LITTLE DEUCE COUPE

Dark Lady turned up on Friday after a punishing week at work and - so being a warm, kind, gentle attentive etc. - when she suggested we went out for a curry rather than her cooking, I generously agreed!

I have a curious relationship with curry. I can still smell and taste those 70s meals in flock-wallpapered restaurants. When the eating wasn't about the food it was about proving your manhood. When a selection of drunken blokes would order the hottest thing on the menu (all in a comedy Indian accent straight out of It Ain't 'alf Hot Mum. So un-PC was it that I shudder at the thought of how those poor waiters must have felt).

No wonder we were poisoned on a fairly regular basis. What acts of germicidal or chemical revenge went on in the kitchens is anyone’s guess. I used to eat them on a fairly frequent basis when money allowed. Impressing women with your ability to sup at the lava flow that was a Vindaloo whilst discussing the merits or de-merits of Emerson Lake and Palmer whilst airily dismissing the whole of the Motown catalogue as "pop fluff"! This was the height of sophistication in Walsall back in '74.

It may also explain why, with breath that could stun an ox, why I rarely got kissed.

One such evening upon dropping off my date (nope, no kiss, not even a peck) I drove home in my recently-purchased, very second-hand Fiat 500. (Terminal halitosis and a car that was scarcely a motor vehicle, let alone a babe magnet). I felt a little strange in the stomach area. Hmm…what was this. Was it sexual frustration? Possibly. Was it the realisation that I had struck out yet again? Probably. As I pulled up outside my parents’ house the truth hit me.

"WWWWHHHOOAOOOOAOAAAAARRRRGGGGHHHHH"!!

That’s better..."WWWEHHHHHOOOOOOAAARRRGGGGUUUUGGGHHHHH"

Oh god....how one stomach could hold so much rice!

And so it went on for quite some time until I heard the front door open and my Dad was standing there ready to go out on a night call. As he was a Doctor you would have thought one of his first jobs would be to minister to his ailing 18 year-old.

Sizing up the situation with an expert and practiced eye he said:

"You don't look very well. I'd go to bed if I were you"

With that he was gone as his Peugeot 504 swept around the corner into the night.

You notice that I have been mentioning old cars in this blog. This is to set the scene for last Saturday when I was kindly invited to judge the Classic Car Show as part of Hastings Week.

Each year, a fine selection of cars - old and not-quite-so-old - gather in the Old Town to be polished and cherished by their proud owners. What I like about the show and also what makes me terribly nostalgic is that the vast majority of these vehicles are, dare I describe them as, ordinary, mass produced cars. Not a single E-Type nor Aston Martin did I see. There was one Rolls Royce, but mainly we were talking Fords, Reliants, Vauxhalls etc. All daily drivers from the 50's to the 80's. All buffed by their proud owners. Every one a winner. However, my job was to choose just one from the 60 or so on show.

With passing age I note that cars that people now consider "Classic" are in fact ones that family members drove. A Vauxhall Magnum. The Viva version being the car I was taught to drive in back in 1973. A seemingly ancient Vauxhall being one like my father had. Several Austin Minis, which my Dad and my Mum used complete with the starter button on the floor and a rubber covered chord that acted as a door handle. It could have been a car park from a photograph taken in 1980 anywhere in the UK.

So congratulations to Carolyn Bates, proud owner of an Austin Metropolitan.

You can see her car and a selection of others on my Facebook page  (visit here) as I have posted a couple of short "films" of the event on there.

I have also realised that the Jewellery related cliffhanger from yesterday’s blog has still not been resolved and I have run out of time.

Until tomorrow’s un-missable instalment. Safe driving and remember "NEVER MIX RADIAL AND CROSSPLY ON THE SAME AXLE"!

I'M A LITTLE BIT DRUNK AND I NEED YOU RIGHT NOW

Thursday evening and another one in a great series of BBC Radio 2 Concerts: Lady Antebellum. Was hoping that the Dark Lady was going to be able to make it but major tycooning took her to Doncaster so she wasn't able to get back in time which was a bit of a shame. So popped into the pub round the corner from the BBC to find the usual suspects priming themselves!

