks on that list, I wrote an initial business plan, also available for inspection here. I also finished off several client assignments on an associate basis after leaving the old firm. My diary for those weeks looks ridiculous – it was a ludicrously busy time.
Example of a ludicrously busy week
It was hard to get businesses started in those days. It was
impossible to find premises without 12 months or more trading record, but how
were we supposed to get a trading record without space. Thank you, Nick
Pickering of Rochester Partnership for helping us with space for that early
part of Z/Yen’s life.
It was a similar “Catch 22” with start-up business finance in those days. Michael, Elisabeth, Janie and I took Z/Yen’s initial business plan to the South of France late August – we had to pitch it to our prospective external investors at Eli Wallitt’s villa in Saint-Cézaire-sur-Siagne, near Grasse.
Grasse rooftops
We all stayed in Nice at the Hotel Windsor. My financial records show that we ate one night at Le Farniente, which is still there 25 years later. We also ate at a place named Au Bistroquet which is harder to track down now.
I especially recall the convoy drive up to Saint-Cézaire; Michael and Janie had very different ideas on driving speeds on unfamiliar mountain roads in little hired cars from Avis; I expect it looked like a latter-day version of the car chase scenes in Monte Carlo or Bust!
OK, in truth these photos are of my parents’ visit to that same Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur part, in 1958.
That initial financing arrangement did not end at all well, but that debacle came later – part of Z/Yen’s Book of Exodus – whereas this promordyall chronique is Z/Yen’s book of Genesis.
I did still find time for writing some silly stuff. There was a leaving do for several people on 30 August at Corney and Barrow. In fact, I think, technically, that was my leaving do as well. I’d had an informal, smaller gathering of friends at the same venue on 12 August at my own expense, but I think the 30 August thing was laid on by the firm. I produced a handout for the evening, which I think went down well.
I do also recall around that time some farcical conversations with the Companies House people, who struggled to register our little group of companies because different departments, that didn’t speak with each other, dealt with holding companies and subsidiary companies. The holding companies got bounced because they didn’t have subsidiaries, while the subsidiaries got registered to (at the time) non-existent holding companies. Technically speaking, this might mean that Z/Yen has never has existed at all; an intriguing thought.
At several
points, I thought the business wouldn’t be ready to start trading on 1 October
1994, but of course we were able to open our doors (or I should say one door, for
one room in Gresham Street) that day.
I wrote the quoted pieces below for sharing at a leaving do for several BDO Consulting folk who were leaving BDO Binder Hamlyn, including me, although i had technically left the firm at the beginning of that month.
In short, my firm, BDO Binder Hamlyn, was to be taken over by Arthur Andersen. I didn’t think the latter firm would appreciate my hair style.
Adrian Burn was the Managing Partner of BDO Binder Hamlyn. The character Pandoreuss is Elisabeth Reuss, now Elisabeth Mainelli, who was Adrian’s personal assistant.
Enough background:
THE SECRET DIARY OF ADRIAN BURN AGED 49 3/4 by SUSAN TOWNSLEY-WHITT
Tuesday 22 March 1994
I received a visit from a Mr Waddia, a most helpful gentleman from another leading firm of accountants like mine, except his firm is named Arthur Andersen. Mr Waddia is the most important man in Arthur Andersen and he said that he would pay a lot of money for a merger with Binder Hamlyn. He would give several Binder Hamlyn partners (including me!) equity in the merged firm and everyone would be happy. It sounded almost too good to be true, but I asked my friends James, David and John and they all said it sounded simply super and we should go for it. It’s a deal! Hurrah!
Monday 28 March 1994
I’m not very pleased today. The Sunday Times has spilled the beans on my splendid deal and lots of my junior partners have quite clearly failed to understand the benefits of the arrangement. I found some of their comments most unhelpful. I had to spend the whole day going round 20 Old Bailey explaining to all those junior partners and their staff oiks that the Andersen’s thing would be good for everybody and no-one would get fired (except for all the people that Mr Waddia told me I would have had to fire anyway). I am now in a foul mood and shall go off and investigate a bit of Queens Moat tomorrow to make myself feel better.
Wednesday 30 March 1994
One of my less astute junior partners who is not really my friend, William Casey, turned up in my office today. He had a sun tan and said he had been in Africa on consultancy business (I think that is what he does) until today and had only just got the news. He said that Andersens wouldn’t want a consultancy practice because they already have a big one and what was I going to do about it. I explained the bit about no-one getting fired and several partners getting equity in Andersen’s and he went away looking much happier. I asked my adorable secretary, Pandoreuss, what she thought of it all and she just said “Dumkopf”. I asked my friend Richard what this means and he said it is a compliment a German person gives to you when they think you have done a clever thing. Oh Pandoreuss! I really didn’t know you cared!
