Meeting your young un's new girlfriend is almost as traumatic as meeting your own new girlfriend.

They met on the internet. They got together. Somehow, seeing them together this evening was so very very heartwarming.

I'm really proud of our bairn and I'm sure we're going to enjoy Ch's company for a long time to come.

have you ever had one of them moments when you know what you want to write but just don't know how to put it?

All I can say is 'nice one, David'.

My third and final (I hope) Cantabrian confrontation.

Again this time I was walking a few yards form Canterbury city centre, having just said goodnight to my salsa partner. I was just untangling my headphone wires (why is that such a difficult task?) when I heard some kerfuffle in the dark street ahead. I decided to put my mp3 player back in my pocket so that I would have my wits about me in case of bother.

As I got closer, I heard the sound of a male shouting the usual knobhead stuff "..stand still...come here.. don't fucking walk away..." and the sound of a female crying in obvious distress.

I realised that there were only the 3 of us in the street. There was a risk that the male was going to be violent towards the female. He was of young, athletic build. I'm in my mid forties and of non-athletic build. He may have had a knife, I definitely didn't have a knife.

What should I have done?

The second episode in my trilogy of dangerous occurances in the heart of Anglicism.

I'm coming away from salsa one night; walking away from the city centre and toward the railway station. I had just said goodnight to my regular partner and was oblivious to the three people approaching me. They were just 2 boys and a girl who'd been out having a few beers. As you do.

My mind was miles away as one of the boys asked me "excuse me mate, do you have a fag I could borrow?".

Canterbury must be the begging centre of England. Every 20th step in Canterbury city centre has to be a John Cleese one to get past the smackheads who litter the pavements. You soon get used to shaking your head in a derisory manner.

It was this shake of the head and the contemptuously uttered "no" that I delivered that night. It was probably a bit harsh given that the begger in question was just some ordinary lad who just happened to have run out of fags, rather than a professional junky. A "I haven't mate, sorry" should have sufficed but I was caught a bit off my guard so reverted to default mode. And to be fair to him, I think he took my refusal quite well.

His mate didn't though. I guess that he was the boy who wasn't with the girl and felt he had something to prove. He commented "have you got a wallet, cos I'm going to mug you?".

Do I run? Do I throw my wallet at him? Do I punch him? No. My reaction was a gut one. I laughed at him and said "huh! the size of you!". This really wound him up. As I walked on at a dismissive gait he ranted some words of agression which included "..come on then, let's sort it out..".

Although it is likely that I could have beat the the little twat to a pulp if I'd needed to. I kept on walking and was releived that he didn't follow.

I'm relaying this tale simply because it leads into my next posting so please bear with me.

Four weeks ago I was on a train from Kent to London on my way home for the weekend. I had just finished my first can of cider (it's a 4 can journey in total) when a surly youngster sat down opposite me. Actually I am only assuming he was surly because he was about 15 years old and chose to sit with his feet on the adjacent seat. First impressions eh?

I wasn't really taking much notice of him in fact; I was listening to my mp3 player and he to his. I didn't even take much notice when he started to chew his earpieces, presumably having assumed that they were buggered beyond repair and if they were of any use at all it was as some experiment into taste and tactility of synthetic compounds.

It was only when he got up to get off that something clicked with me. He'd left the chewed up ex-headphones on the table, presumably for some random person to deal with. Instinctively, I removed my own headphones and I heard myself saying "there's a bin over there".

"Yeah I know" he said.

"Do you want to put that in it then?" I asked with as much self confidence and authority as I could muster.

It took him just a second to respond. He reached into the front right pocket of his jeans and pulled out a penknife......

Well actually, I made up the last sentence. In fact he said nothing, picked up the deceased headphones and left. I'd done my civic duty and hadn't got stabbed.

Have you any idea just how exilerating that was for me?