No stress!!

~~~
"The legal community was left reeling this week after Matthew Courtney, a 27-year-old IP associate, fell to his death.
Matthew had joined [a certain magic circle firm beginning with the letter "F"] as a trainee in 2004. A spokesman for the firm said that he "was a terrific person and a very promising lawyer" and that everyone had been shocked by his death. Matthew died instantly after he fell from a stairwell leading to a restaurant at Tate Modern last Friday evening.
The press has already come to its own conclusions, claiming that Matthew had been brutalised on the hours ("16 hours a day, seven days a week" according to the Times) and had been extremely stressed. But RollOnFriday has heard that he was very cheerful and generally billed a civilised 40 hours a week. This stepped up in the two weeks prior to his death because a deal he was working on was closing, but only to 60 hours a week. Tough, but hardly into all-nighter territory and par for the course at a major City firm. Matthew's father has commented that when they last spoke there was no suggestion of "anything untoward", and the police are currently treating it as an unexplained accident. The inquest began yesterday." - the latest from Roll-on-Friday

Here's the deal:

Stress is a ba-a-a-a-a-a-ad thing indeed, and poor Matt has paid the price in true dramatic fashion - throwing himself (and all the agony of written-off and unbilled time) into the moat of grey concrete around the Tate. (At least that is what the other gossip columns say, and why not believe them when their story seems all the more poignant than that stairwell thing?!)

So I came in to work this Monday, and found out that the Partners in my department had a quick and dirty meeting during the weekend to discuss how to keep us away from tall buildings and sharp objects. Matt's little modern art exhibition had obviously given all of them ulcers. We were all herded into a conference room on Tuesday and given a little talk on managing stress. Then we were all taught how to "Calm down in one minute". Really! The process goes like this:

(Step no. 1) Breathe in through your nose on a slow count of three.
(Step no 2.) Push your stomach out as you breathe in.
(Step no 3.) Breathe out through your mouth on a slow count of six.
(Step no. 4.) Repeat Step 1. to Step 3. at least two more times.

Tips:

If you feel light-headed breathe more slowly.
Practice three times a day and you will remember the steps when you are stressed out.

Needless to say there was a lot of heavy breathing in the office that day!


Well, what do I do when I get stressed? - Now mind you, it happens quite regularly nowadays... See, at this very point as I type out on this blog, I am waiting for a faxed letter from New York; arguing with a very sleepy lawyer in Hong Kong and watching e-mails boomerang to and fro between very confused clients who have too much money and no clue what to do with it. So yes, I get stressed but I have the best remedy I know! A little game I am playing over this week on my new favourite internet site!

The game is :

Choose the best sofa for my new home

The choices are (in no particular order)...

OPTION 1
Modern corner unit, comfy colours and large enough to sit 6 visitors. Issue: Will I have 6 visitors???

OPTION 2

Simple all-leather black sofa - never goes out of style - portable into any decor scheme - ah... but good Lordy-Lord! How bloody boring!!!

OPTION 3

A black sofa bed, modern, big enough for me, my bum and I, but "artificial leather"????

OPTION 4

Black leather sofa - simply grand - a nice bit-o'-class - but bloody hell! At £1500???

OPTION 5

We-e-ell... this what you get for £20.00...

OPTION 6

... and this one will give me a back-ache...

OPTION 7

...and this one will give me sore eyes...

OPTION 8

...and what EXACTLY would you call THIS???

OPTION 9

Mummy would like this... Granny too. Me? I would willingly commit arson to get rid of it!

and finally...

OPTION 10

'nuff said!

And now the best part of the game starts! The whole game gets directed at you - yes YOU reader! See, I have bought one of these sofas over this week, and it is sitting in my living room right now. If you guess correctly which one - aha!! then you get a free air ticket to come over to my place and sit in it! No really! It is a promise, and the riverman~~~ never lies! At the very least it will be test of how well you know the riverman~~~ (and for the people who have known me for over 10 years... no excuse will suffice if you get it wrong!).

So happy guessing... and no stress ya!?