Lady Antebellum were just fab and you can hear the concert this coming Thursday at 8pm here on Radio 2.

Earlier I had been to the gym to be generally forced to stretch. Pull. Hop. Twist and pant. Not entirely sure why I do this, apart from my total lack of will power. So as a last ditch attempt to stop myself turning into Jabba the Hutt and expire with a massive coronary, I place myself in the rather less than tender hands of Wes. He is a nice young man, but like most trainers, I think has a cruel streak. He enjoys making people suffer. Or maybe just me. He is very good at it. Lots of undignified exercises and I can certainly appreciate the difference, as can the DL. The downside of this is that there is always a bit of me that aches or twinges. This is a similar argument to the one we had with "National String Week" on the show: what is the difference between string and twine.? So what is the difference between an ache and a twinge?

Friday came and I hauled my twinge-ridden and aching carcass onto the train and headed to Hastings. Time to tidy the house before the Dark Lady arrived. I moved a few bits and pieces around before the draw of the TV. I have been slightly in the doghouse lately as I bought her a little charm bracelet and some charms. Promising to have the charms affixed at the jewellers had placed the envelope containing them somewhere safe. After my week clearing the garage I had removed vast piles of paper from all sorts of surfaces and taken them to the recycling bin.

A cold horror slowly crept over me when I realised that the last place I had seen the envelope was on the kitchen table amid a pile of newspapers. Maybe the safe place hadn't been so safe after all. Maybe I had accidentally "recycled" them! I couldn't find them so was going to have to own up. I wasn't sure I could stand to see her little disappointed face.

What was the best thing to do?

Rush out and buy some more and try and pretend they were the same ones? Hmmm. I bought them off the market and so they wouldn't match ones from jewellers which would also cost an arm and a leg.

Own up?

Own up and fall to the floor weeping hoping for sympathy?

As I have intimated on the programme before maybe the answer was to faint "strategically"!

Find out in the next thrilling instalment of…

ALEX LESTER'S DAILY BLOG.

"AND SOMEONE SNEAKIN' ROUND THE CORNER..."

Another day and another phone call from the hardware shop.

"Your knives are ready"

Dark Lady loves cooking and so over the years has amassed a formidable array of weaponry. Yet years of constant use mean they have become somewhat blunt. Like many things in life. Eyesight. Gum recession. Walking pace. This has been a gradual process until you realise that cutting a tomato means sawing away to little or no effect or squashing it on the work surface.

Something had to be done. So last week I took 9 of the not-so-lethal weapons to a local hardware shop to have them sharpened. Due to an intervention by the DL I didn't take them all to be fixed at the same time. Blunt they may have been but a blunt knife is better at cutting than no knife.

So the final four were ready and I slunk back to the shop to collect them.

"You a Chef?" asked the guy behind the counter.

Suppose it must have looked a little odd. Same bloke comes in with a load of knives. Goes away and comes back the next day with a load more to be serviced.

To begin with I was a little concerned to be wandering around a populous area laden with lethal weaponry. However, in the end you just forget about it and get on with it.

This was the undoing of a rather ditsy friend of mine who had linked up with a few mates in the pub one night before heading off to Germany to following morning early.

Well the evening wore on and much drink was consumed and she accepted a little gift from her friends and weaved her weary way home.

The following morning the alarm shook her noisily awake and, realising that she would be late if she didn't hurry and had - in her inebriated state - forgotten to pack for her weekend away, grabbed the bag she had been given by her friends the night before and flung a few things in, being careful to not include her ticket and passport. After all there are fewer dumber things to do that turn up for a flight without the right paperwork.

With minutes to spare she rushed to the check-in.

"Is this bag yours?"

Asked the rather stern unsmiling airline employee.

"Yes"

"Did you pack it yourself"?

