The Apprentice 2012 Week 10
The task this week was to procure deals from high class establishments for a special one-day only offer to be offered on a deal-a-day website Keynoir. After almost being fired last week Stephen was appointed the project manager of Sterling and Jade for Phoenix strangely without much argument from the others, particularly Adam. They met up with the CEO of the website who told them that they operated at the high end of the market and didn’t want any old tut.
For Sterling Stephen decided to go with Gabrielle whereas Ricky went off on his own. The other team having one more member had two teams of two with Jade and Nick and Tom and Adam working together. Jade’s team stayed behind for a while deciding where best to go and made some appointments before the set off rather than Sterling’s more on the fly approach.
Jade and Nick visited a posh female-only spa, Sanctuary, where they managed to get a great deal on a spa treatment getting a 50% percent discount and then nearly lost a great deal in top London brasserie The Gilbert Scott by momentarily forgetting how to use a calculator but managed to bag it in the end. Tom and Adam were not so lucky but managed to get a couple of deals themselves by the end of the day.
For Sterling Stephen and Gabriele first approached a dentist and then later on one of those fish-spa thingies. They also got a deal on a virtual golf experience. Ricky on the other hand spent the whole day going into restaurants and getting free plates of scollops, managing to get a couple of deals in between scoffing his face.
One of the ideas that Sterling had was to try and place all of their eggs in one basket by going to Champneys near Tring a luxury spa hotel but between the three of them it was decided that it was too far to travel and it would be better to try and get as many deals as they possibly could in the time they had available.
By the end of the day Sterling had 9 deals to offer the website and Phoenix only had 6. It would depend on what offers the website chose and the amount of sales that the produced as to who would win the task.
Out of the 9 deals that Sterling put to Keynoir only three of them were accepted totalling £6440 with only 2 of the 6 deals got by Phoenix were accepted totalling £14,563. This left Sterling the losers and Stephen with egg on his face after promising Lord Sugar last week that if he was made project manager the he would win. Whatever you say mate.
As there were only three team members left the all went back into the boardroom and Stephen admitted that he had lost but that he wasn’t really responsible for the loss and that Gabrielle should be the one fired as she had been the least productive team member on the task.
Ricky admitted that he probably should have spent less time eating and asked for more deals than he did and thought that Stephen should be fired as he was the project manager and they lost and also because he wasn’t firm enough in stamping his authority on the task and insisting that he go to Champneys where they might have won the task instead.
Stephen did his usual trick of trying to deflect blame from himself and was convinced that he had got away with it when Gabrielle as fired for not performing on that task and also for probably going as far along the process as she was likely to until Lord Sugar decided to fire him as well after he had laid down the gauntlet the previous week.
I was sad to see Gabrielle go, but it was high time that Stephen was fired and I didn’t shed a tear when he left in the taxi.
Book review : Mostly Harmless
Mostly Harmless by Douglas Adams
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
It is probably true to say that Mostly Harmless was one book too far for The Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy series, as although well written and entertaining to read, it lacked a lot of the humour and the warmth that were inherent in the earlier books which made them such a joy to read.
Only a few of the characters from the first book made an appearance here with Zaphod Beeblebrox being the obvious exception, and this wasn’t as chock full of wonderful and wacky ideas as the others had been which was a bit of shame really as they were always the highlights of the other books in the series.
I can’t really say that this is a bad book, because it isn’t; I can’t say that it is badly written either, because it isn’t, but it just isn’t as good as some of the other books in the series, but at least it does provide a conclusion to the whole story, even if it is rather underwhelming after everything that had come before it.
I would read this if you had been following the story since the first book, but if you had never read another book in the series then I wouldn’t bother as you wouldn’t want this to be the only book in the series that you had read, and be representative of the Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy as a whole.
Book review : Campaign
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Campaign is unlike any Doctor Who book that I have ever, or will ever read. Once you have read it you can sort of understand why BBC book refused to publish it in the form that it was in, but you also wish that it had been published because it really would have been a major kick in the teeth for the books as this was so different to anything else that it had published before, or would publish again.
So experimental is this book in style and in content when compared to the standard Doctor Who novels that are out there especially in its presentation on the page itself which in this novel is often somewhat different to the normal style of the book range.
I personally think that BBC books were scared to print this is in its original form and how it is presented here because it was so out of the ordinary when compared to the normal Doctor Who books and perhaps a lot of the readers wouldn’t take to this very experimental book. Personally I think that this is a crying shame because this book is certainly an interesting read.
I am not saying that it is brilliant, because it isn’t, it does have a lot of problems, but what I like about it is that is different and it is not afraid to tell the story in an inventive and clever way and for that reason and that reason alone this is a book worth reading.
Book review : Seventy-Seven Clocks
Seventy-Seven Clocks by Christopher Fowler
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Seventy-Seventy Clocks is the third book in the Bryant and May series and although I enjoyed reading the book with its outlandish plot twists and turns and ending I did find this book to be a bit to far fetched (when compared to the others that I have read) for my liking, but it was a very enjoyable read all the same.
I think this is due to the writing which is always interesting to read and is often rather witty and clever. I did like all the little comments about the differences between life in the nineteen seventies (when the actions is set) and the present day, some of the things that were said were quite funny with hindsight.
Like the previous book in the series there was lots of interesting minutiae about art history, Victorian societies, Gilbert and Sullivan operas, historical guilds, watchmakers etc which is all very fascinating and makes for an interesting read as well as teaching you stuff about things that you probably knew nothing about in my case quite a lot of stuff in this book.
