Lewis Malka of Joseph Sterling Jewellers is away in The Big Apple doing his bit for charity and is forgiven for not finding a sub, but otherwise the table is even more crowded than last week and Christian of Danesoft kicks off the 60 seconds round. Mike Segall of New Business Generation wants intros to accountants and lawyers reminding us that 43 per cent of new business comes from cold calling.

Our curtain man Roger Morgan is back looking for photographers who photograph properties for estate agents while Richard Houldsworth of Splatt Print now has a digital printer as well as the more common lithographic one and wants intros to charities. Jason Southard of Aces & Faces the fun casino people, is back while Zoe Antin of Opus Telecom picks up Fiona’s theme of a couple of weeks ago “It’s rubbish out there!” Putting a positive spin on things, she is offering a free cost audit to see if they can save on telecomms costs for businesses as well as looking for cabling contractors who can handle Cat 3 & Cat 5 work.

Louise Hassett of Delfont Mackintosh announces a new production in April next year http://www.uktickets.co.uk/news/140/ Calendar Girls which will replace Avenue Q. Michael Dodd from his eponymous Media company points out that there is free media out there but with the furore surrounding Jonathan Ross & Russell Brand, reminds us that there are dangers. Fiona Gale of Only Connect Solutions gives a perfect example of how an hour of “me time” at insurance giant Axa pays dividends with lower absenteeism and improved productivity for its staff.

Kirsty Joly of Perfectly Tempered points out that a large box of her chocolates can have the same impact and be considerable less expensive than say, the case of wine some corporates give. Hiten Thaker of Revolution Creative who previously showed us the MOBO magazine he designed, shows his Kiss FM credits which he developed as the previous creative people did not achieve very much. Two years after setting up on his own, Justin Beavis wants intros to people who live in Hull or Coventry as his next project may mean spending a lot of time up there and his market is often guiding businesses through the next 3 to 5 years.

Yours truly from in2 Consulting is offering reveiws to people with pension and other portfolios as some have done much better (or worse) than others – if there was ever a time for a financial review, it is now. Christoph Klemmt of YouMeHeShe architects has teamed up with some chums to open a new art gallery www.thecorndor.co.uk while James Hearsey standing in for Paul Ffitch of Sayers Butterworth has moved from the exciting area of audit into the minefield of tax, reminding us that TODAY is the deadline for paper tax returns.

Mike Nightingale of Green Park Insurance Services is looking for people with > 1 property – type of property unimportant – they can all be put on one policy. Gavin M-H is now gainfully employed at Destini? plc and takes the morning off to celebrate, sending Mike Jennings of Avenue-UK in his stead. Jamie Denham of Sliced Bread Animation is in Austria so sends Adrian Thatcher of Effective Vision as sub whose area of expertise is CCTV in general and the digital type with video analytics in particular.

Michael Sinclair’s Chine One Call offers on-line translation Mandarin/English (& vice versa) with back-up translation services to boot. George Metcalfe tells us about komboloi (Greek worry beads) and a story about an actuary that could have come straight off Sigmund Freud’s couch. For the uninitiated, actuaries are basically mathematicians who often work for insurance/pension companies where the senior ones earn £1/2 million a year. Parents might like to keep this in mind if their little ones complain about homework…. Hopefully no one mentioned the joke “What sort of person becomes an actuary??” Answer: Someone who finds accountancy too interesting….

Mike Chan now of Shadow Finance (Abbey Alliance RIP) manages well in his 10 minutes considering he was only reminded of it when he walked into the room. His niche is basically Failed Applications and gives 3 examples of where they have rescued clients and provided the necessary mortgage finance, after being dropped in it at the last minute by nervous lenders. At the same end of the table, someone quotes George Soros who has said recently that properties could lose 2/3rds of their value in the next 3 years?

Maurice Press of Disability Resource Team finishes a very enjoyable meeting on a You couldn’t make it up note with a story about an American lady who put her new motorhome on cruise control while driving on the freeway. After doing this, she went make a herself a sandwich in the back with the inevitable result that it went off the road. But she successfully sued the manufacturer as the manual did not say you had to stay in the driving seat when using cruise contol. She got a new motorhome and > US$ 1 million dollars. On a more more serious note, Maurice asks and gets intros to local authorities helping Alexis of The Happiness Centre who wants an intro to Bechtel, the multi-national construction group.

Have a good weekend…and drive carefully.

George Emsden