Barf

Shame you decided to opt for an early night, Lisa. I had sore feet two days later: that's how much fun the Claverton Rooms was. And I was wearing comfy Bloch dance sneakers. God knows how you women manage in high heels and no cushioning.

I'd almost decided not to go to Bath again because of the distance: a hundred mile round trip is a lot for an evening's dancing. But then Rachel said she was happy to drive so I gratefully accepted. Lizzie and Tall Malcolm made a carfull.

Classes? Well, the threatened ballroom didn't materialise: the first classes were beginners' chachacha, merengue and bachata. I did John's bachata class and learnt a couple of new moves (so I now know four...) For the second class I decided to do Jools' class even though it was improvers, as I remembered being impressed by her teaching in the Steam Rock a long time ago. She was good, too, and I did learn one technique that I'd either never learnt or had forgotten.

Free dancing was crowded (it was sold out, and they made two and a half grand for the Tsunami appeal). As usual, the music and sound quality was great. I didn't know that many women there - quite a few of the usual Bristol and Bath suspects weren't around, and for a change, I didn't spend all evening dancing with the Cardiff girls . It's always good when it's going well and you can dance with people who haven't experienced all your moves dozens of times before. Went down quite well with most of them, though I definitely started losing the plot as 1am came and went.

I had one near-disaster dancing with an enthusiastic, attractive, but tall and strong young woman - I spun her in for a dip at the end of a song and instead of leaning back into my left arm she turned round and leant into my right necessitating a quick change of plan to avoid her ending up on the floor...

Very late getting back. Last time I went was with a carful of sensible people, and even then it was three by the time I got home. This time it was 4 am, so I spent a large part of Sunday asleep. I usually feel like I've got a hangover after a night's dancing because of the smoke, but the Claverton Rooms is blessedly smoke-free. It's worth the trip just for that: it's extraordinary how much better I felt the following day compared with La Tasca, even after the added sleep deprivation.