In da club

Went to a formal dinner at a traditional London gentlemen’s club last night. Met some interesting characters, straight out of the old school. One chap, whose appearance would be best described as Stephen Berkoff dressed as Jarvis from Newman and Baddiel, responded to an enquiry as to his occupation with “not very much… I farm a little…”; now we’re not talking the Archers of Ambridge, here, by that I think he meant “I own a large country estate and occasionally shoot the odd pheasant”.

Someone I met said he lived in a Chinese pagoda in Ireland. With the same nervous instinct for a quick, inappropriate gag in an unfamiliar social situation that made me introduce myself as Bryan Ferry, Roxy Music to my Cambridge University director of studies when he forgot my name at an alumni drinks party, I immediately claimed to live in an Irish pagoda in China. My reception was similar on both occasions — blank incomprehension.