"Yes"

"I SUPPOSE YOU THINK THIS IS FUNNY?!!!!!"

…barked the official who had now been joined by the Police.

She was hustled into a side room and every item was removed from her bag as questions were hurled at my hung-over, bewildered and increasingly frightened friend.

Eventually her belongings were handed back to her with a lecture on how, in this day and age, chances could not be taken with anyone and she should have thought of that before she played such a terrible trick on the hard working front line staff.

As she tottered out to catch her plane (although by now that had gone so she had to get a seat on the next one) she wondered what on earth she had done to elicit this terrible response.

As she sat down and prepared to put her bag in the overhead locker, she got the first sober chance to look at it since she had received it in the pub the evening before....

It was a novelty case. Written on the side in large black letters was one word:

BOMB!

"FINGER ON YOUR EYEBROW..?"

Day two of the daily blog and I have been forced to confront the awful shocking truth that stares back at me every morning at 1am. MY FACE!

Yes, I have long grown used to the "great face for radio" jibes (this often happens after one of my fleeting TV appearances). In other words, every ten years or so. So make a date with me some time in 2020 for my next scintillating cameo.

The hooting can often occur upon entering a pub and encountering several lairy blokes who are even less well grouped than myself. Think of the famous chart of Evolution and think of some of the creatures at the start. Yup, you get the picture.

At some point over the last 15 years my eyebrows appear to have vanished. One moment they were there…the next gone!

Hair still grows normally where it should except there.

I am trying to put a gloss on it but I think it now precludes me from a number of roles.

For example, being a Ross Kemp/Vinnie Jones type hard man. Shaven heads are fine but you have to be able to cultivate that “don't mess with me.....SHUT IT!!!” persona if you can't do the facial expressions. Although in truth, with Vin in particular, there aren't that many facial expressions to begin with.

Dark Lady drew them in for a lark with an eyebrow pencil. She laughed.

I am aware there is another of those epidemic type films out soon: "Contagion". I am going to try and frighten people by saying that only people with no or severely reduced eyebrows will survive the coming horror. Although like most films of this type, a small child and a dog will also survive.

Or then again maybe I can have it registered as a disability and so I can get on "The Week’s Good Cause" on Radio 4. Failing that a selection of musicians and "celebs" down on their luck who think that a charity record could put them back on top
Who needs to be on there to make it credible

Uh oh....here comes Bono!

WELCOME BACK MY FRIENDS!

So to the first in a new venture for the blog: I am turning it from a lengthy weekly/bi-weekly dissertation to a daily diary. We shall try it and see if you like it.

What I have learned after 34 years in this industry on both sides of the fence - not only the BBC but also in the Commercial sector – is that change is difficult and not always welcome.

In my experience change occurs in two forms:

1) Changes are made it is a success. Senior management take the credit

2) " " " " " " failure. You take the blame.

In commercial radio I was once told by the boss:

"If it works I'll say it was my idea. If it fails it’s your fault."

Then a few years later at the BBC, the then-Boss said to me:-

"Don't like what you are doing"

Me: "What do you want me to do?"

"As soon as I hear it, I'll tell you!"

There is another side to this in that people end up being paralysed by fear of change so nothing is ever tried which leads everything to stagnate. Or there is a sudden rush to change just for the sake of it. This leads to terrible blunders and catastrophic failures. If this happens at the BBC the response is usually: "A bold experiment" and then it is quietly forgotten.

All this is a very long winded way of saying I am trying to do something a little different to that which I have been doing since 2007.

Out with some friends down the pub on Friday night, Dark Lady woke up Saturday morning and discovered that she had lost her charm bracelet. When I say it was a charm bracelet it was a tiny silver chain with a small silver star on it engraved with the letter "R". This was a clumsy attempt by me to reinforce the difference between left and right. Very early on in our relationship it became obvious that this was her one blind spot and so I thought this would help her differentiate between the two hands, particularly useful when driving.

