The Business Course
In September 1992 I attended a business development course held over a weekend near St Albans. The course was organised by Hertfordshire Training and Enterprise Council (TEC), now part of Business Link, St Albans. It was generally a good course, but I think that there ought to be "health warnings". The problem is that people are (rightly) encouraged to be open and honest about their business problems, and some people can be there to take advantage. Now I had a major problem at the time; Peter Theobald. I chatted over this with some of the other people in the group and it was agreed that he would have to be dealt with, and they agreed a strategy to bring him up to speed or get out. One of the people in the group was a Mrs Nicola Low. She is a large and ugly woman who runs a cleaning company (now defunct). I have to admit I disliked her on sight and my opinion only got worse.
Guy Costin
A month or so after the course, I received a call and visit from Mrs Low at my premises. Whilst I was reluctant to see her, she explained that she had a friend who was interested in my sort of work. A few days later, she introduced me to her friend, Guy Costin, who was interested in my software products and keen to sell them. After dealing with Peter Theobald, it was a breath of fresh air to meet someone genuinely interested, and I readily agreed to the three months' trial proposed. Mrs Low got rid of Peter Theobald in a particularly nasty and heavy-handed way. We were very lucky he didn't sue, but he himself must have realised how poorly he was performing. Whatever else I might say about him, Guy was a good salesman and the company took a huge upturn in business under his "reign". However he was extremely greedy in his demand for remuneration and he left after a year when I wasn't prepared to triple his salary. He now works for a large UK-based company. Alas getting rid of Mrs Low was another matter altogether. However she had a heart attack early in 1993 which got her out of the way for a while.
Sue
Towards the end of 1992 the relationship with Janice fizzled out. I think it always was a non-starter. We were very different people. However she taught me a lot and introduced me to a lot of things, for which I shall always be grateful. As the business took something of an upturn, I was able to get about a bit more and meet a lot more people in the "real world" outside the Christian scene and in August 1993 I met Sue. Sue had been married before and had a daughter, Nadine. All a bit of a culture shock. So things set fair to change in 1994, but not all clear sailing, alas.