Monday 22 April 1994
I’m a bit miffed today. Mr Waddia says that he will have to pay millions of pounds to BDO so that he can buy Binder Hamlyn. “I hope you’re not expecting much cash or many equity partners, Adam, or else your going to be disappointed”, he said, “and you’d better get rid of a heap of your dead wood partners and managers PDQ”. I didn’t find those comments particularly helpful. I went off to close down a bit more of Queens Moat which took my mind off and made me feel a bit better.
Thursday 26 May 1994
Not a very good day. Mr Waddia has spoken to Mr Hall and apparently only two Binder Hamlyn partners will be allowed equity in Arthur Andersen. Fortunately one of them is me (hurrah) and the other is my friend James. Mr Hall has also told Mr Waddia that by the time they have paid BDO to let Binder Hamlyn out, Arthur Andersen can only afford £2.54 for Binder Hamlyn. “I thought you were the most important man in Arthur Andersen, Mr Waddia”, I said. “I am”, he replied, “in Arthur Andersen UK. Mr Hall is the most important man in Andersen Consulting UK. He is a more most important man than I am”. I think I understand. I told Pandoreuss and she just said “du bist ein schtick fleisch” which my friend Richard tells me means that I am a first class negotiator. Oh Pandoreuss! One day you will be mine!
Wednesday 10 August 1994
I am not very pleased. Mr Waddia tells me that Mr Burgess has told him that my consultancy cannot call itself a consultancy because only his (Mr Burgess’s) consultancy is allowed to do that. “I thought Mr Hall was the most important man in Andersens”, I said. “He is”, replied Mr Waddia, “in Andersen Consulting UK. Mr Burgess is the most important man in Andersen Consulting Worldwide. Mr Burgess is a more most important man than Mr Hall”. These people really ought to sort themselves out! William (who is not really my friend) went up the wall when I told him. I said that he could revive the incredibly successful former name, Binder Hamlyn Small Fry and he went away seeming happy. These consultancy (sorry, small fry) types just need a few kind words and they are all motivated, networking and selling work like crazy. William must have done a great job after he saw me today, because three strangers called me asking me to give personal references for William. Pandoreuss told me that William “ist ein schlemiel”, which apparently means good salesman. I went off and investigated a bit more of Queens Moat.
Tuesday 30 August 1994
I decided to stand up to Mr Waddia. I told him that I was not happy about having to sack 10 of my equity partners and a whole group of managers after all that we had been through together. “Heck, Adam”, he said. “Adrian”, I corrected (I can stick up for myself you know). “I know how you feel, Adrian. I am going to have to sack two of my equity partners in a few months time so I know how uncomfortable you feel.” His words made me feel a lot better (they have a superb manner, these big six types, although we’re more than a match for them, yes indeed). Mr Waddia continued “perhaps you could give me a few tips on how to go about sacking equity partners, I’ve never had to do it before”. It’s good to see that we are already starting to influence the Arthur Andersen Worldwide Organisation.
NEXT WEEK: Adrian Burn, the Wilderness Years.
In addition, I circulated the following “song list”:
AND NOW: Adrian Burn’s top five favourite records of all time.
1) A medley of songs from the musical “Half Binders Andersen”, including:
* We’re Half Binders Andersen, we’ve many accounts to sell; * Lynchworm, lynchworm, measuring the office space; * Wonderful, wonderful, old Chicago, centre of Andersen’s style; * There Once Was an Ugly Merging; * No two businesses ever we’re so unlike; * Fumble Binders, fumble Binders, tiny little thing; * We’re signing on the dole together, the dole together, the dole together, we’re altogether redundant as a pubic hair in soap.
2) Arthur’s, We Love You (the paranoid Android song) c/w You’re in the army now.
3) Routs and Mergers, routs and mergers, soon consultancy will work for Burgess, Binder Hamlyn’s over, cos this merger is a takeover.
4) Arthur’s theme “When you get going between the dole and new employment”.
5) Binder’s is merging in the autumn, ding dong lets hope it will survive; Arthur’s no vulture, it’s just a strong culture, so change the way you work, just change the way you work, for gawd’s sake change the way you work in time.
My earliest diary note of the events that actually led to Z/Yen are in the week of 28 March 1994, which has a 9:30 call with Michael Mainelli that day and the evening of 30 March booked out “MRM” (that’s Michael) for a Park Inn Chinese meal, at my place, organised at short notice.
My memory records a couple of “two bottles of wine” evenings with Michael, but actually I don’t think 30 March was one of those. I think the first “two bottles” evening was a couple of weeks later, after a consultancy team meeting at which it became clear that the so-called “merger” was going ahead and that the consultancy was going with it.
