Wake up to the daily chirp of the birds. A squint at the ceiling and I see the time from my projection clock. It’s 4:09am. Not too bad as they often start as early as 3:30am during the summertime. Try to remain in sleep mode but my brain starts engaging. Any hope of drifting back off to sleep is gone.
A few minutes later and I find myself staring at the screen of my trusted iPad hidden underneath the duvet to avoid any light entering the room. Aha! Two of my chess gamers have made moves - that'll keep me busy for a minute or so.
With my return moves played, I quickly turn the attention to emails. Hotmail first, as always, as these can be dealt with very fast and are not too taxing at this time of the morning. Two are band related - yes I am still a drummer in a band - and trying to get 6 guys together to rehearse regularly consists of at least 50 emails to arrange and re-arrange dates and times. I see Dwell have yet another amazing offer on some furniture I don't need or want - didn't they go into administration, anyway? I scan through several other junk mails and find nothing else too pressing. Facebook next, nothing of note so far but it is early still. Can’t put it off any further - it's into the office emails now. Not too many as after all I only went out of them at 1am.
Oh dear - the dog is awake now. I'll have to get up and let her out.
Jump forward to 8:30am and I'm arriving at the office. I like to get the parking spot next to the pillar as no one can park too close to the driver’s side to block my door opening.
Time to clear more emails before the pipeline meeting at 9am.
10am is meeting two of the day with a representative of our Title insurer coming in to discuss more detail of this surprisingly complicated insurance. 10am becomes 11am in the blink of an eye.
I have a 12:30pm lunch appointment in North London with a broker I have known for many years, so with one eye on the clock it's time to organise terms for two cases that have arrived by email. The two missed calls showing on my trusty Samsung can be dealt with en-route, so best to prioritise a couple of issues on pending cases before I set off for the meeting.
12:05pm. Just about to leave when Nick, Nick Russell, one of our business development managers, asks if I would accompany him to a meeting in High Holborn at 2pm.
5 minutes later we hit the traffic together bound for the North London Enfield borders. Using every back street I can remember, we utilize the time to return calls on our mobiles. My hands free versus his finger in one ear.
12:40pm and we arrive at our destination, ignoring the double yellow lines as we park right outside the door. A brief apology explaining lunch is off and after a quick cup of coffee and a catch up we are heading into town.
After a brief discussion about where to dump the car and switch to the underground, I decide to drive to High Holborn. Using positive thinking we pass the British Museum, turn right and park in a space that has just opened up. A quick call to mobile parking and we’re all set.
2:01pm. Ring the bell. No time for lunch yet. Turns out to be a very interesting meeting with a high street bank wishing to offload loans. An hour and a half later we find ourselves back on the street grabbing a quick sandwich. Get in the car and head back to Borehamwood HQ.
We hardly have time to speak with two new enquiries for me and several calls to Nick
4:49pm. We finally arrive back at the office.
I have a large loan to fund so it's time to send out the terms to investors.
5:00pm. I am into the case managers’ office to discuss the day’s updates on several pending loan cases.
After several more email clearings, it's 6 pm and the office is clearing out for the day. The phones have died down and I can get on with preparing terms for two of the cases I agreed today. This doesn't take too long and I get them emailed to the brokers by 6:30pm. A call home to warn I am going to be late.
Emails are now flooding in from our funders on the loan I sent out earlier, each requiring a reply. An hour and a half rushes by and at 8:15pm I decide to head home.
It’s 9pm now and dinner is forgotten. I’m back on the iPad to answer the accumulated emails from the last hour.
At last a window of opportunity to deal with some reports required for the upcoming board meeting.
Midnight and a quick check shows an email count of 157 - pretty usual for a weekday. No more moves on my chess games so I will try to get a good night’s sleep. Oh yes, perhaps I should write this blog first. 1:10 am.
David is a Director at West One.