Before I get too smug I must point out that she is a far, far better driver than myself and it was only last weekend as we drove across a mini roundabout in Hastings en route to buy pie that her cry of "STTTTOOOOOOOOOPPPPPPPPPP!!!!" alerted me to the fact that I hadn't seen the car speeding from the right straight towards us.

Saturday and it was up to the Midlands to see my Dad who was busy digging out his compost heap. (We Lester's are just built for a good time) and up to Halfpenny Green Airfield to do a little flying. Nice headwind which meant I was airborne in about twenty feet...or so it seemed and headed south to Kidderminster. Looped round the town and headed back to the field. With the wind at my back it only seemed to take about ten minutes before I was back on the ground again with that novice pilot feeling

"Yessss I cheated death again"!

Sunday back down to the DL who had whomped up (Nerd Note: Granny in the Beverley Hillbillies regularly "Whomped up" a mess of vittles) a whole host of food. From Chilli through to a fantastic potato, bacon and cheese pie. As a result, I sat otter -like on the sofa until bedtime.

Then a new week started and arrived at the studio in time to see the remains of Strangelove.

As you have pointed out for a man who spends such a lot of time in the gym he gets a lot of colds etc. He now has a spectacular one which is pure comedy. Well, from where I was sitting it was: red-faced, eyes streaming, spectacular sneezing. It was a hoot. Although I have a suspicion that he will have the last laugh. Vanessa Feltz pops in to say good morning most days. Monday she opened the door, got halfway in, saw what was left of Strangeo and was off again. Never seen her move so fast!

SAME OLD USED TO BE!

Due to a combination of other commitments (inertia and not leading a glittery showbiz lifestyle) I thought it may be good opportunity to change the way I do the blog.

I have been writing these since 2007 including three "American Adventure" road trip blogs; these in particular have been a lot of fun to do as I sat in any one of 100 often grim motel rooms in the Mid-West tapping out my thoughts and impressions of the day whilst filling myself up with fizzy beer. Had I been Ernest Hemingway, in the morning I would have doubtless woken to a destroyed room with a waste basket full of empty bottles and the floor littered with crumpled pieces of paper, all failed furious first drafts. Oh, also utilising my limited knowledge of Hemingway there would probably one or more of the following in the bed: 1) Hooker. 2) A big fish like a Tuna. 3) A "Death in the Afternoon" Bull corpse.

Dark Lady - whilst not being a vegetarian - would probably draw the line at at least one of these!

(Yes, you guessed. Sorry. No blokes’ porn film fantasies in this blog).

What I would like to try is to write a shorter daily blog rather than a weekly/bi weekly longer one.

Research shows we now have the average attention span of a....

(Some hours pass)

Sorry, went to make myself a cup of tea and got roped into a couple of episodes of Camper Van Crisis.

Where was I? Ah yes. I thought it would be fun to try the blog as a sort of daily diary and see how that goes down.

However, just to bring us up to date before we try this new way of operating:

Since I last wrote a number of things have been going on. First off a triumph for chest-beating, Testosterone-fuelled man-stuff. You may remember that the DL had accidentally dropped a bunch of keys down the back of her kitchen units. How was I to retrieve them? You came up with several bright ideas which mainly involved, as I recall, wanton destruction of what is essentially a brand new kitchen. Tearing panels off was a popular choice as was poking around with sharp objects and - failing that - Dynamite.

I had a brainwave. Magnets! Just attach a magnet to a piece of string and let it down the back of the cabinet and then to use one of our favourite phrases: "hey presto" - up will come the keys!

So to the hardware shop to buy a magnet. This is no longer as easy at it sounds. Long gone are the days of magnets of the red variety with the steel "keeper" as used in cartoons to suck out heavy objects like irons that had been hidden in opponents’ boxing gloves for unfair advantage purposes.

Also, I don't remember the last time I saw a card of iron filings which with the aid of a small pencil-type magnet you could put eyebrows or a beard on a man’s face with.

