My Wealth Creation Journey

Day 399 - Sunday 31st May 2009

Up and working after a leisurely breakfast. Sorting out the CEF programming to make sure that the Order gets written away correctly now we are allowing different Deliver Addresses to be used. I have a few tasks to get sorted today on this.

Lunchtime of to my mothers via the shops.... purchased a new lamp yesterday, not bad value at £3. Tomorrow my Sofa is getting taken away which will provide more space in my Bedroom! So a little re-arranging will take place... finally getting myself sorted out! There is hope for me yet!

Back from my mothers, some more bits and pieces finalised for work and then cooking some Fajitas tonight!

All in all a bit of a relaxing weekend, but I have a lot of work to do for the next few days and I won't be around from Thusday onwards, so I must get my head down and get stuck into some development work now.

Day 398 - Saturday 30th May 2009

Relaxed a bit this morning but up and around 9:15am. Catching up with some social networking and some conversations abroad!

I have some work to do for CEF this weekend for Deliver Net which involves some modifications to the system. We also need to define the groups for billing, but I'll probably leave that until Monday and get Otis to sort those things out.

Otis is sorting out the CIE bits over the weekend as well so that should all be available by Monday and I can get that all configured for training next Tuesday.

One of those days today, where I can't quite get into the work, but I am just tidying up a few bits and making sure that I have everything outstanding in my lists.

I'm going out for dinner tonight and need to go and get some wine to take with me. I also need to get a new Razor, shaving Gel, Deoderant and post shaving moisturiser... It's been ages since I bought any of this stuff so buying a job lot today! Had a haircut on Friday for the summer which is good for keeping cool in this hot weather.

The trees outside the flat are producing a huge amount of seeds at this time of the year and it looks like it is snowing outside. These floating seeds get absolutely everywhere so I try and keep the windows shut, the trouble is the temperature outside is about 26c today and so it's pretty hot inside as well.

Dinner is a pleasent affair down in Rickansworth near the river which is very enjoyable!

Day 397 - Friday 29th May 2009

Up and about at 6:10am this morning. Get a couple of Blog posts out of the way early for the wealth creation journey. Must keep these up to date, it is really easy to get behind on these things.

Yesterday it was quite interesting I wrote a bit more in the book for the chapter on Business processes, some interesting revelations came to me whilst going through this with my colleague which were worthy of putting into the book.

PAYE payment day today and also sort out some other payments to suppliers. I want to keep on top of this from now on...  a new order, less for free and a more commercial reality to the whole thing.

James of Blue Autumn fame is now going to start getting behind late payments. Visit the blog http://www.latepaid.com for further details on what is happening with the late payment legislation and what you can realistically do about getting paid late by your customers. James is fighting a battle now with Four Seasons Health Care over late payments spanning 5 years. They no longer do business but he claiming close to £700k, this is being viewed as a landmark case.

Finishing up some odd jobs today. Executives of the web email footers, but I want to chase in their debt they should be on a standing order but have not completed this yet, so this needs sorting out. Also I bill two others Laing O`Rourke and Hysen International as agreed.

The computers we are getting have now been completed, so I will pick them up on Monday. Still no official quote in for my side project (getting closer to announcing this... watch this space)

Table Tennis practice with Roger tonight, the weather has been nice today, so it will probably be very hot again!

Day 396 - Thursday 28th May 2009

Up around 7:15am this morning, there are quite a few tasks to get out of the way today, lots of payment reminders to go out. A few invoices to raise, and some odd jobs as well. I decide to get a sofa that is in my flat removed by the council £25 minimum charge for 3 items, so I've got one, so I might ask if anyone else wants to throw anything out give me a £5 and put it downstairs on Monday so they can collect it as well.

First job is to write a small program to reinstate the headings that mysteriously get removed when you add a new form to the iCos system. Otis picked up the exact circumstances under when this happens and now all the headings have gone a small program to put them all back is needed. This takes about 1/2 an hour and will be useful when this happens again.

Deliver Net are ceasing to buy Inco from two suppliers and one of their main customers needs changes to their online forms to accommodate this, Otis gets this finished off today, but we will only be able to deploy this evening because people start ordering pretty early.

Haircut booked and some other support jobs out of the way, I'm going to get a chance to write some more of my book today. The weekend looks like a programming one to make changes to the online forms ordering for a couple of new accounts.

I chase up the product coding for the new Subbie CIE on One-Hyde-Park, that data comes through at about 4:30pm so this is Otis's job for tomorrow, getting all that data into shape and setting up their details on the system ready for the training which has been organised for next Tuesday.

My little side project... still waiting for the quote from the fabricator... Jesus may have to find someone who is a bit more hungry for business. Can't imagine in a recession and these guys are so lazy and unhurried, you can understand why other countries do better than us, they would appear to want to work!

