No. 62: Dodging Turkey and Talking Rubbish

This week I have had no less than 6 Christmas celebrations. Venues included two Indians, a Thai, and a fish-only restaurant. Turkey has not yet passed my lips. There was even a breakfast at the top of The Shard, and a meal in the bar where Table Tennis was, apparently, invented.

My company has included American Bankers, British Engineers and French Scientists. Conversation has been appropriately varied:

• Debating why London Underground has to inform passengers to ‘Mind the Gap’(American Bankers). Was it, they asked, that the platform builders simply forgot to talk to the train designers? Or did the train designers obtusely think that it would be fun to design trains that didn’t fit?
  
• Discussing whether saving a document on the cloud is more environmental than printing it (French Scientists); I swear it can’t be, but I am struggling to substantiate this. Just saying it loudly, slowly and firmly is not working.  All arguments to support my case gratefully received. I need to win this one. It’s becoming a matter of national pride.
  
• Reviewing (in horrific detail) the delights of all the lap dancing nightclubs in Hong Kong in the early 1980s (British Engineers). I have never been to a lap dancing club and, having now learnt more about their mysteries, never intend to go. Despite this I can’t help feeling that this would make a brilliant specialist subject on MasterMind (a TV quiz for the non-British). I know just the man to sit in the contestants chair!

My week ended with (this evening) my final leaving ‘do’ from Thames Water. In a bar in Reading I got a chance to say thank-you and goodbye to the 100 or so people who worked in Thames Water Commercial. They have diligently carried me for the past few years; they have made me look far better than I deserved. I will miss them all.