Each shop I entered answered "yes" to the question, "do you stock magnets?" and duly pointed me in the direction of the fridge novelties. How the world operates now if they are the only magnets on offer, I have no idea.

I have not seen pictures of the Hadron Collider but in my mind’s eye it is a huge cylindrical apparatus covered in tiny smiling pigs, top hats and views of Salt Lake City.

My Dad is the "go to guy" for in his "man cave" he has everything you need to do anything. This has been built up and developed over half a century and now if anyone requires a differential for a 1942 Vauxhall or that little thingy that made Concorde's snoot droop: my Dad has it in his garage.

"Magnets"

"Hmm…what sort"?

He only had about half a dozen varieties including the comedy half hairpin version with the "keeper".

Now nothing I attempt is ever simple. Would I manage to find string, attach it and haul up the keys?

YESSSSS!!!

Friday before last we went of to the Festival Hall in London to see Brian Wilson of Beach Boys fame. Last year he "re-imagined" the work of George Gershwin. DL and I are huge Gershwin and Beach Boys fans so this was going to be great.

It was. Brian Wilson has had well documented mental troubles over the years but the musician is still there, even if the voice is a little wayward and he has a rather odd demeanour as he sits behind a keyboard which he rarely touches.

First half was the Gershwin part and the second was Beach Boys; hit after hit after hit. As is the case with all concerts the artist you are watching never does your favourite track. So "In My Room" was notable by its absence. DL nudged me at one point and pointed out, "How can you hear this and not be happy?"

She was quite right, of course, as we beamed our way through a fantastic evening.

Last week with the wedding now barely two months away it seemed a good idea to try and tidy up my house, as relatives will be staying, and it is rather a tip.

So I had a week off in order to clear it up and also to get rid of tons of rubbish in the garage.

First was the table in what I laughingly refer to as my "study". It is covered in bits of paper as well as being home to my computer and a printer and to give it that full "tycoon" ambience; a rather old Anglepoise lamp. I am not sure that Lord Sugar or Donald Trump have six year-old utility bills on their desks. I have. I also found a couple of cassettes and a box of cereal bars three years past their sell by date. This is the sort of stuff that has made Captain Scott's hut in the Antarctic a place of pilgrimage.

The table took a day to clear and claimed the life of my shredder. I have (had) a heavy duty document shredder which, it is claimed, can help prevent people steal your identity. Not sure why anyone would want to be me but that is another story. Still, thieves are often very dumb:

"You got me that new fake passport, Fingers?"

"Yeah, stole this guy’s identity. Dead, I think. No one will ever suspect. Sorted"

"Great. So let’s see...from now on, I am a German Dictator called Adolf...Adolf...Hitler?"

"Cushty!"

I shredded and I shredded and I shredded, pausing only for tea and the occasional episode of Top Gear on Dave.

Late that evening when all was nearly cleared I found a credit card. I had never used it but it was still valid. So I put it through the shredder as it said I could.

IT LIED!

I am still picking bits of ground up plastic out of it several days later.

The Garage proved to be a similar problem as inertia set in after the first couple of boxes were moved. I also needed to hang some bikes up on the wall and discovered my drill had somehow been parted from its chuck key. I have another cordless but that isn't really powerful enough for masonry. So I made a half-hearted attempt.

I also vacuumed the floor of ten years of accumulated dirt.

By then it was Thursday so up to London to meet up with my mate, Libido Boy, and off to the Irish Cultural Centre in Hammersmith to catch one of my favourite artists, Eleanor McEvoy. This was a benefit as the centre is threatened with closure which would be a terrible shame. Normally when he hits town we head off out to Camden later. However, he had to be up early as he had to drive to Somerset with two Chinese business people who he brought with him. A man and a woman who were very nice and very polite and for the woman it was her first trip outside of China. They were also very jet-lagged and so, during the quieter numbers, I could see their eyes closing. Eleanor was even better than ever. She too, like Brian Wilson, has been "reimagining" This time rerecording a whole lot of her finest songs for her latest album, Alone. Our Chinese friends snapped up a couple of copies after the gig so the word is being spread. Although, as she travels so widely, if a man in a pith helmet hacks his way into a clearing in deepest darkest comedy stereotype Africa and discovers a woman there he should remove his solar topee, extend his hand with the greeting: "Eleanor McEvoy, I presume?"