My daughters birthday today... a bit of a sad chapter in the rich tapestry of life. She doesn't talk to me, we haven't spoken for about 3 or 4 years. Two grand children, one whom I last saw when he was 1 and the other I have never seen. Now the eldest is going to be 6 this year. I guess time is a great healer, but both parties have to want it... anyhow I have a chance to think about what happened 23 years ago... which are good memories.

Bit of social networking to finish the day and then off to bed, I want an early start tomorrow!

Day 395 - Wednesday 27th May 2009

Up and about this morning at 7am, catch up with a couple of Blog Posts and organise the jobs for today. The Window lads are back this morning to finish off. Today they are going to be working in the same room as us, fortunately I'm off down to Wembley for a meeting at the consolidation centre for the One-Hyde-Park project today so going to be out for a bit.

Otis turns up at 8am and no sooner has he arrived the window lads are here as well. The weather is a bit rubbish today, raining and quite cold so it's going to be a bit chilly with no window in the office here. Sure enough we hit a cool 17c which is not warm for working in !

Down at Wembley meeting with the contractor who is delivering in the Kitchens, Service, Utility and Bars for the One-Hyde-Park project. Here it is all about logistics and how the goods are going to be handled to determine what the product codes are likely to be. The meeting goes on for longer than I expect around 2 hours with a final agreement on how they intend to operate with the centre.

I have only one further contractor to sort out for this project and that is the bathroom people. This has been 8 or 9 implementations within an implementation and has consumed a fair amount of time, not that I'm grumbling at least Laing's are prepared and can afford to pay for our services. That is one nice thing about working with a large company they expect to pay for services rendered and they accept work will only commence once a Purchase Order is placed etc. etc. They also know that things don't happen instantly... on the whole more reasonable.

Back at the ranch, Windows are nearly in... looking good! I'm going into the other room now, which is a lot tidier than before to continue with my book. It's very pleasant now working in the other room. Nice clean table, less interruptions, comfortable environment where I can concentrate on the writing... and no internet in there, which is a bonus... no temptation to check things... more work gets done!

Coaching at Barnet tonight, not a wonderful session, however Norman (the guy I'm coaching enjoyed it), back at home, just in time to see Man 'U' lose the European championship final... not that I'm at all interested!

Day 394 - Tuesday 26th May 2009

Back to work today after the Bank Holiday weekend, although I was busy yesterday anyhow. 7am I'm straight onto getting the Blog posts up to date, and by 8am I have the 2nd Chapter of the e-book 'Running a Business online' out of the way.

Otis is in at 8am and he tells me Morris will be here at 9:30am to continue the development of the Rugby Football club website (blogsite). We are reworking their site to enable them to more easily update things themselves and also to be able to easily hook into other social sites such as Facebook and YouTube.

Morris (my business partner) is over for most of the day as they want to get the back of this broken. Morris is introducing the new site to the gang at the Rugby Club tonight and wants to be able to show them the site in an almost completed state. The original website will need to be scaled down as well because the new site will be providing a significant amount of the old content.

I'm pressing on with the e-book today, getting the Introduction that I wrote on the 'Web based business platform' merged into the e-book. There will be a fair bit more to write but it is a good start. This is a kind of 'wet the appetite' intro to why people should consider a web based business platform to run and manage their business, which will be fleshed out to include some really good examples of how it can not only save money but also make a significant difference to their business.

My other side project (details to be made available shortly) is moving forward but I still haven't got the quote details through, I'm pushing as I would like to take this to Hungary at least in prototype form.... watch this space.

Table Tennis practice tonight with Roger at Urban Progress TTPro, hopefully we are in the main hall, at least we can see in there !! 

Day 393 - Monday 25th May 2009

Bank Holiday here in the UK today! A  bit of a lazy start and another cooked breakfast! Still some bacon and eggs left over from the weekend. Makes a nice change to have a cooked breakfast I rarely get the chance for these in my daily routine.

Today I am focussing on making some progress with the e-book. I want to get the second chapter out of the way. Up to page 50 already and going well. I must make good progress this week and get chapter 3 out of the way before the end of this week would be good. Then it is the home stretch.

I'm blogging a bit today as well. The WillMeOn website is updated with the performance of William Maybanks over the weekend. He and the Urban Progress TTpro club managed to finished runners up in the play-off weekend and so will be playing top flight table tennis next year in the UK British League.

Check out the picture below of a Watford Observer newspaper article from years ago, I think my first Newspaper entry !

Click on the picture and check out the Watford Table Tennis Blog to read more about this story and what is going on in Table Tennis in Watford!

Good progress with the book! A slight interruption as I chat with Claire Raikes - Business Blog Angel, she has just come out of a relationship and is now enjoying her freedom! A quick chat with friends in Hungary as well on Skype... this free communication really is very good!

