I was giving little anne a game of tennis in the back garden the other day, on the odd occasion she wasn’t stuck to the computer, you know get some real exercise like we did as kids.

 Anyway, I give her the old dickie davies disguised top spin lob but it just went over chris akers garden next door, so we carried on but told her to get Goergia to lob the ball back over as you do.

Which she did no probs, BUT get this,  I realised little anne hasnt been next door to ask Georgia to lob the ball back over, so I asked her if she had, she said ‘ oh dad i facebooked her and asked her to lob the ball back over’. What is that about, facebooking Georgia next door to get the ball back, well i never……the good news is I can still play decent garden tennis and remain unbeaten in my street…..

The other day I filled up with petrol and fancied some sweets as you do, anyway this bag of assorted mints caught my eye as I was after the mint toffees, one of my favourites. So I opened up the purchase and hunted down the toffee mint straight away ( see evidence of toffee mint on packet ) . Blimey O’reilly there were none, nadda, niente, just everton mints, butter mints and murray mints, what is that about ? Shame on you Bassett, I am sending the empty packet and wrappers back to see what response I get. Am I right to be suspicious of the mixed bag ? Should you stick to speciality only ?

I went to see Michael Buble at the 02 the other night which was great, but if you look carefully at the photo on the right we had some harry hill lookalike sitting with us, for some reason my mate Simon thought this was hilarious which made him start acting like a ten year old, talking, laughing and eating popcorn throughout the show, we were getting tutted at by the other guests and especially Judy Moody sitting behind Harry Hill.Even our wives tried to make out they didn’t know us on the way out !!! Still we had a good time regardless.

Ok Rich, why you got a picture of this dog on a blog ?

Cos it Mrs.D’s new best mate and is now living with us, somewhat hypocritcal I know but the girls were all moaning, dad can we get a dog and so on and so on, and in a moment of weakness I agreed and this is the end result, one dog getting all cosy on my settee.

So far she has eaten a fifty pound note and a trainer, and Tony said she’s not allowed at work as it will remind him of Ray Butler. Still she might be useful at chasing some rents instead of her tail.

Can my week get any better ? The Boy wonder Enzo has given me a nice lead - some hungarian tenants  looking for a place in Potters Bar. Boyaks, I got a nice three bedder in Strafford Gate with a Hungarian Landlord, surely they will get on like a house on fire ! No probs but I have not got the keys, I phoned landlord and made the appointment as you do, everyone meet at the property, chinese dentist, 2.30 pm, what can possibly go wrong ?

Well, this is whats gone wrong, landlord has decided to go out and let me get on with the viewing, I know this cos he has been in to the office to  find out from Caz when he can go home as he’s fed up waiting in McDonalds, meantime I am waiting outside the house in the rain with the Magyar tenants ?

Now I am hunting up and down Darkes Lane for one missing Hungarian Landlord who is no longer in Maccy D’s and must the only person in the World without  a mobile !!!

Change of career anyone ?

What is this beirut petrol station ?, tescos at brookfield Wednesday lunchtime thats where, what is going on , they even had a couple of security wallies directing you where to queue, if I hadn’t of been on fumes I would have done one, oh and when you finally get to the pump an hour later you got to start telling it where and how you going to pay. Its alright if you are on the missing list or you got nothing to do for the next week but personally I am on a boycott.

Useful Tip for Tescos : I would rather disembowel myself with a clubcard or collect all your old shopping bags round the M25 than fill up there again !!!!

Hey Rich, why is Jean reading the paper at work ?, aren’t you too busy for that sort of thing ?

Well, I let her have a read of last weeks midweek paper on account it only had a few pages in it, what is the point of producing this just so you can stick it straight in the re-cycle bin ?

Useful tip for the Mercury : Ditch the midweek paper and try to improve and bring up to date the weekly newspaper.

More rubbish weather today causing junior bordella everywhere and have not seen a rubbish man from Borough of Brox since before chrimble, what is going on, are we getting a rebate on council tax ?

Useful Tip for Local Council : get the people on housing benefit to clear the snow.

Stopping smoking and detox- day 13.  Doing pretty well at the moment but unable to give up swearing

Had a corker of a new excuse for late payment on friday, telephone call as follows :-

Me : Hi there, Rich from Anthony Davies, notice your rent is a bit late, are you coming in today ?

Tenant : Yes , no problem but I need to say that really I have had a problem with leaves falling on the path and driveway and I am unhappy that I nearly slipped up and it is dangerous, so what do we do ?

Me : Well I might be able to sort out a lot of problems but stopping leaves falling from the sky is not one of them.

Tenant : Oh, well there’s leaves everywhere.

Me : I know, I swept loads up from front of my house and back garden the other day.

Tenant :  Oh Ok, but these are all wet.

Me : I get the picture, lots of wet leaves, bit slippy, but you still need to pay the duke of kent.

Tenant : Oh I see, I will come in later to pay the rent.

So this new excuse does not work in case you want to use it.

I received an excellent letter from the Mercury on Saturday morning informing me that because market conditions are tougher for agents they are going to keep their advertising rates on hold for 2009 !

My Response :  Dear Mercury Newspaper, you have banged your heads, as I have told you before traditional newspaper advertising is in serious decline, what you need to do urgently is to review your position, change the product, realise that advertising agents are your lifeline to your jobs and reduce your prices !

As you are probably aware we have ceased advertising within local papers since the start of october and guess what, our deals are not down, of course we probably run the risk of perhaps not attracting new clients but I remain convinced this is an uneccessary cost to our business.

Listen guys , trust me, we do not need newspaper advertising any more a) it is not cost effective  b) it is old fashioned c) the internet is where it is at. Do I need to say any more, think wisely about your budgets for next year.   Rich

Would you adam and eve it? I was at Bluewater yesterday and Mrs D’s Audi was low on petrol as usual so I pulled in to Asda at Greenhithe to fill up.

Deep joy, what a great place, basically you can only get petrol here, nothing else, no one queuing up to top up mobiles or electric keys, no one doing the lottery, no women digging up their bags at the front of the queue, no one buying papers or sandwiches.

You just fill up, drive up to the cashier and pay, how good is that, in and out in five  minutes. Asda, open up in Hoddesdon, this is proper old fashioned with a modern update!