“I’M not sending many Christmas cards this year, so you won’t be getting one.” Thus declared Clive, one of Oxford’s long-time ‘characters’, when we met on the steps of the Ashmolean – he was leaving; I was entering.

I pointed out this would be no loss because he hadn’t sent me a card for eight years, but thanked him all the same.

It was the thought that counted. I can’t believe that I came out with that terrible cliché, but short of calling him a tight-fisted old sinner, it seemed to be the best reply.

The cost of everything had soared, he said, before adding that little Yuletide treats had to be sacrificed.

I abandoned my Ashmolean visit and instead suggested we went to a St Giles pub for a pre-lunchtime drink.

“What’s your poison?” I asked (another dreadful cliché).

“A single malt – a double measure if your funds run to that,” he replied, quickly adding ‘Bowmore’, his favourite.

“I’m resigned to drinking blended whisky this Christmas, so I’ll make the most of this one.”

I don’t know how he gets away with it.

MINE had been a soft drink – ginger beer – in a bid to keep out the cold, so I headed for Cowley Road, a place that, like Clive, is never boring.

Crossing Magdalen Bridge, I was not surprised to find only a few seats occupied. Tuesday’s temperature was near zero. Therefore the sight of a young mother holding her small daughter, rather than allowing her to snuggle into what appeared to be a cosy pram, was a surprise.

I smiled broadly but the mother read my mind. “She needed feeding,” she said, revealing the child was being breast fed.

Apparently my blushes were most endearing.

HASN’T there been a Chinese takeaway on the site of AT Box, opposite Jeune Street, longer than anywhere else on Cowley Road? I can remember collecting food from there when my elder son – now 44 – was a baby. We lived in Thame and such oriental delights as sweet-and-sour pork and rice had yet to hit the town.

The lease is up for sale. I hope it survives as a Chinese takeaway if for no other reason than nostalgia.

FINALLY congratulations to Sister Frances, of Helen and Douglas House, on her latest honour – a National Gardens Scheme Lifetime Achievement Award.

But without wishing to offend the NGS, it is no more than she deserves. The same can be said of the OBE she received five years ago and the Woman of the Year title the following year.

The fact is she’s a living saint and the Almighty doesn’t hold earthly investitures for these people.