Table Tennis practice this evening with Roger, looks like a two shirt job tonight it is very warm and will be a hot one. How right I was two shirts soaked as if I have had a shower already or been caught in the rain !

Quick update with William Maybanks on Skype he is back to Hungary tomorrow, so I will catch up with him when I visit on the 4th June.

Day 392 - Sunday 24th May 2009

Enjoyable lay-in this morning and a nice cooked breakfast! Today I have to go over to see my mother, the weather is unbelievable with 25/26c today. Summer has arrived maybe?

I check my list of activities and tasks to do this morning and get things in order. One of the tasks I have coming up over the next couple of weeks are the modifications for the 'Four Seasons Health Care' group and their online ordering. In preparation for this I am looking at the changes that will be necessary to support the introduction of budgetary control for them. There are quite a few database changes that will be needed.

I have a chat with a friend in Germany over Skype today and the drop William Maybanks - Willmeon a quick text to remind him to Twitter about their competition this weekend. Urban Progress TTPro are in action this weekend in the Division 1 Play-offs in Derby.

Off to my mothers via Asda's to get a few bits today. My sister and her daughter are over there again and we have a pleasant hour chatting. I set my mothers electronic picture frame up the other day and she has got a new mobile phone with a decent camera on it so she has been snapping away. While I am there I install her phone software and download the pictures onto the USB stick for her so that they re on her Picture frame as well.

I took some pictures in Cassiobury park at the end of April and there is one my mother particluarly likes, so I dowload this one as well. Clive (my mothers partner) wants to send this into country file so I give him the all clear to do this.

Back at the ranch I quicky implement the database upgrades into the Deliver Net database and upload. Salmon tonight with a nice salad and Balsamic vinegar dressing.... very tasty!

Day 391 - Saturday 23rd May 2009

A bit of a lay-in this morning, watched 'Unforgiven' with Clint Eastwood last night and it was on pretty late, so I take it easy this morning.

Time to catch up with some Social Networking stuff as well as plan the weekend. I didn't hear back from the school re my blog post about the Exhibition / launch of the Table Tennis Academy in at Watford Boys Grammar school, so I'm going to just run with it and post it up this morning. There is nothing controversial in it anyway.

They managed to finish off my bedroom new windows yesterday which look pretty good, but now I need to sort out the room. There are some more things to throw out, and again I'm pretty ruthless, if I can't see me using it in the short term then out it goes.

Off to get some food and a couple of trips to the bins required with some of the casualties of my clean-up!

The weather is really quite nice out there today but this heralds the start of my allergy season. I guess I really ought to start contacting some people about this to get rid of it, the inhalers become a necessary evil at this time of the year and I hate these things with a vengeance... being able to breathe is ... however an essential part of daily life and these things at least bring some respite from the wheezing!

Going to cook tonight some Lasagne... tomorrow going to be Salmon with salad and a bottle ofgood quality white wine... normally a red man, but in the summer the lightness of white wine is a delightful change !

Day 390 - Friday 22nd May 2009

Up bright and early, nice late spring early summer kind of day today, sun 23c and a good weekend coming up by all accounts too!

My lad is working from home today as he has to take his car in for a service plus MOT. He is also seeing Morris (my business partner) about sorting the Chesham Rugby Club Blog site which should be up and going by the time this blog post reaches the worldwide audience !

I get a couple of Blog posts out of the way this morning and then I was hoping to make progress with my Book. Before I know it there is a knock on the door and the guys doing the Windows turn up... then Morris and Otis (my lad) turn up, they have dropped his car off at the garage however it was not prudent for them to go to Otis's place, step dad at home and all that so they've come over to the office here.

This is good on one point and not so good on another. Inevitably I get sucked into the conversation about the Blog site and need to throw in my points and recommendations all of which steers me away from the book which is difficult to do with people talking close by anyhow.

There are a few support calls as well today, nothing too huge but some of the things need to be discussed with Ian my colleague. I also on reflection thinking about the quotation software we are working on that it could be used by our new customer Yellow Pig with a few tweaks here and there. Must send an email to my colleague to get that programmed in!

I was expecting the quote through today for the fabrication work for my new product I am working on, but as I suspected everyone has gone AWOL today and Monday is a bank holiday so I'll have to wait now until next Tuesday probably... I do hate waiting when I have something that I am excited about! Keep coming back here as this product develops you'll here it first on this Blog !!

Caught up with Claire Raikes of Busness Blog Angel today, she has gone through a few tough times of late but is coming out the other side much stronger and postive so it was really good to catch up and hear her plans which sound fantastic !

Table Tennis tonight, a little bit warm so it will be a good sweat-out tonight. Friday nights are normally pretty crowded, but of late the Tables have been not so good and the Nets awful, so I'm taking my own Net tonight, at least the lighting and the floor is good in this hall !