There is a hell of a lot going on in this book which is the longest (it runs to 450 pages) and most complicated of the books in the series so far, but it still remains enjoyable and a pleasure to read with its interesting team of characters in the peculiar crimes unit who are always fun to learn new things about.
Book review : The Diary of a Doctor Who Addict
The Diary Of A Dr Who Addict by Paul Magrs
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Diary of a Doctor Who Addict is a book about a young lad growing up in the north east of England in the early nineteen eighties over a couple of years when he is just about to turn thirteen.
Quite a large portion of the events in the book would be rather familiar to people who grew up at around the same time and had the same interests as the lead character. The author of the book is a good few years older than me so whilst I did identify with the main character of the book it was more because I was also a Doctor Who fan at that age (and an inveterate reader) even if it was more in, the mid eighties than the earlier eighties that I was of a similar age to the main protagonist.
As a Doctor Who fan I enjoyed picking out all the references to different stories as well and that is what I most enjoyed about the book, as well as totally understanding many of the frustrations of the main character although I could just as easily identify with some of the characteristics of the main characters best friend as well.
The Apprentice 2012 Week 9
This week’s task was to raise the awareness of English Sparkling wine by creating a promotional campaign including a new image, website and an online marketing campaign.
One of the first things that happened in this episode was the fact that Lord Sugar gave Phoenix the chance to pick which member of Sterling they wanted to join their team as Phoenix only had three members compared to the five that comprised Sterling. Without much deliberation they chose Nick and so the teams were now more finely balanced than they were at the start of the day.
The project managers were chosen next and Tom put himself forward for a second time on the basis that he was in the wine trade, which was fair enough really and it was assumed that with him on board they couldn’t possibly fail. Despite each member asking to be considered as project manager it was Ricky Martin who was chosen by a show of hands.
Tom took Adam with him to sample English sparkling wine and have a jolly good time whilst Nick and Jade slaved away on the marketing campaign for them.
Ricky took Jena with him to sample the wine leaving Gabrielle and Stephen to start work on the actual campaign. Gabrielle goes about things the right way whereas Stephen storms in head first like a bull in a china shop. He also starts brainstorming ideas for a brand name to suggest English wine and comes up with Cert, Grandeur and Chink. Grandeur is the one they choose as the best of the three names that they had, despite no being their English sounding.
With Tom and Adam to busy drinking wine to be of much use to them Nick and Jade come up with the idea of using the initials E.S.W and incorporate that into a logo. On the other team the more creative Gabrielle comes up a logo of a rose as a wine glass which ticks both the boxes of Englishness and the wine itself.
The next day half of team worked on the website with the others filming an online advert. For Sterling Tom and Nick work on the website leaving Jade and Adam to film the advert with Jenna and Stephen filming the advert for Phoenix and Gabrielle and Ricky working on the website.
Jenna and Stephen with the instructions to make a classy online advert proceeded to do the exact opposite of Ricky’s instructions and produce a rather excruciating advert based around a wedding reception where the bride is give some horrible wine instead of the lovely English sparkling wine that she requested. Jade and Adam’s film wasn’t much better but just concentrated on showing the wine, the logo and people enjoying the wine itself.
When the project managers got to saw the films that had been produced neither was totally happy with Tom worried that theirs was boring and Ricky worried that theirs was too cheesy.
Once everything had been completed both teams had to make a presentation to experts in the field and show what they had done. The experts then fed back to Lord Sugar and the teams wouldn’t know what had happened until they had gone back to the boardroom.
In the boardroom Phoenix was told, in no uncertain terms that their website was mainly aimed at selling rather than to showcase the wines and that Sterling’s website was more what they wanted to see.
As for the promotional films Phoenix’s was considered to be a bit boring and no different to countless other videos about wine but Sterling’s was derided for being cheesy and not taking the whole thing seriously.
Due in part to the cheesy nature of the video it was Sterling who ultimately lost despite actually having the better campaign.
Ricky immediately went on the defensive laying the entire blame in the hands of Stephen and Jenna who had produced a cheesy video contrary to his instructions of not making a cheesy video and Stephen and Jenna countered with the argument that he should have been there to supervise the video if he wanted it done in a specific way and not just let them get on with it as it he had done.
Ricky didn’t have a case against Gabrielle who had just got on with the task at hand and had been instrumental in creating the logo for the website which was the one thing about their campaign that was liked b the experts.
When it came to choosing the two people he was going to bring back into the boardroom with him for a grilling he chose Jenna and Stephen, which was fair enough as Gabrielle wasn’t at all responsible for the advert, or for the general failure of the task.
When they returned Ricky carried on with his assessment of the task being that they failed because of the advert which he told them wasn’t good enough; Jenna said that she took a risk in making the advert in the way that she did but that if Ricky was really unhappy about the execution of it then he should have been more involved in the creation of it and Stephen tried to deflect everything away from him whenever he spoke.
After much deliberation it was decided that Jenna was the person who would be fired as it was her that was responsible for the travesty of a advert, but it could easily have been Ricky who was fired for not actually taking any responsibility for the advert and letting her get on with it, without actually checking that it was what he wanted in the first place it could also have been Stephen for not really getting involved in the task in any meaningful way.
Personally although Jenna did do a bad job of making the advert, and went totally against what the project manager specified, Stephen should have gone as he didn’t really contribute to the task and just tried to deflect attention away from himself in the boardroom.
