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flights earlier that day! It took us 4 hours, with one call of 140 minutes, but we did manage to change the
tickets, and at minimal cost. (see miNiZ105 for another David story)

Actually, although David was chaotic in his personal life he was a very good businessman and salesman.
At one time he was the majority shareholder and Chairman of the largest independent insurance broking
company in the UK. His business life turned chaotic for a time (this is David we are talking about) but I am
not at liberty to share that part of his life with you.

David was twice in the Guinness Book of Records for bottle collecting. Firstly for the largest unduplicated
collection of miniature Scotch bottles (over 25,000) and later for the largest collection of miniature
Guinness. Separate from his formal business he also ran Mini Bottles UK. This made the series of much
sought after UK building ceramics, the even more sought after Goebel Clown
bottles, as well as many, many straight bottles. These included ‘specials’ for
company give-aways etc. and the famous ‘watch’ bottles. The watch bottles were
made for the birth of Prince William but, in typical David fashion, things went
wrong. When delivered it was discovered that the printing was badly rubbed on
most of them. After months of arguments with the supplier it was too late to sell
these bottles in quantity. David & Lynn therefore stripped the labels off most of
them and the series of (twelve I think) flower bottles was born.

R.I.P. David – you will be missed.

David Smith

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