THOSE of you in the working world will be deliriously happy to note that this year's National Meetings Week will be from October 6 to 11.

I know I told you about this last year, but promotional material for the 2003 event catches my eye again.

It seems we should now be worried about "meetings avoidance syndrome."

Perhaps this terrible condition is explained by a survey which shows that a third of people who attend meetings think they are boring, a waste of time and are too often held out of habit rather than necessity.

The other two thirds, presumably, are sad people who enjoy them.

A poll of organisers found that 80 per cent think there are too many skivers and people who should be delegates are staying away.

National Meetings Week aims to convince us that this is a bad thing 'cos the chinwagging industry is worth £6 billion to the UK each year.

Nowhere in the stuff I have here does it say that you cannot blame bright people if they choose to be elsewhere.

You simply have to applaud the imagination shown when it comes to making excuses.

Examples include: "A blackbird is nesting in my car and the eggs are about to hatch" and "my cat hid the car keys."

Then there was the delegate who stopped to relieve himself in a lay-by and had his car stolen.

Presumably he was really down the pub with the chap who claimed he could not get out of the house because the dog would not let him.

I can sympathise with people like this because I was once unable to attend a conference after the Martian spaceship which abducted me chose to return me to a quiet Lakeland mountain rather than a stuffy hotel in Manchester.

Believe what you want, I don't care.

The co-ordinator of National Meetings Week, Martin Lewis, believes they should be perceived as "wish to attend" rather than "seek to avoid" events.

Accordingly, ideas are being floated to encourage people to turn up when they should.

These include free booze throughout, boxing gloves to thump managers and lap dancing in the mid-morning coffee break.

Sorry, my mind is running away with me.

These thoughts are not being discussed at all, but there is talk of offering a bonus or some other incentive for attendees.

Other recommendations include better lunches, reducing the length of sessions and starting with some lively jazz.

Initiatives around Manchester are set to feature a "Meetings with Mirth" promotion by the Bolton-based M61 hoteliers' group which seeks to use humour as a means of achieving more productive business get-togethers.

My sides are sore already.

Moving on, I notice that the Rank Group wants to move its bingo operation out of the former Odeon cinema in Ashburner Street and create a bingo hall and casino inside the old Sainsbury's building.

If this happens it raises a question about the future of the distinctive Odeon.

It would be really helpful if some imaginative developer was to come along and turn it into a modern cinema/arts complex able to accommodate top live acts of the day.