As protests, it wasn't up to much. Only two late-middle-aged, grey-haired women were there. Had one of them not caught my eye, obliging me to respond with a cheerful good morning', I doubt she would have spoken.

"You aren't going in there, are you?" she said, pointing to a large city centre fashion clothes store whose national reputation had come under close scrutiny the previous evening in a BBC television programme for allegedly selling clothes made in the Third World by young children.

I said it was not my intention on this occasion and unworthily received her blessing as a result. I asked if there were more protesters. She pointed to her sole companion. It was a spur-of-the-moment decision. She (Diana) and her friend (Enid) had watched the programme and had been appalled.

"I had expected some students might be here, but they are probably more worried about their year-end results or are away home for the summer," she said.

There was something familiar about Diana, stirring memories of a decade or so ago. I felt we had met on an earlier occasion. Could it have been at one of the 1990s' Campsfield House detention centre protests? Yes, she had been there and more recently at the Oxford animal science lab on a couple of occasions, although she denied being a perennial protester.

"My success rate is not impressive," she said resignedly. "But I can say I tried."

Were Seb not such a thoroughly decent bloke, it would be easy to dislike him. He has the knack of knowing which hot news is to hit the streets days before it does.

Take, for example, the sainted Valerie Singleton's revelation this week that she had not taken vows of chastity and, in fact, had been a bit of bright spark in those days when Blue Peter disciples would have happily nominated her as Mother Theresa's rightful heir.

What's more galling is that he's not a journalist - he works in a food factory - but he manages to get the starting price on the dirt well before it comes to the post.

Seb told a few of us of this coming bombshell several days earlier as we took the waters in the sunshine at the Head of the River pub.

We accused him of blasphemy, but with his record, we had an uneasy feeling he could be right.

The conversation moved to children's TV programmes of today and yesteryear - Magpie, Jackanory, Andy Pandy and the one with Leslie Crowther, Eamonn Andrews, Peter Glaze and Pip Hinton, the never-to-be-forgotten Crackerjack.

"And what about John Craven's Newround?" said Denis, a recently retired estate agent.

"I used to tell my kids to be quiet when that came on because it was better than grown-ups' news programmes."

"He never talked down to children," said Seb. "That made it special as well as unusual."

For the next few minutes, Newsround was the topic of conversation, before we moved on to John Craven's Countryfile and other work.

Our appreciation might be long overdue, but given the chance, we would pass it on.

How like a corny script from The Archers it was when, three hours later, while crossing the road in front of Banbury Town Hall, the aforementioned Mr Craven, who lives in north Oxfordshire, approached. Should I stop him and fulfil the shared wish? I decided not. The cornet that was dripping two flavours of ice cream across my knuckles made it most inappropriate.

Still on the subject of ice cream, it was a salutary learning experience when I ordered a single scoop at the relatively new café and shop in the old Music Hall building in Cowley Road. It would cost £1.95.

"Do you want a tub or a cornet?" asked the young assistant.

"A cornet," I replied and handed over two pound coins.

"That will be another 35p, please," she beamed broadly. "Cornets are 40p extra."

Now there's a new one.