I remember buses where you could sit behind the driver and see what he was doing except after dark when he would put down his brown corrugated blind so he wasn’t distracted by the light. He was never a woman. His indicator was a strange looking thing like a red jam jar lid that he turned this way or that. He had a big steering wheel so when he turned a corner there was lots of arm and elbow movement, lots of feeding through, which I still try to emulate when driving my 4x4…

I remember Etta James.

I remember the scratches on my first vinyl copy of Van Morrison’s Astral Weeks. The worst ones – which caused the stylus to jump -were during Madam George. I can still hear them when I am listening to my CD copy. I had the same problem with Bob Dylan’s 115th Dream.

I remember after my birthday dinner at The George, Chideock, feeling too full to have dessert, then Steve coming out from the kitchen with a warm chocolate brownie and cream complete with candle singing ‘Happy Birthday to you’. We forced it down and it was good. And all manner of things were good.