So it was off to bed without hitting the fleshpots. It was also very nearly the end of the week and so the end of my weeks "holiday".

I too had an early start as I had to be back in Hastings first thing as some men were coming to put some metal work in my back passage.

(Move over John Inman. Graham Norton. Larry Grayson. Alan Carr. Julian Clary. Frankie Howerd etc. )




Don't forget I am now on Facebook, you can find me here. I am also on Twitter (ooh, get me!) you can add me @alexthedarklord or visit here.

And if you want to hear a record on the shoe - maybe one you haven't heard in years, one that means
something to you or just a darned good record you think would sound great, then I would love to hear from you. Submit your suggestions here.

And - last thing - make sure you download this week's Oddcast; the funniest bits from the week all mixed together in one bite-seized chunk. Click here.

I STILL LOVE THE NIGHT LIFE

Not seen any live music for a week or two so was getting twitchy until my mate, Al Booth (who produces, among other things, The Bob Harris Country Show) said she had a couple of tickets for Brad Paisley at the O2 in London.

I had seen him before in a far small venue in London and he was amazing. Terrific guitar slinger and a demon songwriter, as well as making the most exquisite videos. If you have never seen the Vid for "Online" check it out on YouTube; it’s a peach! The only thing that marred his performance was his adoption of a faux "Briddish" accent from time to time. You don't need to do this Brad; we love you for who you are.

After the previous gig the record company or promoter sent me a questionnaire asking me what I thought. This was obviously in preparation for his major assault on Europe. I replied that he was a terrific performer but for the fake accent as it made me feel uncomfortable and him sound a bit of an idiot to these sensitive Old World ears.

Had he read the constructive criticism? No he hadn't. In fact, this time he was even worse! He - like many from across the pond - claimed British ancestry via his wife. Aaaauuugggggghhh!!!!!

I love America and its music but there is something about this thing they do that really grates. There is scarcely a U.S politician or celeb who doesn't somehow find out they are part-Irish or their great, great, great uncle came from "MANchesturrr".

I thought we had begun to move past that in an increasingly PC world.

How do US entertainers get on in other parts of the world?

"Hello Dublin...to be sure at all at all at all at all. Didn't I just see a leprechaun as I was drinking a pint of 'Gine-ness'?"

"Herro Tokyo rubbery to be here"!

"Bonjour Paris, j'aime les frogs legs et le surrendering"

"Achtung Berlin....invaded anywhere lately?"

"G'day Sydney, hands up who's a convict?!"

Wonder how we Brits would get on in the Mid-West?

"Howdy, Lexington married your 13 year old cousin yet? ptui ......tang!"

Try that and you would be full of bullet holes before you could say "right to bear arms"!

I suspect it is just me, but I though I detected Al shifting uncomfortably in her seat.

It also proves that as a producer for Bob she is an expert and I am merely an enthusiast.

Support act - Darius Rucker of Hootie and the Blowfish fame - was on fine form as well. When he launched into "It Won't Be Like This For Long", I muttered, "this is a cover, isn't it?"

"No. Track from his first album."

Ah. I heard it dozens of times on US radio and as most of the tiny stations in the Mid-West tend not to have DJ's outside of prime time (Eeeek!) no-one has any idea what is being played. So I had never put the two together artist and song.

With our new exciting Facebook feature I made a few short "films" of the gig and have posted them on there for you to have a look at, as well as other exciting and self-revelatory bits of video. Thrill to me in the pub eating pork scratching. Wow to me walking along Hastings Seafront. Be baffled by my early morning "Brown Mile" and get all unnecessary to my Fokker!