I’m pretty sure that we ate and drank in a place along Craven Road, near to Michael’s place. Spanish, I think, but possibly Italian – I think now Il Gusto.
The date of the “two bottles of Rioja” evening during which the name Z/Yen emerged is lost in the mists of time, but I am guessing late spring and I specifically recall the name emerging towards the end of another Park Inn Chinese meal at my flat. By that time we had colleagues Stuart Otter, Steve Taylor and Kate Carty lined up to join the new venture, together with the elusive John Thompson, who had been a client of Michael’s. No-one was entirely comfortable with the name Z/Yen, but when we challenged everyone (including ourselves) to suggest something better, answer there came none.
…and a BDO Consulting Xmas lunch the next day. Not sure where we ate that year – but it mught have been the Bleeding Heart again – in any case I won’t have been interrogated in the 1988 mode – click here or below for that story:
Janie took quite a bit of work over that first weekend back – 18 & 19 December. My diary is silent about the weekend. there was talk about meeting up with Kim & Micky on Monday 20th for dinner, but I think we canceled that out, again perhaps pressure of work and dread of meals out during that holiday season.
Janie even took a couple of clients on Christmas Eve, whereas I (still a BDO salaryman for the last holiday season) needed to use up my accumulated holiday days to avoid losing them. I had Microbee come to look at my cockroaches that morning instead.
I went to my parents on Christmas Day and Janie saw her mum. Janie and I got together for the holiday season on Boxing Day.
We spent part of the Twixtmas period at Janie’s and part of the time at mine. Phillie, Tony & Charlie were around that season and when they wanted to stay at Janie’s, we decamped to mine.
I think we took the three of them to the flicks at Whiteley’s on Tuesday 28 December. For sure we took them to see The Secret Garden at some point during that period. I think Charlie (aged 6 or 7 at that time) got a lot more out of that experience than any of the rest of us. I am pretty sure it was on that occasion, while walking from my flat to Whiteley’s, that Tony opined to me on the sanity (or otherwise) of Janie’s family; judging Janie to be the sanest one but not delving into where that assessment might stand on other benchmarks or spectra of sanity.
It was my good fortune to be spared the family trip to Bristol during Twixtmas, not least because I had some client work to do that Twixtmas (the International Transport Workers Federation didn’t shut down for Twixtmas).
Janie and I got together again for new years eve – a quiet one if I remember correctly.
I think we spent a fair chunk of that time going through our holiday pictures, and why not?
Dreaming of a sun-drenched Twixtamas?
After spending the first couple of days of the new year at mine, as the family were still around, we then switched back to Janie’s place after another of those Worm family meals on Bank Holiday Monday (3rd January) at the North China Restaurant – still there as I write in January 2020. (The restaurant, not the Worm family).
So we spent the next weekend (8th/9th) at Janie’s; a quiet weekend by the looks of it.
While in China, I did a great deal of thinking about the planned book which became Clean Business Cuisine. Here are the notes I made while on that trip. I shall not try to translate them.
Michael Mainelli and I traveled to Geneva and Gland more than once, while we were doing some advisory work for the World Wide Fund For Nature (WWF). This was our longest visit – best part of a week in my case – I think Michael might have stayed a bit longer.
Good to see that the above picture of the World Intellectual Property Organisation building in Geneva is licenced to be used under creative commons.
Michael had lived and worked in Geneva for a while, a few year’s earlier. We stayed at Michael’s favourite hotel from that bygone era; Small & friendly it was. L’Hôtel d’Allèves. More than 26 years later, judging by the website, it still looks like a nice relic of a bygone era; somewhat upgraded from its 1993 incarnation.
I recall having a good meal with Michael in the hotel on the evening we arrived. Local dishes and local wine.
Several members of staff at the hotel clearly knew Michael, who was keen to show off his command of the French language. Unfortunately, while Michael is no doubt very good at learning words and grammatical forms, his accent has a very un-French sound to it. I remember a few times, repeating what Michael had said or me choosing some simpler French words from my own, more limited, French vocabulary, to ensure that we were understood. That aspect of the trip reminded me of family visits to France; my father had a similar problem with spoken French.
Despite Michael’s insistence, while briefing me pre-visit and/or in transit, that Swiss trains run on time, the service between Geneva and Gland was almost British in its tardiness while we were there for this trip. We experienced several delayed journeys during that week, including that first Friday ahead of the weekend.
Michael had arranged a weekend jaunt with a charming woman, Ita Schlik, who was a former colleague of Michael’s. Ita took us out to Annecy for the day, I think on the Saturday.
