In the Navy

Let us return to last Friday, before I got my sore toe. To the Blue Lemon Baguette Bar on North Terrace, where I am sitting at a metal table on a metal chair eating a number 16 baguette, with my mother, who is eating a different number, which I have forgotten.

A band strikes up across the road in front of the Museum. It is a brass band. It is a mixed gender white-uniformed Navy Band. It is Navy Week. A small crowd gathers to listen. They should do this every Friday, says my mum.

After we've eaten we cross the road. We have ten minutes before we have to be at the Elder Hall. Shall we sit down in the sun and listen for a bit? I ask. Yes let's, says my mum. The band is playing I Love Rock 'n' Roll. They are trying very hard to get the audience to clap their hands in the air but nobody will. I feel like clapping my hands in the air, but I, too, won't.

Does anybody like Tina Turner? asks the burly trumpet player. No one admits to it. Well, he says, our singer does and now she's going to sing you a medley of Tina Turner hits.

The singer, small dark-haired and pretty, sings You're Simply the Best. The sun and the music and the little three year old boy dancing in front of his mother make me feel that I am in fact enjoying the ambience. Maybe I really am. Yes, I am. But I'm also deeply suspicious of the men and women of this band. Especially the MEN. As we walk off in the direction of the Elder Hall, I fix them with a baleful stare.