I can feel that there is a little of Stan Boardman in everyone.

"The Geermans bombed our chippie" (Repeat ad nauseam until the 70's draw to a close.)

Took Friday 26th August off, so the Dark Lady and I headed to France as we were running a little low on "Apericubes" (a tasty Gallic cheese snack) as well as wanting to catch up with some friends of ours who live in the middle of nowhere with little other than moles for company and a fine selection of food and wine.

As usual it rained but that didn't stop us having a fine old time and we were able to show them our tiny collection of several hundred pics from our US trip last June. It was gone midnight by the time we went to bed.

The following day we did a bit of sightseeing and found ourselves in a pretty little spa town Bagnoles de L'Orne which boasted a terrific chocolate shop. DL being an "L" is very keen on chocolate. Me being a "B" (fill in whatever that stands for in your eyes) is happy to come along for the ride.

It is amazing what they can make out of chocolate these days. Everything from eggs to shoes and - at this shop – great, erm, "art". For some reason a bright spark had decided that it would be fun to make scenes from the Kama Sutra out of chocolate.

So there in the window was a selection of tableaux that would make a Premiership Footballer in a post-match hotel bedroom celebration with several blonde strangers blush.

Frankly, not sure if this stuff was to be collected or eaten! Not really the sort of thing you would pass round at Christmas during the Queens Speech:-

"Choccie, Aunt Agatha?"

"Hmmm, lets see. Think I'll have the Tigress. I find the Congress of the Crow leaves a nasty taste in my mouth." N.B This is, erm, factually accurate.

Summer time and there are a number of Fetes/Fayres and other celebrations. So it was off to Bexhill the other weekend to visit Peterhouse, a retirement home for people from the advertising industry. It was fabulous and everyone made me terribly welcome. As a sucker for nostalgia there were loads of posters on the walls of the corridors of old and half-forgotten as well as completely forgotten advertising campaigns from years ago.

As this was the first time I had visited I was able to make "Short-But-Cheerful Speech 12A". If I get invited to places more than a couple of times I have to think of something else to say in my opening remarks before I declare the festivities open.

Note to anyone in the same position: they have come for the bargains and the food and drink. Get on and off as quickly as possible, they are not interested in what you have to say. If you time it right you will escape the wrath of the mob.

Then I got tucking in to the food and drink that was on offer.

Beautiful sunny day and I enjoyed myself immensely.

Last Weekend it was the Summer Fair at St Michaels Hospice in St Leonards-on-Sea. I have been involved with this charity for a long time now and I have always marvelled at the hard work and dedication of the staff and volunteers.

When it comes to events like this, the Dragon's Den mob could learn a thing or two as could the world’s best entrepreneurs. The volunteers can pounce within a nanosecond and before you can say "Good morning" your wallet is empty and you are tottering home laden with cakes, books, CD's and all sorts of other stuff. One stall I looked at was selling nick-knacks. This included something small and wooden with three knobbly rollers on it.

"What’s this?” I asked

"No idea," came the honest answer. It was either something to do with pastry or a massage device. One thing is sure though: that item is now at someone’s house being regarded with puzzlement by the purchaser.

“How did that get here?”

What don't you need on a nice hot day in late summer?

A heavy duty woolly hat, that's what.

I had barely walked through the door before I was the proud owner of said article and only managed to avoid a lengthy mohair scarf by running.

So if they would like to link up with the French Chocolatiers, I am sure they would have no difficulty selling any amount of confectionery Karma Sutra to Convents up and down the country!

_____________________________________________

Don't forget I am now on Facebook, you can find me here. I am also on Twitter (ooh, get me!) you can add me @alexthedarklord or visit here .

And if you want to hear a record on the shoe - maybe one you haven't heard in years, one that means something to you or just a darned good record you think would sound great, then I would love to hear from you. Submit your suggestions here.

And - last thing - make sure you download this week's Oddcast; the funniest bits from the week all mixed together in one bite-seized chunk. Click here.