January 2004
Last night went to a surprise party for Jackie's 40th. It was planned as an early evening buffet and drinks. We all got there at 4:30pm and hid in the dark behind the furniture... she didn't arrive till 6:45pm ... but good fun was had in the dark behind the furniture in the meantime.
First chance to catch up with some jobs around the house after the Christmas holiday and the weekend up north for the wedding. This afternoon the highly filthy fish tank got a good spring clean and now the four gold fish are wearing sunglasses it's so bright.
Better late than never. I've at last uploaded the photos I took at Matt and sally-Ann's wedding. Not very good but you can see my point of view! Click here
Hundreds of daredevils have taken to the skies above Bangkok to set a world record and mark the queen's birthday.
The skydivers swooped in their hundreds out of six transport planes, more than 2,000 metres above the temples and skyscrapers of the Thai capital.
Nearly 700 skydivers from 42 countries took part in the colourful display.
But the mass free fall did not go entirely smoothly as a strong wind blew a few of the divers off course, leaving their parachutes tangled in trees.
Most of the divers were members of a group called World Team, but they were joined by 250 parachutists from the Thai armed forces.
For the people of Bangkok, the sight was spectacular as the divers soared and then floated down in bright blue and yellow suits and parachutes.
What with bird flu and the MyDoom virus there's never a dull moment at work. Protecting us all from these menaces is keeping us all very busy. Too busy in fact to write much in this diary as you can see.
It's the end of the month and my new month's resolution is going to be to put more in the diary.
A great Christmas holiday with a lovely upgrade to business class at the end (A former pupil now works for Emirates). No time to get over jet lag, straight back to work with a thousand jobs to do and emails to answer.