In which I rub shoulders with famous journalists.

Well of course I am very well used to having nights out with a witty and educated man so why am so nervous about Friday. Just because this guy I am seeing then has been on the radio, and the tele, and writes for newspapers and magazines, and publishes his own books....I'm going to stop there as I am feeling inadequate enough already.

So how come this football loving social worker from a nondescript town in the Midlands is spending an evening with Mr Steel?

Obvious really - money has changed hands.

Rewind through my life to New Year when my very good and very wealthy friend took 13 of us to Lapland for a very incredible four days. The rest of us had no idea how to thank her, what with her being the kind of person who has everything already. When I say 'the rest of us had no idea', I should say all but one of us had no idea as another friend had a very good idea. We would get Mr Steel round to her house for the evening - and even better... the rest of us would be fairly confident of getting invited along too. Just one problem - we had to win this auction See Lot Number 22.

And much as I would love to be able to tell you I paid a fair share of the total winning bid I did not. The vast majority of it came from the person who had the idea in the first place. I was not the only one who nearly died when I saw how much this bid had cost, but thankfully she had gone into this with clear ideas about how much she could afford to put in, and how much the rest of us could NOT afford.

So Friday night it is all round to A's for a raucous night in with Mr Steel. Weird stuff.


And for those of you who have never heard of the bloke - Brom, Moo and others - he does these lectures.