The British Open is over and once again in a major sporting event, our own Open Championship, we fail to turn up. We didn’t perform in the world cup in Germany. Wimbledon, except for one very surprising game by Andy Murray proved to be a total flop and Jensen Button is only a mere 80 points behind Alonson in Formula 1.


But the really annoying thing is we know we are not any good, with total British conviction we were sure we would not win the Open particularly after Monte decided to call it a day at half time.


What has happened to the winning spirit we got from the complete anihilation of the Aussies last summer to win the Ashes. The only way I can see us winning anything is to take a leaf out of the American’s book and start our own World Series of something that only the British take part in. Even then I would lay a bet we could come second.


But while speaking of Americans I am sure some of them may be OK but any nation that can vote George Bush as its leader must be not all there. What can you say about the man, presumably when promoting family values says:

"I've been to war. I've raised twins. If I had a choice, I'd rather go to war." —George W. Bush, Charleston, West Virginia, Jan. 27, 2002

But really my unrest with the Americans started with Captain Marvel, Dave and Angie. This all goes back to one of my earliest projects. I was simply consulting on this one and finished up in a hotel in Nottingham with seven or eight other team members. Angie was the new girl on the block, fresh to the company and to working away from home, I of course was an old hand and felt I should take her under my wing and give her a few pointers. This naturally had nothing to do with her being seventeen, blonde and pretty good looking. She did well and in fact she went on to work on other major projects with me at a later date, she would probably still have worked with me later even if she hadn’t done well, though not of course because she was seventeen, blonde, etc.....



Captain Marvel was the representative from the company whose software we were buying. A very loud American whose only redeeming feature was that, as we were the customer, he saw fit to pick up the nightly hotel tab. He always signed it off with a flourish as Captain Marvel. So on the grounds that I have very few principals, and that anyone buying the booze cannot be all bad I decided that Americans were acceptable. Until Dave came along.


Dave was a quiet guy from Fort Lauderdale with an apartment on the river. Nice guy, maybe ten years, perhaps a couple more, older than Angie. He introduced me to Vodka and Grapefruit as an early summer evening aperitif. He was also the one to drink his flaming sambuca without blowing out the flames. Nasty, didn’t eat much for the next few days, lips all blistered. He also seemed to take a shine to Angie.


By now I was in communication with Angie’s mum and dad, letting them know she was OK and doing the right things. They were concerned as this was her first experience of being away from home for any length of time. So I made sure that no one tried things on with her.


Then along came Dave with loads of dosh, pictures of his apartment in Fort Lauderdale and tales from America. He asks her out for lunch, she hesitates but asks where he wants to go. “Paris” he says. That’s Paris, France - he’s suddenly gone from nice guy to Flash Yank in two minutes. He wants her to fly across to Paris with him for lunch. How can I explain that to her dad, I don’t think he would approve. Paris for lunch! The last guy on the team to ask her out took her to McDonalds for a burger before taking in a movie and I worried about how to explain that to her dad.


So what can I do, any seventeen year old's head would be turned by this guy’s style so how do I stop this happening. Obviously explaining to Angie that I didn’t think this a good idea only makes me sound like her dad and that wasn’t going to help. So in true project management style I find a work-around. I let someone else in the team know what happened the last time Dave took some one to Paris, the return flight delay, the surprise hotel even how he dumped the girl the next day. This made up message was past through three or four people before reaching Angie who that night told Dave where to stick his lunch.


Dave was very confused and spent the night at the bar with me trying to understand what had gone wrong. I of course consoled him and commiserated with him and simply said “young girls, how can you understand them?” and ordered another drink to go on Captain Marvels bill.

OK, so sometimes the Americans are useful.