What a plonker!

Talk about shooting yourself in the foot! Try this for bureaucracy gone barmy.

I got an email today from the Supplies Manager of an NHS Trust. We supply them poster frames. The sender had copied in all 678 of his other suppliers so there, for my edification, were the email addresses of all their suppliers. Interesting, but not especially discreet.

So what was the email about? He was writing to stress the high importance the authority attaches to Data Protection and the meticulous standards all suppliers are required to observe at all times - with the threat of contract termination to any offenders.

In my day (oh here he goes again), before email was ever conceived, people knew what a blind carbon copy was. Today few people seem to be aware what Bcc means in Outlook.

Now ... what shall I send to my newly aquired mailing list? Umm? A little spam maybe? Or will I receive all the other guys' spam first, because they've all got my email address too!

The Beast has been Released

Unfortunately I have had complaints. Apparently it's not just the fridge that stinks - now it's the whole kitchen.

It seems my smelly cheese is to blame. Monsieur Fromage, who awaits my lunchtime pleasure, is a ripe little Frenchman and the noses of my work colleagues are evidently, as the French would say, 'sensible'. (Interesting that the French word for sensitive is 'sensible' - a source of many a mis-translation.)

Tupperware (or whatever it's called now) to the rescue. Popped the smelly French cheese into the box and sealed the lid - et voila, le pong est disparu! The morning passes peacefully without an odorous complaint; the aroma safely contained. But then it's time for lunch: so bread at the ready I open the box. Out pops this nasal assault upon my workmates to cries of The Beast has been Released. Never mind, I enjoyed it anyway and I don't mind eating alone.

This tale reminds me of a conversation I had recently with a Chinese associate who told me that while he studied in France the one thing he could never get used to was the stink of their cheese. It seems that Chinese sensibilities (aah there you see the English link to the French word for sensitive, nothing to do with sensible) find well matured dairy products rather unpleasant to say the least. I'm guessing that Camembert exports to the People's Republic of China are not a high volume line.

Sorry if you thought the mouse in the picture was The Beast. I just thought he was rather cute. And no, it's not French cheese in the picture, so don't be picky. And now I need to get in my plug ..

Click here if you need a sign holder for a delicatessen or cheese counter.