Chairman’s blog Thursday 6th June 2024

The 80th anniversary of D-Day was a beautiful morning, 21 members were in attendance and before the meeting got underway in true EBF style there was 60 seconds silence where the sacrifices made were both pondered and acknowledged by all of us. It was also a morning when Terry Maylin returned following his marathon bike ride from Benfleet to Loch Lomond. He looked fit and healthy and had managed in addition to raise with some assistance from EBF members approximately £1200 for his chosen charity. Congratulations Terry!

The Performance League

The month of May produced a runaway winner with 403 points in Matt Barry. Scott Griffiths was a very creditable 2nd with Terry Maylin and Mike Skinner in 3rd and 4th respectively.

Education Presentation

Jane Malyon was our presenter and she initially explained the origins of the term ‘Baker’s dozen’. Crafty bakers pinching some of the dough from neighbours who presented it to them for baking were finally stopped in their tracks with the threat of having their arms chopped off if they did not behave. To make sure they did not suffer this fate that would force them into a change of career a dozen loaves/rolls actually amounted to 13. Do we add value to our businesses giving to customers/clients the extra roll. Both interesting and entertaining.

The 60 Second Round

Paul Corrigan was the current Oscar holder and opened the proceedings. He was followed by Blake Hammond who by this time singing the praises of glow stick was able to demonstrate a great tool when we have power failures. Were they only 93p each?… and did they last for 12 hours. If I am wrong I will no doubt be corrected but they can be a useful tool for anyone, not just campers.

Matt Berry still had D-Day in mind and the efforts of his grandfather during the conflict and in relation to a book that he had published after the war. Matt has sent round details to us if we are interested in a book that is perhaps more than interesting.

Chris de la Prida raised the spirits with talk of a good deal with a 5-star hotel in Ibiza This promotion coupled with the sunshine that was streaming into the room was never going to create gloom even when Brian Painter recited all of the ways in which smoking can damage your body; hair, skin, and teeth to mentioned but a few and all this ends up with death. If you smoke it really is worth going and seeing Brian. Spirits also were not dampened despite Neil Bellham’s tale of woe after his good deed performed on a large drunk lady backfired with a bad review.

If you want to have your 60 seconds reported by me in this blog you would do well not to use Latin words that are difficult to spell like allegro and adagio, so Nick Cooke can consider himself fortunate to receive a mention for his 60 seconds in praise of music.

Andy O’Neill is involved with water quality in premises occupied by the dead as well as the living. Sites occupied by funeral directors containing water features represent good referrals for him. It’s always nice to keep members busy so funeral directors are useful for both Andy and Vincent Goode who was displaying booklets also created for funeral directors. Mike Skinner acknowledged that we should never indicate that we are too busy, although a lot of drone work over London creates a lot of paperwork and in the immediate future simpler jobs, such as golf courses who do not bring with them the attendant regulations would be nice.

Rather worryingly James Humphreys is still looking for industries that are populated by burly men and women; in this instance companies that employ van drivers. He can produce fleet cover second to none where he can also use colleagues to do the donkey work.

Irony of the week, John Hammond looking for fire stations to install their fire alarm system etc. Coals to Newcastle you would have thought, but he’s recently been involved doing just this for Thetford Fire station.

Jane Malyon still has some limited space on her cookery course on the 23rd June 2024. Special offer £55 per head.

If Mike Skinner was busy, so was Scott Griffiths and for some reason this was exemplified by ‘Barry Morgan’s world of organs’. If you are puzzled by this reference, you weren’t listening. Paul Corrigan had been listening and awarded the Oscar to Terry Maylin who was able to boast an award to TM Law for best personal injury legal services in the Basildon area

This weeks statistics and points of note

• Business recorded for May    £59,000

• Referrals recorded for May    42

• Business recorded today        £12,000

• Referrals recorded today        14

10-minute presentation by Nick Cooke

Paul Booth was the interviewer and Nick answered questions both about his early career and how he got to where he is now. He helps those with problems such as, vehicle impacts on buildings, assessments of where you locate fish tanks full of water and cracks in a Tuscan villa. He designs steel beams and considers subsidence the most difficult and worst problem that he has to deal with. He likes to expand his knowledge and deal with subjects other than structural engineering. Studying geography will apparently at least make you know where you are going. Entertaining and informative. Let’s see if we can find a steel beam for him to design.