Annecy is a beautiful town; I remember our visit being a very relaxing and enjoyable day out. Ita was very good company and clearly knew the ropes extremely well in terms of scenic routes, avoiding traffic and gaming the differential benefits of being in France and being in Switzerland – e.g. where to fill up with petrol, where to fill up with wine and gifts. There seemed, to me, to be a whole border industry based around those differences, with no physical border to be seen. A possible lesson for us in the UK (or what might soon be left of the UK, he writes in January 2020).
I do recall the clocks going back that weekend (about a month earlier than in the UK). I went for a walk early on the Sunday and every public clock had been changed overnight. Yes, top notch effort with the clocks. So, based on my own experience, I’m not so sure about trains, but the Swiss are great at clocks…
…I’m starting to sound like Harry Lime…
But we were mostly there to work and we did most of our work in Gland.
Mind you, I recall one occasion when Swiss-style time keeping might have helped. We arranged some surgery sessions, which allowed people to approach us informally with issues. Michael and I would pair on those. I got to one surgery five minutes late, to find a woman in tears in front of Michael, who looked unusually lost for words. I imagined an Oleanna-like incident or something, but it transpired that this woman simply got very emotional worrying about her spreadsheet or some such administrative problem that was troubling her.
I also remember one flight back from Switzerland with John Ward and David Taylor (of WWF), but without Michael. (It might have been this particular trip or it might have been one of the shorter visits). The pilot clearly made a mistake on landing – the experience was so bumpy and damage-noise-ridden that we all jumped out of our skins. The co-pilot apologised for his colleague over the public address system.
I’m pretty sure it did eventually find its way into NewsRevue…
…but not on the particular Thursday evening of my return. The lyric was scribbled in my diary while I was away and I can see from my electronic log that I typed it up and saved it c19:15 on the evening of my return.
So I probably took the script with me to the Canal Cafe that very evening, printed out on the rudimentary line printer I had at home at that time. Yes, for sure I did rush to the Canal Cafe that night, grabbing a Thai meal on the way, to catch the opening night of a new run and to drop off my new script.
There’s dedication to both work and play. Not so sure about the rest.
Janie and I were preparing to go to China, Hong Kong & Bali in the late summer of 1993. An element of prophylaxis was called for, including some vaccination. In particular, we both needed a typhoid jab; I hadn’t had one of those since 1979.
My track record with vaccination was not (and is not) a glorious one. I am a true believer and always take recommended vaccines, but I get irrationally nervous for jabs. One especially ignominious example from my infanthood (some time in the mid-1960s) is contained in the prelude to this (here or below) weird, other story:
For those who choose not to read the above, Dr Green ended up under the dining room table at Woodfield Avenue giving a terrified, bolting infant-version of me one of my childhood jabs in the buttock.
Further, my previous experience with typhoid vaccination, in 1979 ahead of my visit to Mauritius, had not been a great experience. It had left me feeling very sore and a bit poorly for a couple of days.
I therefore planned my typhoid jabs with precision, arranging a Friday end of the day appointment so I could drive straight over to Janie’s, where she had promised to look after me and help me convalesce from the jab.
I seem to recall that she made soup for the purpose. Chicken might have been involved as well. We’d been going out for over a year by then and in any case she had insight into the quintessential cultural mores.
Prophylactic, therapeutic, palliative…chicken soup has got the lot
While all that tender loving care was being prepared in my honour, a trembling version of me turned up at the Colville Health Centre to see Dr Rasheed at 17:40.
Dr Rasheed was a locum, I believe. My regular GP at that time was Dr Catherine Mok. I used to refer to my regular GP as “Mok The Afflicted”, but only because I was addicted to puns. She was a very good GP in my view.
Are you all right?…
…asked Dr Rasheed, perhaps concerned by this trembling wreck of a patient.
Sorry, doctor. I’m a total wimp when it comes to jabs.
Hmmm. Well, the really cowardly people don’t turn up for jabs at all. What are you afraid of?
It’s irrational, doctor, I realise that. But actually, in the matter of this typhoid vaccination, I get a bad reaction to it, so I am anticipating feeling very sore and a bit poorly this weekend.
Dr Rasheed looked puzzled.
When did you last have a typhoid vaccination?
1979, when I went to Mauritius.
Dr Rasheed laughed.
We don’t use those antiquated vaccines any more. You haven’t had Typhim before. You might get a little soreness at the site but side effects are all-but unheard of now.
Back when a jab was really a jab. You knew about it for days. That’s what I call a jab.
It was all over in the batting of an eyelid. I felt like a total fraud as I was driving to Janie’s place, anticipating some 24 hours of tender loving care, realising that my chances of actually feeling poorly were vanishingly small.
Cushions, plumped up pillows, gentle entreaties of the “how are you feeling now?” variety…
…so for how long did I milk that TLC situation before coming clean to Janie that I had been worrying about some obsolete vaccine from a bygone era and didn’t feel sore and poorly at all with this one?
