So Nigella Lawson comes up to me at this party…..

……this is true – and she says, “Can I just say, you’ve got a really good look”. Note the careful choice of words. “You’ve got a good look” – very different from “You’re good looking”. I was looking particularly unkempt. Battered leather jacket from a charity shop, torn jeans and a pair of very old Red Wings. “Yes”, she said, “You look like one of the boys from the fairground”. Gee, thanks. I thought of this back-handed compliment when David Hepworth, in his excellent blog, mentioned fairground music. Why is it that we always associate 1950s rock’n’roll with fairgrounds? Because, he explained, back then before the advent of DJs and discos the only place you could hear recorded music powerfully amplified was at a fairground. And that’s why, when you’re on the dodgems, this is still the sort of music you want to hear.