Either way, as ever, my best wishes for wherever you take Bluebird to the water. Your story is inspirational and needs to be told to as wide an audience as possible.
Thanks Stuart, kind words and good to know you're still looking in on us. For those who don't know, Stuart and his team were instrumental in making our engine run using many original components a complete success.
The BBP press release and press call were two weeks after this date and the LDNPA statement was itself made long after the date of the BBP press announcement (27th February). The Bluebird Project was not 'still in conversation with the LDNPA' from the 9th February and this lasted until our Project Leader received a telephone call last week in an attempt to resolve the date 'problem'.
That was no attempt to resolve the date problem. It was a panicked bleat about how we absolutely
must make an application to run
K7 - not a chance. I said we'd speak again once they'd sorted the timing issue and written to us to that effect. Mr Bureaucrat then told me in warning tones there's rules that we 'ignore at our peril' (all I could do to keep from bursting out laughing at that) and that as a member of the business community I must understand this because I know I have have to pay my VAT. Oh, puh-lease...
Well, Mr Jobsworth, if you're reading this... do your due diligence on me and you'll find that I enjoy a spot of peril whilst I'll bet a fiver you've never been self-employed.
We are, apparently, no different to someone who may, for instance, want to hold a synchronised swimming tournament in Wastwater. That's as may be on paper but I doubt very much that ballsing up a synchronised swimming tournament would get you the sack.
This is different, I tried to explain. Nothing like anything that's gone before or likely will again. A mind-blowing piece of history, an opportunity as wide as it's long and deserving of special consideration, a veritable feast of possibilities...
But rules are rules... How do people live like that? Perhaps, you know how you can get a guide dog for the blind, maybe you can nowadays get a thinking dog for the stupid and we should have a whip-round to get them one.
And from another source, not Mr. Jobsworth at the
Lackadaisical Display of Not Producing Anything this time. I was told that a potential showstopper was traffic management and closing a single road meant a bureaucratical excursion to the terrifying heights of County Council level - eek! And that they wouldn't touch it without a feasibility study that would cost £3K that isn't to be had.
Now then, we've been quietly taking your donated money and flogging you DVDs for ten years and chucking every penny we could save into a pot while we work and travel as volunteers. What this means is that when we had to sign a cheque last week for our accommodation on Bute, a handful of modest apartments, the cash was at hand, so why couldn't our wannabe partners afford their feasibility study?
The excuse was that nothing could be done because we'd never given them a 'when'.
Now, as I've said already - I care not how hopeless or disorganised anyone wants to be just so long as they don't attempt to shift any hint of blame to our side of the table because we are neither hopeless nor disorganised and have done everything expected of us.
I'd wager that the County Council has absolutely no idea
when they'll next be washed out and have half of their roads and bridges carried away by flash floods - but I bet they have a plan.
No excuses, please.