It was great to see Natalie Read, business development manager for Orion Expedition Cruises this week, when she dropped in with her pal Kenny. Stroking his ears, she briefed us about developments to the company’s product range.
And before you break out in a sweat about inappropriate relationships with colleagues, Kenny is a cuddly toy koala who is a celebrity in his own right. If you do a booking with Orion, you could get the chance to capture a koala of your very own.
Natalie is somewhat prone to mishap and we can only hope that 2011 does not continue in the manner in which it started. First, the poor girl filled up with petrol and while she was inside the kiosk paying, an opportunist thief stole her bag from the car.
I sympathised with her. A girl’s bag is so revealing. After all, who’d want a stranger rummaging through your vitamin supplements, medicated toilet tissue and emergency knickers?
Bad ski run of luck
But Nat’s bad luck hadn’t stopped there. When she first walked into the shop, I thought she’d overdone her eye make-up, but up close, I could see she had a black eye. She rolled her eyes and said, “I’m blaming my partner.”
I raised my eyebrows, wondering if I should get in touch with ‘Woman’s Hour’ with a story of domestic strife, but it turns out he was only responsible for taking her skiing.
“I was worried about the bad weather, but Ashley [Dellow, head of sales for Leger Holidays] assured me it would be fine.”
Apparently, poor visibility led to Nat falling unceremoniously out of a gondola and hitting the ice at velocity. At least Ashley had the good grace to feel guilty when he removed her goggles to see her swollen cheek and black eye.
I told Nat that she wasn’t alone, as anyone who’d seen Mandy Nickerson at the recent Travel Weekly Globe Travel Awards would testify. I bumped into Mandy in the loos where she promptly revealed her injury and told me about the Bales’ Christmas party at which the karaoke had been a big feature.
Mandy got up to do her number, but her co-ordination was somewhat lacking and she whacked herself in the eye with the microphone. It will take more than a shiner to take the shine off Mandy!
2008 prices – yes please!
Back in the office, I was confronted by an elderly lady with a 2008 Page & Moy brochure.
“I’ve circled the tour I want and the price I can pay, so I’ll leave it with you,” she said.
Bless her. The tour no longer exists, and those prices? Well, 2008 seems a long time ago!